CHAPTER 5

 

“What are you doing still awake, sweet girl?” Kian asked his youngest daughter, Sierra. She’d pulled herself up to standing, her tiny little fists were wrapped around the bars of her cot. She looked so cute in her pink onesie and with her inky-black hair all mussed-up.

When she saw her daddy, she giggled, that tinkling little laugh wrapping itself fiercely around Kian’s heart. She would be his and Cate’s third and last child together.

“Where’s Mummy?” he lifted Sierra up out of her cot and placed a gentle kiss on the top of her head. Sierra wriggled, kicking her legs.

Cate was sleeping softly, curled up on the rocking chair in the corner of the nursery, wrapped up in the silver-grey fleece blanket her sister, Remy had bought them when their first child, Lola was born all those years ago.

As he bent over to kiss his wife’s cheek, Sierra wrapped her tiny fist around a chunk of Cate’s hair and gave it a hard tug. “Ouch,” Cate whimpered, her eyes blinking open.

“Sorry,” Kian said sheepishly. Although he’d hardly seen her since she’d started rehearsals for Stepping Out, he really hadn’t meant to wake her up just now.

“It’s OK,” Cate smiled at him. She reached out her arms for her youngest daughter. “Come here, you little munchkin. You’re supposed to be asleep.”

Sierra reached for Cate’s hair again. “No, you don’t.” Cate laughed, scooping her hair up out of her daughter’s reach with one hand. She put Sierra down in her cot and reached for her favourite toy, a cuddly dolphin. Sierra didn’t like the dark so Cate switched on the gentle nightlight next to her cot and tucked the covers around her. “I love you, munchkin.”

When she got to the door, Cate turned around and Sierra had shrugged off her covers and was stood at the bars again, looking at them with those big, black doe-eyes. “Do you think we should…?” Cate turned to Kian.

She was so tempted to bring Sierra back to bed with them. She was already feeling incredibly guilty that she was spending so much time away from her children while rehearsing for Stepping Out. But she and Kian had agreed when she was pregnant with Lola that they wouldn’t let any of the children sleep in bed with them. There had been lapses over the years but it was important to both of them that they had that precious space where they could be husband and wife and not just Lola, Mateo and Sierra’s parents.

“She’ll be fine,” Kian put his hands on Cate’s shoulders and gently turned her around. “As soon as we’ve gone, she’ll settle down and go to sleep. You know she will.”

“How did rehearsals go today?” Kian asked when they were in their own bedroom. He’d stripped down to his boxer shorts.

“It was good,” Cate reached for her phone. “I’ve got some footage if you’d like to have a look?”

While Kian was watching the footage, Cate went into the bathroom. When she came back, he was scowling. “Don’t you like it?”

“I know it’s only dancing,” Kian grunted, “but does he have to put his hands all over you like that?”

Cate rolled her eyes. “We’re both awake and at home for the first time in ten days, do you really want to waste it talking about dancing?”

“That’s a very good point,” Kian said huskily. He reached for her wrists and tugged her towards him. Cate was wearing a pair of black silk pyjamas. The top was unbuttoned just enough that he could see the shadow of her cleavage. The silk clung sinfully to the swell of her breasts, drawing his eyes to the tight buds of her nipples. He slid his hands slowly down her back and over her bottom and dipped his head, taking her nipple into the wet heat of his mouth. “Ow,” Cate cried. The added friction of the silk pushed it over the edge into painful.

“What’s wrong?” Kian immediately looked up.

Cate put her hands over her breasts, “they feel really strange. I must have knocked them during training or something.”

As she stripped off her pyjama top, Kian looked at her bare breasts. “They aren’t bruised.”

“Maybe I’m due?” Her cycle had been screwed up ever since she’d had Sierra.

“Mama?” Mateo’s voice came through the monitor; he’d woken up and was thirsty. When Cate came back from getting him a glass of water, Kian was stood at the side of the bed. “Take your top off,” he instructed.

