“What do you say we go away for a few days?”

“Away?” I question, looking up at Michael. It’s been a couple of weeks now since Crusher and the others left to go back home. There’s still been no sign of Blade, and though I worry, I’m starting to feel better. There’s no reason for him to come here. Michael is probably right, and he’s in Mexico or somewhere now. I was never that important to him, and he never truly wanted Maggie. There’s no reason to think he would risk his life to get some sort of crazy revenge. It’s right after the day at the hospital, I’ve somehow built Blade up to be even more of a monster in my mind. So, knowing he’s out there is always lingering in my thoughts. There’s always this…fear.

“Yeah. There’s a lake in Norman. Let’s load up and go up there for a few days, rent a place out by itself and just relax,” he answers.

We’re on the sofa watching a movie and eating popcorn together. I have my head in Michael’s lap, his legs are stretched out, with his bare feet resting on the coffee table. This is something we do almost every evening together. It usually ends with me falling asleep and Michael carrying me to bed. Sometimes we make love, sometimes he simply holds me—either way it’s perfect. That’s how I would describe my life right now. Perfect. I’m happy.

Michael seems happy. We talk, we laugh and we…love. At least it’s love for me. I admit that to myself. I love Michael. If I had met him earlier, before life went to complete hell, how different would my life have been. I look at our joined hands that are lying over my baby-bump and I know. Deep down in my soul, I know that life would have been completely different. I grieve that loss, but I’ve come to accept what Michael told me the first time we made love together. He is Maggie’s father in every way that counts. He’s going nowhere. I have no idea how I can trust someone—especially a man, after everything, but I do. Unconditional Trust.

“I can’t go anywhere, Michael,” I tell him, regretfully. I’d actually love to go away with him, but it’s not practical.

“Why can’t you?” he asks, and he has that tone. The one that says he’s mildly upset and determined to get his way. Then again, Michael is always determined to get his way.

“Because, I have things to do here,” I reply, not bothering to look up, trying not to engage. I don’t want to argue over this, because what usually happens is I give in. I find it hard to concentrate on anything when Michael looks at me with his dark eyes and those beautiful lips of his smile at me like I’m the only woman in the world that matters. Heck, I find it hard to breathe when he does that.

“What kind of things?” he asks, using the remote to pause the movie we’re watching. The remote to the brand new sixty-five-inch, ultra HD television he bought last week.

Heck, the coffee table his feet are on, he made. He made it with his own hands, and I love it. It’s the most beautiful piece of furniture I’ve ever had in my life. It’s just simple lines, nothing fancy and it’s made out of old barn wood that Michael sanded by hand and then stained it with a dark varnish. He even made two matching end tables. I’ll keep these tables until the day I die. That’s how precious they are to me. When I told Michael that, I was crying in happiness. It’s something I do a lot these days. Michael only shook his head and kissed me.

He’s always doing things like that. In fact, we’re sitting on the new sofa he bought too, and across from the sofa are two matching rocking recliners. His and Hers recliners. All these things he bought because he said they were needed, especially the rocking recliners. He told me he wanted to make sure Maggie could be rocked and happy when we have family night. Family night. Is there any wonder why I’m not completely in love with him? There’s not a woman alive that wouldn’t fall head over heels in love with him—it’s a physical impossibility.

Still, he has to quit spending money like that. He obviously has money, and I can only assume it’s from his time with his club back in Kentucky. But, he’s not in that life anymore. I don’t want him to waste his money on me. I’m terrified of him doing that. If he does that and money gets tight, he might go back to Kentucky. He might leave me…or worse. He might expect me to follow him to Kentucky and become part of his life there.

“I know you’ve been spending money on me like crazy, but Michael, we can’t live like this forever. We have to think of the future, and for me, that means finding a job. I have the bills paid up for another month, and you’ve been insisting on buying the groceries, but I need to have a job before long.”

“The hell you do. You’re not going to work, Hayden. You’re pregnant. Very pregnant. You have to take care of yourself.”

“I have to have a job to support myself.”

“Do I look like that kind of guy?” he growls. Pulling me around so I’m lying on my back, head still in his lap, looking up at him.

From this angle, I can see the scars that run up his neck and I have the strangest urge to reach up and lick them…

“Hayden! Stop ignoring me!”

“I’m not ignoring you,” I defend, with a sigh.

“Then what are you doing? I’m trying to have an argument with you here.”

“I’m thinking about licking your neck,” I tell him, with an annoyed sigh. “And what do you mean, that kind of guy? You’re the one not making sense.”

“You want to lick my neck?” he asks, incredulously.

“All of you really, but I’d start there. If you’d stop being grumpy.”

He grunts in reply, and I can’t help but giggle.

