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“You’re not going to be like your father,” I told him.
His eyes found mine. “I already was. When you first told me you were pregnant.” His tone was saturated in guilt.
And I forgave him. Utterly and completely. Right then and there.
I grabbed Boo from my stomach, kissed her on the nose, and set her gently on the floor. Then I moved. It was rather awkward and took me longer than I would’ve liked, but I finally positioned myself so I was straddling Kip, my stomach between us.
“You are nothing like your father,” I stated firmly.
He settled his hands on my hips. “You don’t know that. You’ve never met him.”
I grabbed the sides of his neck. “I do know that,” I argued. “Yeah, you freaked out a little when I first broke the news. But you beat yourself up for it the entire time it was happening.”
I gave him space to argue with me, but he didn’t. He couldn’t. Not without lying.
“And you’ve more than made up for it,” I continued. “You don’t let me lift anything heavier than a mug of coffee. You help me out of bed every morning, but not before I get an orgasm and a cup of java.” I gave him a wicked smile. “You cook for me. You don’t blink when I bring home a cat, and then you potty train said cat.” We both looked at Boo, who’d climbed onto the coffee table to glare at me for kicking her off her perch.
I looked back at Kip. “You come to every doctor’s appointment. You read the baby books. You know more about my vagina and womb than I do. You built a beautiful nursery.” I leaned in to kiss him gently on the lips, having to stop myself from deepening it. “There are about a million other things I could list, but that would take too long, and I’m getting horny.” I rubbed myself against him to punctuate my point.
Hunger sparked in my husband’s eyes.
“Thank you,” I said quietly. “For sharing with me.”
He leaned in to kiss me, a little deeper than I’d kissed him. I rubbed myself against him some more.
“You’re welcome,” he murmured against my lips. “It’ll be your turn next.”
My stomach dipped. Not in a good way. Sharing my past beyond what I already had made me want to run away. But I didn’t. I stayed put.
“Next,” I agreed. “But not now.”
Then I leaned in to kiss him, and I didn’t stop.
Nor did he.
* * *
It was storming.
The thunder was loud enough to shake the house.
That was what woke me. Normally, it wouldn’t. But pregnancy insomnia was only getting worse, what with the leg cramps and having to rotate myself like a gas station hotdog whenever I needed to turn over.
Kip held me in the night, because he was Kip and because he always needed to have his hands on me or the baby. But I also had a large pregnancy pillow that ran the length of my body and surrounded me on both sides.
It cocooned me, made it harder to lie flat on my back, and helped with the hip pain. I did indeed love the thing, although I hated the barrier between us. It did help when I got out of the bed in the middle of the night, not wanting to wake Kip. Usually it was just to pee—I had to do that multiple times—and he often woke despite how sneaky I tried to be. He was hyperaware of me, and his sleep was much lighter than mine.
But he didn’t wake. Not with the thunder, nor with me getting out of bed.
I went to the nursery, sat myself in the chair by the window, and watched the sea rage, the rain trickling down the glass. I got lost in the storm, my thoughts, the future.
“You’re not supposed to get out of bed without me,” a voice growled softly.
I wasn’t surprised, having expected Kip to come and get me eventually.
“If I woke you up every time I got up, you’d never get any sleep. You have a daughter who kicks against my bladder,” I replied, rubbing my stomach.
“But you didn’t get up to pee. You’re in here,” Kip pointed out. He then moved me from my spot in the chair, though only so he could sit and then position me half on his lap. The chair was large enough that it was roomy even with the two of us. Three, if you considered my stomach.