Cate hesitated. As much as she wanted to make love with her husband tonight, she was aching all over from training.

As if he could read her mind, Kian gently stroked her cheek, “it’s not about that, not tonight.”

When he stepped back, she saw that he’d made a makeshift support for her sore breasts out of pillows. “Lie down on your front, angel.”

Cate took off her pyjama top and clambered up on to the bed. The gap in the centre of the mound of pillows was just big enough for her boobs to fit inside.

Kian knelt down; she felt a gentle pressure on the backs of her thighs. “I thought you might be sore,” he explained, drizzling a little warm oil down her spine, “so I asked the Seattle F.C. masseuse for some tips.”

“Oh my goodness,” Cate rested her head on the lovely soft pillows, “that feels amazing, Kian. If I wasn’t crazily in love with you before, this would definitely seal the deal.”

“That’s good to know,” he chuckled. After he’d finished soothing all of the aches and pains from her neck, shoulders and back, he moved down to her legs. He carefully lifted up her hips so he could tug off her silk pyjama bottoms.

“I feel guilty,” Cate said softly as he gently massaged her ugly, blistered feet. “I’ve only been dancing for a couple of weeks and I already feel like I’ve been hit by a ten ton truck. I can’t even imagine how you must feel having played professional football for all those years. I should have learned how to do this for you before now.”

“If you want to give me a massage,” Kian smirked, “you won’t get any complaints from me but seriously, angel. It hurts so much because you’re using muscles that you’re not accustomed to. I’m not saying that it doesn’t hurt playing football anymore but I’m used to it by now.”

After he’d finished with the backs of her legs, he cleaned off the excess oil and gently flipped her over on to her front.

“I still feel like such a wimp,” Cate said as Kian knelt over her and massaged her upper arms. “When Stepping Out is over, I promise I’ll go to the nearest bookstore and buy a Massage for Dummies book so I can try and return the favour.”

“Whatever you want,” he gently brushed his lips against hers.

He knelt back on his heels and looked down at her breasts, “as much as I might want to, I’m not going to touch them. I think anything I do might make them feel worse.”

“I think you might be right,” Cate winced.

“I want to come to the first show,” Kian insisted as he smoothed his hands over her slender thighs.

Cate wriggled away from him, “I don’t know if I want that.”

She tried to explain, hating the hurt she saw in his dark eyes. “You got jealous just watching that training footage.”

Kian frowned, “as long as you’re both fully clothed and he doesn’t kiss you, I’ll be fine.”

Cate softened a little, “he doesn’t want to kiss me any more than I want to kiss him.”

“Do you remember the World Cup in Portugal?”

“How could I forget?” Cate felt sick. She tried taking some deep breaths. It was every little boy’s dream to play at the World Cup finals and Cate had wanted to travel to Portugal to support Kian but he’d asked her not to go. After England had been knocked out in the quarter-finals by Sweden, Kian had cheated on her with his sister’s friend, Jenna. Cate had only found out what he’d done months later when Jenna had come to their house on Christmas Eve. She’d later twisted the knife by selling her story to one of the tabloid newspapers back home in England.

Cate jumped out of bed and clutching her stomach, ran to the bathroom. The soles of her feet were still greasy so she skidded on the tiles and barely made it to the toilet bowl before she vomited. She felt Kian pull her hair back and winced; she didn’t want him to see her like this. He gently rubbed her back, staying with her until she collapsed, her sweaty forehead pressed against the cold toilet seat. He left her side for a minute but quickly returned with a damp cloth. “Do you still feel sick, angel?”

Cate shook her head; her insides felt as though they’d been hollowed out. When she tried to get up, her legs were still shaky and she stumbled. Kian scooped her up and carried her back to bed. “I must have eaten something funny,” Cate croaked. “I’m so sorry.”

Kian climbed into bed, wrapping her up in his arms. “It was one of the worst mistakes I ever made not asking you and Lo to come to Portugal with me.”