Epilogue
Belle
Two months later in Woodbridge, Virginia…
“You want to name our daughter WHAT?”
I bit my teeth into my bottom lip so I wouldn’t laugh at the look on my fiancé’s face. It was so sour you would have thought I’d shoved a lemon slice in there while he was talking or something. We were lying side by side in bed, and he was close enough to see my shoulders shake from my restrained laughter, and huffed in mock frustration. “Don’t get your boxers in a wad, Ace. What’s wrong with the idea of naming the baby after Teagan?”
“I don’t know, maybe because it doesn’t seem fair to her to name her after such a—”
I slapped a hand over his mouth. “Ah, ah, ah now. You promised to be nothing but nice about her from now on.”
He pulled my hand off his mouth and gave me a look like I’d sprouted an extra head. “Uh, yeah, but that was before the message she left on our answering machine. Did you honestly think I could keep that kind of promise after my son heard her call me the wart on the ass of all of humanity?”
I pressed my lips together, trying not to laugh, but a snort slipped out anyways. When he cocked an eyebrow at the sound, I didn’t bother to try and hold back my laughter anymore.
“Find that funny, do you?”
Holding up my thumb and forefinger a half inch apart, I snickered. “Just a little.”
He growled. “I’ll show you funny, you little hussy.” Then he pounced on me, tickling my ribs before pinning me down on my back with his arms and legs. He’d left enough room in between our bodies so he wouldn’t lie on the slightly protruding belly I was carrying around these days. “I know we’re not married yet, but you should still stand by your man, you know.”
Giving him a big grin, I promised, “I’ll always stand by you, Ace, but that doesn’t mean my best friend won’t be standing on my other side.”
Bobby snorted. Then, dropping his face until our foreheads touched, he murmured, “I’ll let you name our daughter after that harpy on one condition.”
“And what would that be?”
“That this isn’t our last baby.”
Gasping in surprise, I used my hands to push on Bobby’s shoulders until I could see his face again. Naturally, with Bobby’s size, I wouldn’t have been able to push him back unless he let me, but luckily I had a man who wouldn’t let me strain myself at all while I was carrying his child. Some days it came in handy like today and some days it drove me so crazy I wanted to bash his head in with a frying pan. “How many kids are you wanting me to pop out, Bobby Baker?”
He shrugged a shoulder. “I was thinking we could have our own football tea—”
I didn’t let him finish the word before I had a pillow flying at his head, beating him with it repeatedly. “You are not using me as an incubator so you can have a Baker football squad!” Dropping the pillow, I reached for my cell phone on the night stand.
His laughing voice asked, “Who are you calling?”
“Jaxon! I’m going to tell him you’re delusional and shouldn’t go on any more missions until your head’s been straightened out.”
One minute I was pretending to scroll through my contacts and the next, the phone was out of my hand.
His voice was neutral when he spoke, “I’ve already talked to Jaxon today, honey.”
The almost somber tone alarmed me. “And?”
“We leave in three days.” He was watching me intently for a reaction.
“Where are you going?”
“I can’t tell you.”
In a small voice, I asked, “Will you be following up about Laura?”
“Yes,” he said slowly.
That meant he was headed straight into danger, which I didn’t like, but this was his job, which he loved, and I loved him so I had to accept that. After I have the baby, he’d already told me he would support me if I wanted to go back to work for the ATF since I was on an extended leave of absence at the moment, which was probably what I’d do. So I couldn’t very well say I wasn’t willing to support his job when he was willing to support mine. At least I would have Seth here with me so I wouldn’t be totally alone. We could probably take a trip out to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum again in D.C. There was a good chance I had a future pilot in the family.
Not to mention how Laura had died and what she’d suffered through before she’d died, haunted me nightly. The thought other women were suffering as she had felt like a knife through the heart. Thankfully, the guys hadn’t found any more women in Rivera’s house in Mexico. Laura and I had been the only ones there at the moment. However, they had found signs that plenty of other women had been held there at some point in time. If the Ex Ops Team could help them, then I needed to support that as well.
“You’ll contact me when you can, right?”
“Absolutely, baby.”
“Okay, Ace. Do what you’ve got to do to shut those assholes down.”
Bending over to kiss me on the lips, he stayed there afterwards so when he talked, our lips were still touching. “That’s my girl. Now, I’ll make you a deal. You can name this one Teagan if you’ll give me at least one more after her.”
Well, that was a hell of a lot better than a damn football team.
“Deal.”
“Good. Now come here and give me some love.”
He wasted no time in pulling down the top of my nightie to bare my breasts so they were now accessible for his touch. Grasping one, he lowered his mouth to trace his tongue around the outside of my now overly sensitive nipple so it puckered up hard as I moaned at the fierce pleasure of it. Sucking it deep into his mouth, he lashed his rough tongue over the peak until I was arched under him from the fiery sensation. His free hand lightly traced circles down my abdomen, adding another sensation in his assault. My hands skimmed over his cut, rock hard abs as he moved from one breast to the other. Shooting a pleasant burn all the way down to the heated core that was throbbing between my legs.
When I started begging for more, he moved down my tummy, to tease me below where I ached. My breath hitched as he circled my little nub, rubbing it so the burning pressure built slowly. When he breached me with a finger, I gasped at the familiar intrusion. It never ceased to surprise me how good he felt when he touched my body. Adding a second finger, he started to pump a little faster as I spread my thighs further apart while pushing down on his fingers for a deeper feel. Bobby’s touch was heady, like alcohol shot straight into my brain, making everything fuzzy, warm, and oh, so good.
“I can’t wait any longer, babe. I want to feel you. Let me fill that sweet little body up.” In one smooth stroke he sheathed himself inside me. His flesh rubbing against mine—skin on skin—to create what felt like thousands of mini lightning bolts of pleasure shooting through my body. Apparently, we’d both missed out on the phenomenon of pregnancy sex the first time around, which was a travesty since it was way more intense than regular sex and I had a habit of barely lasting longer than an eight second rodeo star before having an orgasm that was so off the charts I could swear I was floating in space.
I was already on the edge of that aforementioned spatially, fantastic orgasm. Bobby was pumping himself furiously in and out with my legs wrapped around his hips, locking my ankles low on his back. As I finally exploded with a scream Bobby managed to muffle with a kiss, my toes curled and I damn near lost consciousness. My inner walls clamped down on him so hard that, mere seconds later, I felt his warm release filling me as he gave a guttural yell before collapsing to his side, turning me with him.
Our breaths were sawing in and out of our chests and Bobby had his arms locked around me like he would never let me go.
Touching our foreheads together, he asked, “Who loves you, Belle?”
“You do, Ace.”
“That’s right, sweet baby. Forever.”
Pressing my lips against his, I agreed, “Forever.”