Chapter 4

Stephanie

I wonder if Luc thinks I’m a complete skank because I’m into sex with him. Perhaps I shouldn’t have come on so strong, but it’s hard to regret doing so when what we’re about to do is going to be amazing. The way I grew up ensured I’d be rebellious at some point, and rebellion at a young age often included sex when you weren’t supposed to be having it. I learned early that it not only feels good but it can give you things you can’t get elsewhere. It can give you emotional connection without having to sacrifice yourself for it—a brief, glorious connection when both of you are united in passion.

For someone who craved to just be noticed for so long and never got it, sex filled a big void for me. And the best thing about casual sex was that I could walk away if I wanted, because I found that I really wasn’t prepared for something more than a brief fling Anything else was too overwhelming. So casual was the name of the game for me, and if feelings grew on the other side, and he wanted something deeper outside of the bedroom, well…that wasn’t something I could quite let myself open up to.

I wonder if I should explain this to Luc, but then I chastise myself for even wondering. It’s none of his business why I am the way I am, and I refuse to care if he looks down on me because I enjoy casual sex. He’s the one who invited me into his home tonight.

And it’s nothing like I imagined a professional hockey player would live in.

It’s actually quite small, although it’s very pretty. Illuminated by well-placed exterior lighting, the house has dark gray siding with white trim and black shutters. It sits on a small hill that takes up the corner of a block of similar-looking homes. The landscaping I can see in the glow of the lights looks professionally done, as the grass is pristine and there are a variety of bushes and plants that you can tell were all carefully placed so that it looks artful.

I’d followed Luc here in my car and parked behind him on the street. When I get out of my car, he’s waiting for me with a hungry expression as he takes my hand. We walk up the sloped driveway that intersects with a concrete path that leads to the porch and I tell him, “Your house is lovely.”

“It’s cute, but it’s not mine,” he says as he trots up the porch steps and opens a screen door. “I decided to rent for six months when I moved here so I could get a better lay of the land before I decided to buy. One of my teammates, Van Turner, is rooming with me. He’s also new to the team.”

Luc opens the front door and then steps back, motioning me in before him. The house is older and the living room is tiny. It’s totally a bachelor pad, though, as there’s nothing but a couch and a large-screen TV with various components on the opposite wall. The kitchen attaches, separated by a small island with a window that looks out over the backyard. To my right is a short hall with what looks like a room on either side and perhaps a bathroom.

My breath hitches when Luc comes to stand behind me, slipping my purse off my shoulder and lowering it to the floor. My nipples tighten when he pulls my hair away from my neck and gives me a feathery kiss there.

“I’m not even sure what to do with you,” he murmurs as he brings his other hand to my breast. He cups it gently and squeezes, and holy hell that feels good.

Stepping back, I press my ass into him, letting my head fall to rest below his shoulder, which pushes my breast into his hand. “If you can’t come up with anything unique right now, I’m cool with a repeat of our first time.”

Luc gives a low, rumbling laugh that reverberates through me, and I can’t help the smile that comes to my face. Perhaps for my temerity or perhaps he’s just testing, but he pinches my nipple through the layers of my sweater and bra, and he’s not nice about it. I buck and moan at the same time, the pain from that pinch shooting straight down between my legs where that familiar and much-wanted heat and wetness start to bloom.

Dropping his hand from my breast to spread wide over my jeans-covered sex, he pushes me back into him and growls against my neck, “Can you feel how hard I am for you?”

I’m only able to nod because he makes me breathless with his touches and dirty talk.

“We went at it hard the last time, didn’t we?” His voice is guttural and filled with need.

I nod again and manage to whisper, “We did.”

Luc contracts his fingers and gives me a rough squeeze between my legs. “Hard enough we shredded a fucking condom.”

If I thought the mention of the broken condom would put a bucket of cold water on this, I’d be wrong. Because it’s not the pregnancy I’m thinking about but rather the feeling of him inside of me, hitting me deeper than I’ve ever been hit before, and the orgasm that produced was unlike anything I’ve ever felt in my life.

“We should totally do that again,” he murmurs before biting me on the neck.

“Yes, again,” I agree as I rock against his hand.

“Well, that wasn’t exactly like the last time,” I mutter as Luc and I lie side by side on his bed. Both of us are breathing heavy and covered in sweat, staring at the ceiling.

