Beautiful Beloved

I could hear Anna crying from the elevator and immediately knew George hadn’t been able to get her to take a bottle.

Sara took off, running to the door and fumbling with her keys before I was able to take them from her and let her in. Just inside, George handed her the baby and—correctly reading Sara’s expression—insisted, “She’s okay, she’s okay, she just woke up and wouldn’t take the bottle. She had one earlier.”

It wouldn’t matter to know that she’d eaten not long before. Sara thanked George in a panicked whisper and took the baby into the nursery to feed her.

“Did you have an accident?” George nodded to my pants.

I looked away from where Sara had disappeared down the hall. “A waiter did, just before Sara had one, just before the valet introduced my car to a concrete pillar.”

“So dinner was awesome, then?”

“A brilliant night, really.” Only when I looked up at him again did I register what he was wearing. “Is that my shirt?”

George ran his hands to his hips. “It’s more of a dress on me.” He pulled the extra material into his fists. “I almost used one of Sara’s scarves as a belt.”

“So . . . a touch of vomit then?”

He nodded, releasing the shirt. “Exorcist baby.”

“Sorry about that,” I mumbled, suddenly hit with a debilitating wave of exhaustion. “I swear there are times she throws up more than I think she’s eaten.”

“Not a thing, I swear. It was so much better than that time my date threw up on me, because at least Anna cuddles afterward.”

“Thanks, mate. Taking care of the baby tonight was bloody generous of you.”

George patted my shoulder. “I’ll leave you to it. Tell Sara I’ll see her next week?”

“Will do.”

After I closed the door behind him, I threw my trousers in the washing machine and went down the hall to the nursery, sitting in my usual spot on the soft carpet near the rocking chair. “How’s my girl?”

Sara smiled down at Anna. “She’s fine.”

I licked my lips, studying her face. She’d relaxed almost as soon as she had our baby in her arms. “I meant my wife.”

Her enormous brown eyes met mine and narrowed as she laughed. “I’m fine, too.”

She looked back down at the baby and sang quietly, stroking Anna’s cheek with her thumb. I watched Anna’s small hand reach up blindly, finding and squeezing Sara’s index finger. Reaching forward, I curled my hand around my wife’s ankle and closed my eyes.

I couldn’t hear anything but Sara’s quiet humming and our daughter’s little baby noises. Our world was infinitely better and we had to come to terms with the fact that, at least for the time being, it was so much smaller.

A hand on my shoulder startled me awake. The floor of the nursery, I’d fallen asleep on the floor of the nursery . . .

Looking up, I was greeted by the sight of Sara in a tiny lace bra that pushed her tits up and together until they nearly spilled from the cups. My gaze traveled south and snagged on her minuscule matching thong.

“New pajamas?” I asked, pushing up onto an elbow.

“A gift from Chloe.”

“For me or you?”

“Both.” She curled her finger to me as she backed out of the room, and I stood, trailing after her until she stopped halfway to the bedroom on a slim, soft hallway rug.

“Here?” I asked, stepping close and bending to kiss her neck. She’d put the smallest touch of perfume on—the familiar light scent that seemed half fruit, half floral, and which she knew made me wild. Seeing her like this, in lingerie, her hair grown long and thick, reaching halfway down her back and brushed smooth, reminded me that it had been forever since we’d put in this sort of effort. It used to be either frantic fucking or a luxurious game.

Now we’d only known exhausted or frantic, and I couldn’t shake the feeling that I should take her to our room, be slow and gentle with her.

“Yeah, here,” she whispered, standing on her toes to scrape her teeth over my jaw. “Remember that time we ate dinner in front of the TV, and I surprised you when the movie I put in was a video of us?” She dragged her teeth along my earlobe. “You got so turned on you fucked me against this wall. Bent at the waist, hands on the plaster and legs spread? Remember?”

