I take from him what I’m afraid to give. His endearing words are something I have come to crave over the last four weeks. Every chance I get I want to hear them leave his lips, just as his lips touch mine. I crave it. Maybe it’s just him I crave, he’s highly addictive to me.

I started working in the office, which was a different devil within itself. I would have energy some days and the others all I could think about doing was sleeping.

My life was like a game of ping-pong, in almost every aspect.

I pinged, he ponged.

Never once has he demanded those words from me, even when he started saying it in front of the others. Eyes would go wide, but they would leave in shock when I didn’t utter the words back.

He tells me he knows, he knows that I am it for him. I was afraid it wouldn’t be the same for me. So I had to make sure, had to know without certainty that it wasn’t one of my situations where I was all in then left.

I was all in.

All in like crazy.

And not just because I’m having his baby. No, that’s just a bonus now. He kisses me, then my belly every night and he makes me swoon, swoon beyond comparison. He’s a different man to everyone else, the one they all know to be cavalier, but with me, in our time, he’s my Creed and no one else’s. I see the deepest and darkest parts of him, and I still love him, even if I haven’t uttered those words to him yet.

His hands wrap around my waist, and he nibbles at my ear then bites it as I pack up my bag. “It’s time.” I smile, nodding and turning around in his arms.

“Are you prepared, it could be a girl,” I say smiling.

He shakes his. “Fuck no, I’ll lock her up.” He lets me go and starts walking to the door as his mother walks in.

“He’s changing so much—you’ve changed him so much,” she gushes as she looks to my belly then back out to where he’s carrying the bag to the car.

I collected the last of my stuff today, and now the apartment is up for rent, I’ll miss it. I’m sure of that, but I am excited for what the future will hold.

“He wasn’t always so cold, you know?” she says looking up to me. Her hand touches my belly. “When he was younger, he was the most loving child you would ever have known, especially to me. I couldn’t go a day without stealing one of his kisses.” Her hand touches her cheek as she smiles. “Then he saw his father shot.”

My eyes go wide. I didn’t know how his father died just that he did. I didn’t want to dig in any deeper than I needed to.

“He doesn’t speak of it. Actually, after that he hardly spoke at all. It was the boys he spoke to and stuck to, they have a special bond those four. I love it. I love them for what they have done for him. And now I’m even more thankful for you and this baby, because he’s changing again, and it really does make my heart swell.” Her hands wrap around and hug me tight to her. Looking over her shoulder, Creed is standing in the doorway watching us. He hasn’t gone back to his house since we moved in, but I know the day will come when he has to or needs to. Right now, though, I’m enjoying what we have. I’ve never had this in my life, never thought I would after I lost my brother.

“The suspense is killing me,” Creed says.

His mother lets me go and we make our way to the door. I tap his shoulder as I squeeze past him, and he pinches my ass as we leave the house.

“Nope, not happening. Not happening,” Creed mutters to himself for the fifth time as he drives.

“It’s not that bad, is it?”

He cringes at my words. He just found out we’re having a girl, he wanted a boy. He’s afraid he won’t know what to do with a girl. I believe he’ll be just fine.

“It’s the end of the world.” He looks into the rearview mirror to his mother, and she goes silent at his words. She shuts the door and sits back in her seat.

He comes to a stop at his mother’s house a while later and lets her out. She waves goodbye as he starts driving to ours. I don’t speak until we reach the house and go inside, and when we do, he’s still muttering. Stripping my clothes off, I wait for him to stop muttering and turn around to face him. When I do he stops, and before I can say a word he’s stripping his clothes off until he’s naked as well, his cock hard as he stalks toward me.

“You’re trying to distract me,” he says, as his hands touch my breasts.

“Is it working?” I ask him sweetly, my hand falling down his hard stomach until it reaches his cock. Squeezing, he nods his head.

“You always know the way to my heart.” He cackles then pushes me back until we reach our room. My back hits the bed and he lifts my legs up so they’re over his shoulders. He teases me at my entrance, his cock rubbing up and down touching my clit. Everything’s more sensitive and I need, no, want sex all the time. At least once a day, and he never says no to me. He’s always ready and smiling as he touches me. I’m afraid when I have the baby that the dynamic may change. No sex for six weeks. I haven’t told him that little diamond yet.

“Creed.” I moan, lifting my hips so his cock falls deeper inside me. He grunts then starts moving, his hands gripping my hips using them to thrust hard and fast. He’s always careful not to lay on my belly or touch it while we fuck, even when I want him all over me. I take whatever he gives.

“So fucking needy.” He smirks, then pushes in again and again. It doesn’t take me long until I reach the place I want to be when he’s inside of me, that place of pure ecstasy. He follows closely behind me, then leans down kissing my lips as he falls next to me.

I roll to my side to smile at him while he strokes my hair.

“I love you, Creed.”

“I know,” is all he says in return then reaches for his cell that hasn’t stopped ringing. He looks to it then hangs up as he looks back to me.

“You know?” I ask scoffing at him. He nods his head. “That’s all you’ve got to say when I tell you I love you?”

“What did you give me?” he asks, firing back at me.

“I wanted it to be the perfect moment.”

His hand is now on my belly, and his cell starts again.

“You tell me every night, Elicea, every fucking night.”

I look at him shocked. He simply nods his head confirming it. “Just before you’re deep asleep when I’m touching you. You tell me.” He turns putting the cell to his ear. “What?” he grunts into it. I can hear Echo’s voice.

“Tell me, you asshole, boy or girl.”

“Girl.” I hear Echo laugh then he hangs up in his ear. “Fucking asshole,” he mutters.

Then when the next words leave my mouth, I cringe waiting for his reply. “One last thing—” He looks at me waiting. “No sex after the baby for at least six weeks.”

He shakes his head as if I’m lying. “No way.”

When I don’t say a word, he cusses. “Fuck, okay, we’ll just have to double our efforts until then,” he says smiling, as he pulls me to sit on top of him. “Practice makes perfect, right? And they say you should never stop trying.” He looks to my belly then rubs it before he pulls me in for a kiss. I swoon. Again. Always.

It’s a kiss that makes the stars sing.

A kiss that begins all great love stories.

This is our great love story.