He didn’t take me up against a door, preferring instead to have me on his bed, on my back with my legs pushed high and wide by his hands. He thrust into me with the same ferocious abandon as our first time, but this was even better. There was absolutely no holding back. No fears. No wondering what the other person could handle.

We didn’t have to wear a condom or worry about knocking me up.

We both knew that the other liked it rough and hard.

“We’ll go slower next time,” Luc huffs out from beside me, our shoulders barely touching.

I laugh as I turn my head and look from the ceiling to him, my entire body still slightly trembling from my orgasm.

Luc lifts up and rolls to his side, resting his head in his palm with his elbow pressed into the mattress. His free hand comes out to lie on my stomach, and then he strokes upward over my breasts. He spends a few quiet moments as we regain control of our breathing, lightly circling his fingertips over my nipples, which is not doing much to calm me down.

I watch him watch his hand glide over me. He’s got a peaceful smile on his face, his hair standing up in a dozen different directions, as my hands were fisting it not too gently for a while. This gentle caressing is completely erotic and yet sweet at the same time.

Luc’s eyes slide down my body right along with his hand. Back down over my stomach until he’s skimming through my tightly trimmed curls. I hold my breath but it comes out in a massive rush as he drags just his fingertip down through my lips, causing my legs to fall open. He doesn’t push inside of me, but just gently swirls it around in his semen I can feel leaking out of me. Then he draws that liquid up and circles it around my clit.

My hips come off the bed, but then his hand is gone. He raises it up close to his face, rubs his index finger and thumb together, perhaps testing the silkiness of the moisture he’d just collected. I’ve never seen a man do that before, because, hello, never had sex without a condom before, but I’m almost hypnotized by it. Just like he caressed me a moment ago, it’s strangely erotic yet sweet at the same time.

His gaze slides to mine for a moment then back to his fingers still rubbing together. “Strange isn’t it?” His deep voice rumbles in a slow cadence.

“What’s that?”

Luc looks back at me, and the intensity of his expression causes my breath to hitch again. Holding his hand up and nodding his head to it, he says, “That this little bit of liquid had the ability to change our lives so drastically.”

I can’t even answer him because now that the haze of lust and sex is settling, the talk of the pregnancy causes anxiety to well up inside of me. And for the first time, I have a sense of dread over what’s to come, causing a wave of doubt to course through me.

“I better get going,” I say as I raise up, startling Luc in the process.

“What?” he asks.

Swinging my legs over the side of the bed, I say, “I better get home. I’ve got some things to do.”

He answers by wrapping his arm around my waist and pulling me back into the bed. Sensing that I’m not going to just stay, he pushes me to my back and then covers my body with his own. His forearms go to the mattress at my ribs and I’m effectively caged in place.

“It’s a Friday night. What could you possibly have to do that you’d have to run out of here so fast?”

My instinct is to push against him, argue, make up a lie about what I need to do.

Something.

Anything to get out from under his amazing body and his gaze filled with slight worry.

But instead I find myself giving up a part of myself that stuns me because I would never give it up to anyone else in this world. Maybe it’s that we now share a bond growing inside of me, or maybe I just need him to know that I’m all kinds of fucked up. “I don’t know if I can do this.”

Luc’s frowns at me, even as his eyes soften with sympathy. “You can do this, and do you want to know how I know?”

I bite my lower lip and just nod, afraid to trust my voice.

“Because I said almost those exact words to Max the night you told me, and do you know what he told me?”

I shake my head, still biting my lip as I stare at him.

“He reminded me that I might not be ready for this, but he would help me get ready. My family and friends would help me get ready. So I’ll say the same thing to you.”

I can’t help the short burst of laughter that pops out of my mouth. “I don’t have anyone to help me get ready.”

Luc tilts his head and blinks a few times. “You have me. But what about your family?”

“No one,” I repeat, and he opens his mouth I can tell to throw out possibilities to me. I shut it when I say, “I have no close friends. My parents aren’t an option.”

With eyebrows raised, Luc asks, “Where are they?”

“Currently sunning in Greece,” I say in a flat voice. “No other family.”

“None?” I can tell this concept is foreign to him by the disbelief in his voice.

“I’ve got a few aunts, uncles, and cousins, but I don’t know them.”

“And no friends?” he asks again, because, well…that’s just pathetic, right? My face heats with embarrassment. I mean, who in the fuck doesn’t have at least one good friend in their life?

So I turn defensive because I’m not sure I can really explain why I can’t connect to people on a deeper level. “That’s by my choice.”