I definitely remembered. We’d made love in the hall before—the frantic kind of pre-baby sex when we’d been unable to wait until we could reach the bed. Those times were fast and messy, a flurry of wild thrusts until we both collapsed sweaty and half dressed on the floor. On that particular occasion I’d just watched a video of me spanking her, and was so fucking turned on we re-created it, right here.

But tonight, when Annabel was fast asleep, why were we—

“I like this rug,” she explained, sliding down my body to her knees and my brain stuttered when she looked up at me with wicked eyes. “It’s soft and thick under my knees.” She guided my boxers down past my hips and freed my cock, watching it grow long as her fist curled around the base. She drew a slow circle with her tongue around the tip. “I also like the way you taste,” she continued, smiling knowingly up at me. “Is that weird?”

I opened my mouth, searching for sound, and finally grunted out a “No.”

She bit her lip, watching her fist work me for a few strokes before sucking at the crown again. I groaned, tensing from the pleasure of her swirling tongue. “I like this sweetness,” she whispered and stared up at me. “Relax. Tonight was a disaster, but a funny disaster. Give me more.”

Sara squeezed me, coaxing liquid from the tip and sucking at it. “What’s it like to watch me do that?”

My mouth opened and I tried to speak but only a garbled sound came out. Her tongue rubbed across the spot just beneath the head of my cock and my hand tightened on the back of her neck, breath tight and high in my throat.

Popping off with a wet kiss she asked, “When was the last time you came in my mouth?”

I knew the answer without having to think too long. It was two weeks after the baby was born and we couldn’t have sex yet. We were delirious with sleep deprivation and on some sort of high over the perfection of our lives anyway. I came on her lips not because she played with me for so long, but because we hadn’t touched intimately in several weeks and I’d felt spring-loaded.

“A while ago,” I admitted.

She nodded, lips pouting before she smiled and bent to kiss a wet, sucking line up my cock.

I wanted her hands around me, gripping and pulling, frenzied in that way that we seemed to never have energy for anymore. Wanted that slick slide of tongue over my skin and the vibrating sounds of pleasure, the urgency. She bent, licking another wet line from the head to my balls, smiling with her eyes up at me as she pointed her tongue and ran it around and around and around in a wet circle at the very tip of my cock.

Fuck.

My fingers found their way into her hair, massaging, guiding her down and I was speaking nonsense; encouraging her and begging her and praising her fucking perfect, sweet little mouth.

“Love that mouth. Fucking love it.” I ran a finger down from her temple to her lips, feeling her slide back and forth over me. “I bet you could take me all the way down, couldn’t you?” I said, giving in to what I wanted so so much.

She took me farther and farther until her eyes watered and she pulled back, sucking in air and staring up at me. I was harder than I’d been in ages, practically shaking with the need for her.

I needed Sara’s deep brown eyes and quiet, scratchy voice and hands that were both soft and strong. I wanted only the arch of Sara’s spine and the taste of the wet between her legs and the clench of her when she came around me with a shocked cry. I’d been with her a hundred times and every one of those times she’d been a different woman—a new discovery—revealing something new of herself.

With my cock between her lips, she reached back and unfastened her bra, letting it slide down her arms and land silently on the floor.

Her eyes twinkled as she looked up at me and when she reached forward and played with her nipple, I was fucking done.

Perfect suction, her hot little ass in perfect view . . . holy fuck. I closed my eyes and gave in to the clawing ache that built in my thighs and stretched upward, tightening . . .

A tiny thump sounded in the other room: Anna rolling into the side of the crib. She coughed a few times.

I started to step away but Sara planted her hands on my hips with quiet urgency. “She’s fine. You’re so close, baby, stay.”

And then the baby started to cry.

Sara slid her mouth down again, sucking hard and fast, begging with her eyes for me to relax, to come, to keep this moment alive somehow, but how the bloody hell was I supposed to fuck her mouth with our infant daughter crying in the other room?

The hungry cry, Sara once told me. “Do you hear it?” she’d asked. “How different it sounds?”

