Chapter 20 #2
I pull her camisole down and drag my tongue across her nipple, slow and deliberate, while my fingers find the other.
She makes a sound that she tries very hard to swallow.
I bring my teeth to the soft, sensitive skin there and nip just enough until her whole body arches.
Her cheeks flush deep, and she turns her face away with a groan.
I catch her chin and bring her back. “Eyes on me.”
Her eyes find mine, and I feel something move through my chest that I don't have a word for.
“There she is,” I say softly. “Let yourself go, Bridget. I want to worship you. That's all I want to do tonight—just worship you. Will you let me do that?”
She nods, just barely, her chin still in my hand.
“Good girl.” I move back down. “That's it. Just like that. You're doing so well, baby.” I mean every word of it, just like always, and I watch the way she lights up at my praise, like sunlight on something that's been kept in the dark too long.
She makes a sound, half moan, half laugh, and shakes her head against the pillow. “You can't just say things like that.”
“I can say whatever the fuck I want.” I look up at her. “And you're going to lie there and let me.”
“God above,” she breathes out.
“Not quite.” I feel the smile pull at my mouth. “Close enough for tonight.”
She laughs and gasps as my mouth finds her again, and the laugh dissolves into something else.
I work my way down her body with the patience of a man who has the whole night and intends to use every second of it.
By the time we come up for air, she's flushed and trembling, looking at me with an expression like she's had too many drinks.
She's drunk on this. Drunk on wanting it, on finally having it, on the fact that we're here and there's no performance required and nobody we have to pretend for.
She's soft and pliant beneath me. I’ve missed her. I’ll do everything I fucking can to keep us together.
I make quick work of undressing, and I love the way her gaze finds mine. So certain, so vulnerable and honest.
“I want you,” she whispers, reaching for my hard cock.
I stifle a groan when her hands wrap around me, stroking.
I find her wet heat and press into her. She makes a sound low in her throat that, this time, she doesn't try to stifle.
I go still for just a second, feeling the sound she makes move straight through me.
“You okay?” I ask. I don't know what to expect from a pregnant woman.
Is she sensitive, queasy, uncomfortable?
Do I have to go slow? “I don't know anything about touching a pregnant woman,” I tell her honestly, and it's fucking killing me not to move inside her.
She's so warm around me, so tight, and I'm trembling with the effort of holding still.
“I don't either,” she says with a smile. “But for now, you have to trust this pregnant woman to communicate with you. I'm okay.”
“Okay,” I whisper. Her fingers tighten in my hair, and I move deliberately, with my full attention on her, watching her face cast in the amber light, the way her lips part, her brow creases and smooths, the way her breath catches and then she breathes again.
I keep the pace slow and teasing, all the way in, all the way out, until she grasps at me, yanks my hips, and pulls me to her.
“Impatient girl.”
“Declan,” she groans.
“There.” I press in deeper, watching her face. “That what you want, love?”
“Yes,” she breathes out. “Please. Just like that.”
“I've got you,” I whisper.
She looks up at me. I hold her gaze a moment longer than I mean to.
“I love you.”
She goes still beneath me. Her eyes fill. She doesn't say anything for a moment, just looks at me like she's making sure I mean it.
What always surprises me about Bridget, this woman who can fill an entire room with her energy and smile and laugh, is that she gets private and quiet when we make love. Her body pulls inward for a moment, she grips me tightly, and then her head falls back.
“I want to hear you. Be a good girl and let me hear you, baby. Just like that. I like to know you're happy, that you like it, that you're mine.”
She does. Her head lolls to the side, but her hands grip my arms, and she groans. “Yes…” She starts low. “Yes,” she says in a louder voice, until she's practically screaming, “Yes!”
“That's it,” I whisper. “Just like that, baby. I've got you.”
My own need to climax builds until I bend my forehead to hers, our breaths intertwining, and she whispers in my ear. “I want to feel you come inside me.”
And I do. Oh my fucking god, it's utter perfection.
Afterward, I don't move away right away but stay where I am, bracing myself on my forearm so I don't hurt her, her head tucked under my chin. She traces my bicep absentmindedly.
I stay where I am longer than I should, then roll over and reach for the blanket at the foot of the bed.
A thick, ridiculous thing in rainbow colors that makes me smile because this is so her, just like the room.
With a flick of my arm, I unfurl it over her and tuck it in around her. She yawns adorably.
At first, I think she's asleep with her eyes closed. Neither of us speaks. The rain outside the window has softened, falling in a steady rhythm against the glass. I listen to her slow breathing.
“You're not sleeping,” she whispers.
“No.”
“What are you looking at? What are you doing then?”
“Looking at you.”
“That's a very intense look,” she says, peeking with one eye. “When you're just looking at someone, it's a lot.”
“I'm an intense person,” I say.
She smiles, and her eyes fall closed again, as if it's too much effort to keep them open. “I've noticed.”
I brush her hair back from her forehead and tuck it behind her ear. She leans into my hand, just barely, as if she wants to purr and savor the feel of it. “How do you feel right now?” I ask.
“You can't ask me that every five minutes,” she says.
“Why not?”
“It’s a bit over the top. I feel wonderful right now,” she says with a smile, her eyes still closed. “I may need some water and potentially some food. I get nauseous and hungry, and the baby has opinions.”
The baby. She said the baby. It makes it feel so much more real.
“The baby.”
“The baby,” she repeats. “We covered that. It's your fault, for the record.”
“My fault,” I say, chuckling, her eyes still closed as she shoves at my chest.
“Right. I was minding my own business.”
I laugh out loud. “Like hell you were. You came to that party dressed to kill.”
“Oh, I’m always dressed to kill,” she says with a yawn, which is very untrue. Bridget adores her lounge clothes.
“And I'm teasing you anyway. I was every bit as complicit in that whole thing as you were. In fact, I damn well seduced you.”
“Did you? I can’t remember. We may need a do-over.” I lay my head beside hers on the pillow. It's warm next to her, and she smells so damn good. “I'd do it again,” I whisper, and there's something beneath the teasing tone because I mean it.
“So would I.”
I hold her in the quiet.
“I'm so sleepy,” she whispers.
“Of course you are.” I bend down to kiss her forehead. “You're growing a human.”
“I am,” she says with a soft smile, her eyes closed, lips tipping upward. “Our human.”
“A whole human,” she repeats, and her smile drops from her face. “Declan, I'm having a baby.” She peeks one eye open, as if it's all she has energy for, and I tug a little lock of her hair. “How? How do people do this? I don’t know the first thing about babies.”
“Millions of people have figured it out before us. Billions. We got this. I've got you.”
She yawns and nods. “I believe you,” she says, and she’s asleep in thirty seconds.
I let myself look at her beautiful hair spilling onto the pillow, her gorgeous body, naked and vulnerable, her hands clasped just under her cheek. The way the blanket curves around her body, as if made just for her.
I made a vow once to keep her safe.
And I make a vow now that I’ll do anything to keep us together.
Anything.