“I won’t argue about anything of mine being gigantic, but really, baby, I’m feeling a little insecure.” He couldn’t keep from chuckling.
Ava took his hand and pulled it into her lap, encircling the ring finger with her pinky. “I want you to have a ring so random skanks know you belong to someone.”
He grinned. “If you want, we can get Ziggy to tattoo your name right up here.” He drew a finger across his forehead. “Then they’ll really know.”
She nodded. “Good.” And then dissolved into giggles and flopped back onto the pillows. “God, we gotmarried. I still can’t quite believe it.” Her voice came out breathless.
“That’s because we haven’t had a chance to celebrate properly.” Mercy leaned over her, hands braced on the mattress, a jungle cat ready to pounce. His hair fell forward as he lowered his face over hers, tickling her throat. He slipped into his loverboy purr, the one that gave her gooseflesh. “Gimme a few hours, baby, and you’ll believe it.”
His lips were hovering above hers when she slid her hand between them, pressing at his mouth. “Wait! I was so tired before, I forgot to take my pill. Here, lemme up, and I’ll get the pack out of my bag.”
He frowned and shook her hand away. “Will one really make a difference?”
“It could. You don’t want to take the chance do you?”
He dropped down to his forearms, and was very still, and contemplative a moment, their chests together, just enough of his weight distributed across her that she wanted to lift up into it, but wasn’t being crushed. He kissed her, very softly, and then lifted his head again. His voice took on an unfamiliar quality, a quiet strain she interpreted as hopeful. “Don’t you want kids?”
She felt the emotion well up in her throat, that warm melting that his surprising, tender moments always inspired in her. She wanted to touch him, and framed his face with her hands. “I do.” Her voice quavered. “I really do. But I don’t know that right now is the best time.”
His brows crimped in question. It was adorable.
“I just started school,” she said gently, “and we don’t even have a place to live. Hell” – wry smile – “we’re hiding out in the middle of the swamp. Who knows how long we’ll be out here. What if–”
“What if I have to deliver the baby myself right here in this bed?” He made a considering face. “I can do that.” He grinned. “I’ve done messier things than that.”
She sighed. “Mercy.”
“Ava.”
Her throat felt tight, and her eyes were starting to sting. She didn’t have any fight in her when it came to this. Just hearing him say “kids” propelled her five years back, to the life that had been lost, their first chance bleeding down the insides of her legs. She wasn’t even sure she wanted children for any of the right reasons; she was convinced that a baby would be a way to reclaim some of that old grief, carry out what was always meant to be.
She didn’t know. There was just this empty, aching, yearning inside her, and she wanted to put a piece of Mercy inside it.
“But wouldn’t it be reckless,” she whispered, “wouldn’t it be selfish, to reach for that now, when we don’t have any right to?”
He kissed her forehead. “Baby.” He breathed a soft laugh through his nose that ruffled her hair. “How is it reckless or selfish?”
She hated the words that were building behind her lips, but she had to say them. She had to let her fear out into the open, at last, so they could deal with it together. “Because of who you are, and who I am, and we were so twisted – maybe we’re not supposed to be happy. Maybe it isn’t supposed to be as easy as houses and babies and being partners.” The tears were gathering in her eyes as she stared up at him. “I’m afraid to have a baby on purpose,” she admitted, “because look what happened when it was just an accident.”
His chest pressed against her breasts as he took a huge breath, and let it out through his nose, nostrils flaring. “You don’t believe any of that.”
“No. But I’m afraid to think that we could be happy, and not pay for it somehow.”
She closed her eyes as he kissed her cheek, nuzzled into her throat, breathed against her skin, kissed her neck. He murmured in French, long strings of lilting syllables. He kissed her mouth.
“Do you know when I wanted you for the first time?” he said against her lips.
The question made her toes curl. She threaded her fingers through his hair and held his head close to hers, so he couldn’t pull away. She wanted to feel his mouth touching hers when he spoke. She pulled the tears back, felt this new, sudden excitement pulse through her. “When?”
She could feel the shape of his smile against her lips. “You’d just turned sixteen, and you drove onto the lot all by yourself the first time, and you were so proud of that, grinning great big. You came up to me, and I remember it was hot out, and you had on these little Daisy Dukes, and a white tank top, and your bra was purple. I could see it straight through your shirt. You called my name, and I turned to look, and you were just –there. I thought, Jesus Christ, look at that. She’s all grown up, and I used to be able to put her in my pocket. I loved you like you were my very own, and all of a sudden, I wanted to bend you over my work bench and see what you tasted like.”
She made a wordless sound and pressed up into him. She felt the hard plane of his stomach against her sex, wanted to rub herself against him.
“That hadn’t ever happened to me,” he went on, his voice velvety and confident as he felt her reaction. “Loving someone so much, and wanting her at the same time. Never. Has it ever happened to you? Both at once like that?”
“Only with you. You know that.”
He kissed her again and she clenched his hair tight in her fists.