I also sit up, and turn to the side enough so I can place a kiss against his Adam’s apple, then I run my tongue along the groove of the deepest scar there, thankful he let me trim his beard shorter.

“Fuck,” he hisses, as I use my teeth to bite along the corded muscle in his neck. His large hand covers my breast, squeezing it. “You’re trying to distract me,” he grumbles, and he’s right, but still…

“I’m feeling needy,” I whisper into his ear, my fingers burrowing into his hair.

“You’re always needy,” he groans, his hands sliding under the nightshirt I’m wearing.

I’ve given up pajamas lately, opting for Michael’s t-shirts, or nightgowns. They give me more freedom with my ever-growing stomach. When his hand reaches underneath and goes straight between my legs, I’m pretty sure I’ll never go back to pajamas. There’s something to be said about easy access.

“You’re bare too,” his hoarse voice growls. His fingers dance across the lips of my pussy, before pushing them apart and zeroing in on my clit, teasing it. “Where’s your underwear, Beauty?”

“I must have forgotten them.” I grin, widening the distance between my legs to give him more access. I’m on my knees now leaning over him to kiss him, while his hand is buried between my legs. His lips devour me, his tongue pushing to own my mouth. He owns all of me. “I need you, Michael. I need you to fuck me,” I whimper when we break apart.

His fingers glide carefully inside me, and every time, it feels better than the last.

My head goes back in pleasure, my eyes closing, as my body gives a full-on shiver of pleasure.

“Motherfucker. You’re already so damned wet, you’re covering my hand in that sweet juice of yours.”

“Please, Michael,” I urge him, already close to orgasming.

“I’ll give you what you want, Beauty. I’ll make the ache stop, but then you’re giving me what I want.”

“To suck you?” I gasp.

He jerks his sweatpants down, not even bothering to take them off all the way. He picks me up by his hold on my hips. I cry out in surprise, grabbing hold of his shoulders to steady myself, as he positions me where he wants me. Once I’m steady, he pulls the nightshirt over my head and off my body. I’d be self-conscious about my body right now, because at a little over six months pregnant it’s definitely bigger, but Michael never gives me the chance. He always makes me feel beautiful.

“We’ll start with that,” he agrees, “lower yourself down on my cock slowly, Beauty. Take it only until it’s comfortable.”

I look at him and his eyes are glued to our bodies. He’s watching me slide his cock inside. His face is flushed with hunger, and he’s so beautiful in this moment, I can’t believe I’m the woman he chose. I never want to give this up—to give him up. I want to tell him, but I don’t, I hold back. I’m still not sure what we are—or at least what I am to Michael. I only know one thing. I love him.

I lower myself, inch by painstakingly-slow inch, onto his cock, taking all of him in—despite his warning. I settle against him for a minute, letting myself adjust. His hand moves up and down my sides, petting me, giving me the time I need.

“I love the way you feel inside me,” I confess, beginning to rock against him. His hands move from my sides to my ass and he squeezes me, hard. My breath catches at the erotic pull it has on me when he tugs the globes of my ass apart, so his fingers can play.

A moment later, I feel his thumb push against the tight ring of muscles. My pussy clenches his cock tightly as I increase the speed of my ride. I love it when he plays with my ass. He does it a lot. He seems fascinated with my ass, and I catch him staring at it all the time. There’s times I find reasons to bend over in front of him, because I like to watch the look on his face. He keeps talking about me giving him my ass, but we haven’t gone there. I’ve never done anything like that, but the longer I spend time with Michael, the more he talks about it… the more I want it. I get so lost in my thoughts that I slow the way I’m moving on Michael’s cock. He puts his hands back on my hips and takes over the rhythm. His mouth captures my tit in his mouth—at least all he can fit of it. He slowly lets it go, but not before seizing the nipple between his teeth and biting hard. My body shakes as the pleasure and pain crash together. I feel more of my desire gather on his cock and run freely down his shaft. I’m so close.

“You’re going to ride my cock until you come all over it,” he says, the words rolling out of him in a way they reverberate on every nerve ending I have.

“If you insist,” I tell him, trying to smile but gasping instead as, on a downward glide, he rakes his cock against my walls.

“Then you’re going to suck my cock clean. Aren’t you, Beauty?”

I lick my lips thinking about it. If Michael is obsessed with my ass, then the same can be said about me and his cock. It’s beautiful, wide and dark in color, veins throbbing along the underside and so long…I asked him how long once and he looked at me as if I was insane. “I’ve never measured. What the fuck does it matter? It’s long enough to get the job done.” I grin as I remember that.

“I’m going to suck you clean,” I tell him, and get rewarded when he slides his fingers to my clit, giving me that little something extra. “Oh, fuck. Michael, I’m going to come,” I warn him, knowing I won’t be able to hold back at all now.

“Then do it, Beauty. Take all you want.”

So I do…