I knew without having to even ask that her breasts were growing heavy and uncomfortable.

This time, when I stepped back, she let me.

I ran the pad of my thumb from her temple down across her cheek to rest on her full, wet bottom lip. “Petal. Go on.”

With an apologetic grimace she took my hand and stood. She looked so fucking beautiful in front of me: topless, wearing her tiny lace pants, legs toned and smooth. She stretched and kissed me once, soft and slow, trapping my cock between us.

“We’ll finish this later?”

“Sure,” I murmured, kissing her forehead.

Her ass, when she turned and stepped into the nursery, was sublime. And then she bent, picked up our baby, and walked to the rocking chair.

Instead of sitting at her feet like usual, I went down the hall into the bedroom to let my body come down.

Twenty minutes later I felt Sara crawl into bed behind me. Her hand was warm when it slid around my chest. Her mouth was soft and wet on the bare skin of my shoulder.

“You awake?” she whispered, letting her hand run down my stomach to where I was naked under the covers. My body began to respond when she gripped me, but I was so fucking close to sleep, so exhausted. I took her hand in mine and pulled it up to my chest, wordlessly telling her we’d find another time.

“Good morning, sunshine.” Will was sitting in my chair, his feet perched on my desk.

I glanced at him and then shut my office door behind me. “Comfortable?”

“My office is better,” he said in response. “How was the epic shagfest?”

“Mildly disappointing.”

His playful expression dimmed at my probably-too-honest answer and he sat up, planting his elbows on his knees. “What happened?”

I dropped my laptop bag near my office closet and sat across from him. “George was good, it was just a lot of updates, a lot of mishaps at the restaurant, and then the sex that never quite happened after.”

“What kind of mishaps?”

“Alfredo on the trousers, water dumped on the mix, Sara’s breasts leaking through her dress, the valet scraped my car. You know, the usual date night.”

Will held up a hand. “Her breasts and the dress and the what now?”

I sighed. “William. Sometimes you disappoint me with your predictability.”

But he was already shaking his head. “I’m honestly curious. They . . . leak?”

I felt my brows pull together. “Well . . . yeah. ’Course they do. You do realize where milk comes from, right? What they’re actually for? That they weren’t created simply for you to enjoy.”

“Do not blaspheme, Max,” he said, holding out a single finger in warning. He looked a little dazed. “And they leak like, constantly?”

“Not constantly, you bleeding idiot. Just when she hasn’t fed Anna in a few hours or if she hears her cry . . .” I winced, meeting his eyes. “Or another baby cry, apparently. I didn’t really anticipate that one, to be honest.”

I didn’t know what to say. It wasn’t that I felt like I was betraying Sara’s privacy in talking about this; it was more that I felt I had access to a secret room in the man tavern and I really shouldn’t hand over the password to Will until it was his time. Let him suffer a bit.

I gave him my most condescending smile. “Lots of things happen with the female body that even you haven’t seen.”

He rolled his eyes. “Don’t patronize me.”

“Why?” I clucked my tongue sympathetically. “It brings me such joy.”

Will tilted his head, and seemed to consider whether or not to tell me something. His blue eyes narrowed and a little smile took over one half of his mouth.

I waited it out until I knew he couldn’t stand it anymore. The staring contest continued for at least ten seconds longer.

“Fine,” he said on a bursting exhale. “I’ve been with a pregnant woman before.”

I regarded him with mild disgust. “Okay, given that I know you’ve never impregnated anyone yourself, I’m just going to say it: that’s slightly fucking weird.”

“Yeah . . . I did a lot of shit then that I wouldn’t do now. But I’ve never been with a woman who . . .” He glanced down to his chest and looked back up at me, brows raised.

“Right,” I said, rubbing the back of my neck. Will was such a notorious breast man, it occurred to me that it was strange that he hadn’t seemed to think about this perk of motherhood before now.

“What does it taste like?” he said, like a crack in the air.

I groaned, rubbing my eyes. “William.”