“But your lack of family isn’t?” he throws back at me.

“No, that’s not by my choice,” I whisper. “I was never given the choice.”

Luc drops his face closer to mine. “I don’t understand. What’s that mean?”

My eyes drop to his shoulder, as I’m unable to answer his question.

“Stephy,” Luc murmurs soothingly as his hand comes to my chin, tilting my face back so I look at him. “What’s the deal with your family? You can trust me.”

No one’s ever insisted on this information. I’ve been on plenty of dates or met potential new friends who are naturally curious, and talking about family is something that most people do. But the minute someone wants to know about my family and get close to me with that knowledge, I shut them down. I close off completely.

I was successful putting Luc off that day at lunch and I could easily do the same now.

But for some reason, the way those warm hazel eyes are leveled at me with a need to understand, makes some of the anxiety in my chest break loose.

So I decide to give him just a little something in the hopes it will make him understand my insecurities and accept the faults that come with them. “My parents are virtual strangers to me.”

“Why?” he asks, his voice raspy with emotion because he just got a taste as well of the flatness in my voice that happens when I talk about them. It’s the way I have to keep the emotional distance from the pain they’ve inflicted on me.

“My parents never wanted children,” I tell him, and his brows furrow deeply inward at my confession. “I was an accident, born to two completely self-absorbed, powerful, highly successful people who didn’t have time to devote to kids when they had to cultivate their success.”

“How do you know this?” Luc asks, and I can tell by the fury in his voice and the heat in his eyes that there was no way he’d ever turn his back on his child. He may have been scared at first, and he may be a playboy, but Luc is a family man for sure.

He’d never want to know that I’d sneak around our huge mansion and spy on my parents just so I could see them. How I witnessed them have millions of conversations with each other, and it was never about me. Or how when I’d done something bad, they would remind me of why they didn’t want kids. It was a common tactic they used to get me to behave, but all it did was make me act out more so I could be noticed.

I can’t tell him any of that because it’s almost unbelievable that two people who created the miracle of human life could be so detached and neglectful.

I choose not to answer his question, as it’s also too painful for me to even admit I’m a bit of a tragic figure, so I deflect. “Can I ask you why you decided to jump in feet first and be involved in my pregnancy?”

“I didn’t want to at first,” he says soberly. “I didn’t want to give up my lifestyle, and I sure didn’t want that responsibility at this stage in my life. I was pissed and I was selfish. I can’t speak for your experience, but for me…the most important thing in the world to me is my family. We’re so close and supportive of each other. Max was the first one I turned to, and he gave me all the reassurance I needed so I’d have the confidence to go forward. And I just realized that this little ’accident’ we had would do nothing but enrich my family.”

I wince as he uses the word accident, because he’s not saying it negatively but so I would understand it’s a blessing to someone like him. This helps me to understand his motivations better, although it’s a little hard for me to swallow that he seems so on board with this now.

“Don’t you have any doubts?” I press him. “You just seem so cool with all this.”

Luc smiles at me, and my breath catches at how beautiful his face is. “I’m still scared, Stephy. But I’m also excited too. I’ve always wanted kids and it’s just happening on a different timetable than what I expected.”

Not me. Not ever.

Well, until now.

“Have you told your parents?” I ask him.

He shakes his head. “I thought we should wait until after your first OB appointment. Max suggested that. I didn’t want to get them all excited, and God forbid something were to happen early on.”

I nod in understanding, and I’m insanely curious about his parents being excited over this. Their son knocked up a one-night stand. Why would that cause excitement?

But as I said, family is a foreign concept, just as it’s a foreign concept to Luc that I’m not close to mine. So I feel like perhaps I should enlighten him just enough so he knows that the only one on my side he’ll ever have to deal with is me.

“My first cohesive memories as a child are of Hilda, my nanny,” I tell him, and I feel his body lock tight at those words. I can’t hold his gaze, so I put a hand to his shoulder and stare at that. “I thought she was my mother for a long time, and wasn’t quite sure who my mom and dad were. They would flit in and out, pat me on the head, and bring me gifts, but I just didn’t understand what my relationship was to them. I can remember one time I called Hilda Mommy and she explained to me who my mommy and daddy really were. But as I got older, it became even clearer to me that I wasn’t wanted, and never more so than when I got sent off to boarding school when I was nine. Until I graduated high school, I spent most of my time away from home.”

“The summers?” Luc asks softly.

“I was enrolled in camps to keep me occupied while they traveled. Horseback riding, fencing…whatever rich snotty brats do, I was there.”

Luc shifts, settling his frame down onto mine, but still keeps his torso off me with his arms supporting his weight. “So you had absolutely no relationship with your parents?”

“They’d say hello to me if we crossed paths in the house, or they’d buy me whatever I needed. I had an unlimited credit card from the time I was thirteen. They founded a tech company together right after they graduated from college and they worked ninety-hour weeks. Then to compensate, they’d take month-long vacations without me because they were rich and could afford to. My dad was from money anyway, so it was just their lifestyle.”

“I don’t understand. What about holidays? And birthdays?”

“My birthday is in October, so I was always at school,” I tell him, and I begin to feel guilty as his eyes start to go flat. “At Christmas there were lots of presents, but no parents to open them up with. Just Hilda, who I’m sure is the one who bought all of the presents and played Santa Claus.”

“I can’t fucking believe this,” he says angrily, but it’s not in a way that he’s doubting me. He’s pissed on my behalf, and that disconcerts me. “You had absolutely no family? Ever?”

“I had Hilda for a long time,” I tell him, a fond, sad smile coming to my face as I think of her. “She had been my father’s nanny, so she was actually more of a grandmother to me than anything. I think she was close to retiring when I was born, but I guess she stayed on because she knew my parents didn’t want me. “

“And she’s dead now?” Luc asks for clarification.

“When I was seventeen she took a bad fall down our stairs and broke her hip,” I say after giving a cough to clear my throat. “She had to have surgery, then went to a rehab facility. She was never able to come back to work and eventually landed in a nursing home. My parents paid for it, so they weren’t completely coldhearted.”

“And that’s why you like to visit nursing homes,” he says.

“Bingo,” I say with a marginally larger smile. “I visited Hilda there every week. All of her family was back in England and she’d been working for the Fraziers for decades as a housekeeper and caretaker of the children. They’d all drifted apart and she only had me who cared enough to visit, so in some ways, Hilda and I were a lot alike. We only really had each other.”

Luc just stares at me, his eyes leaving mine briefly to roam over my face, but when they return to focus on me, he says, “I’ve never heard anything like that before. I consider myself to be fairly well traveled, and being a professional sports player, I’ve met hundreds and hundreds of people in my career. And I never, ever knew that parents could do that.”

“Oh come on, Luc,” I say teasingly, because I can tell he’s really bothered by this. “There are parents who abuse their kids, and others who neglect them. I’m not unusual.”

“No, what you describe is different,” he says, and I actually shiver from a wave of iciness that runs up my spine. “There are tons of kids who get abused, but at least they’re seen and acknowledged. And many are neglected, but often because of drugs or other addictions. But your parents had the means and ability to at least try to be parents on some level, even if it was just the bare minimum. It sounds like they never even saw you, probably while they were looking right at you. To be utterly abandoned by the people who are inherently supposed to care for you with unconditional love has got to be torture.”

I swallow hard, my nose starting to prickle as tears well. I don’t cry often, so I try to push it down. “Look…this is why I don’t like to talk about them. Yes, it’s horrible, but it’s defined who I am and I’ve accepted it.”

“And what is the definition of Stephanie Frazier?” he asks.

I can’t tell him that I’m pissed as hell at my parents and they’ve fucked up how I view the world and people. I can’t tell him because I don’t want to be pathetic, so I tell him something else that is also true, but covers up my deepest flaws.

“She’s funny, this you know.” My voice has gentled and I smile as I put my hands in his hair. “She’s independent, bold, and a risk taker. She likes sex a lot, but really, really likes it with you. She’s pretty much handled anything that life has handed her and she’s done that without help, so she’s figured out she’s got this baby thing in hand even if she’s still a little scared. And most of all, she’s wondering if enough time has passed for you to recharge your batteries and if you have another round left in that gorgeous body of yours.”

Luc was amused as I started telling him who I was, but by the time I talk about another round of sex, his eyes are simmering with hot need.

“You’re deflecting, aren’t you?” he grumbled as his lips hovered against my mouth.

Absolutely true. I’ve shared enough. More than I ever have.

“Not at all,” I purr just before I raise my head and run my lips over his. “I just want you again.”

That’s absolutely true too, so I’ve not lied to him. And that’s all I need to say to get Luc to kiss me hard as we commence round two.