“Maximillian. Don’t even try to pretend like you haven’t tasted it.”

I remembered the conversation Sara and I had about it the first week we were home. We were in the newborn haze, with dishes piled in the sink and in the same clothes we’d worn the day before. Sara was in pain, and I did what I could to help relieve it: with my hands, my mouth. She’d watched, eyes wide and grateful, her nails gently scratching my scalp and asked me how it tasted.

I blinked back over to Will. “It’s . . . sweet,” I admitted.

He whimpered, closing his eyes. “I feel like I need to meet Hanna at the apartment for a lunchtime—”

“Christ, you’re pathetic.”

He opened his eyes and studied me, eyes narrowing. “You dig it.”

“Her tits are glorious. Of course I dig them.”

“Not just that. It.” He leaned forward, forcing me to hold his gaze. “You do! Holy shit! You dig that they leak and think it’s weird. Are you feeling shame, Gentle Giant?”

I pulled back, shaking my head at him. “Absolutely not.”

“And by ‘absolutely not’ you mean, ‘I am absolutely horrified that I dig the—’ ”

“I’m close to kicking you out of my office.”

He laughed, rocking the chair back on two legs. “Which means I’m close to unearthing the truth.”

“The truth, you sodding wanker, is it’s just a weird balance right now.” I hesitated for a moment, trying to organize my thoughts. “Yes, of course there are things about it that are surprisingly hot. But before, it was just us. Max and Sara, living together, still getting to know each other. It’s like you and Hanna now: you can stay out as late as you want, fuck as loud and often as you want, go on a weekend holiday without notice. We were deep in the throes of that, and now there is a little girl in my life who is more important than anything. And . . .” I pulled at the back of my neck. “I didn’t expect it. I didn’t expect to feel so many things at once. I feel like I’m walking around with my heart outside my body, and I know it’s even more true for Sara. I didn’t know how hard it would be to see her energy split. So yeah, the fact that I basically want to fuck her all the time but worry that I’ll . . .”

He sat quietly, listening. But when I couldn’t figure how else to explain the strange tension in me, he guessed: “You feel guilty.”

“A bit.” I slid my palm across my mouth. “I mean, look. There’s only so much I’m needed for right now. Sara feeds her, holds her. Anna wants her mum, you know? I can change her and sing to her and take her running, but she doesn’t need me yet.” I grimaced, hating how it sounded to admit: “But I still need a lot. It feels selfish to want the ‘epic shagfest’—as you so delicately put it—to be just as wild as it ever was. It isn’t just about me anymore.”

“Funny that you haven’t mentioned what Sara wants it to be like.”

I groaned. “She wants me to be a bit rougher again, I think.”

He stilled across the desk. “What the fuck is the problem? You two are on the same page, you asshat.” Will leaned in, expression deliberately neutral. “You still doing . . . the club thing? At Johnny’s?”

I’d always wondered how much Will really knew. Apparently, he knew quite a lot.

“We haven’t in a long time,” I admitted quietly, “not since she was pregnant. She wants to go.”

“But you don’t?” he asked, surprised.

“You fancy the idea of people watching you with Hanna?”

He started to nod, and then paused. “Yes, and no. I like the idea of people watching me unravel her, but I don’t really want men fantasizing about her like that.”

“See, and I don’t mind that aspect. But take your feelings, and now imagine when Hanna’s had your baby,” I said. “When she’s a nursing mum, and tired all the time and tiny the way Sara is. Yes, I fucking love her body right now but it all feels private and like if the world pushed her too hard I would break it in half with my bare hands. That it might break her. It didn’t occur to me to feel like this when she was pregnant because there was nothing vulnerable about her, even when she was ready to pop. She carried herself like she knew she looked amazing. Now, if someone didn’t appreciate how sexy she is, I would put my boot up their arse and kick out their teeth.”

Will regarded me blandly and pretended to yawn.

“So you think this is me being over-fucking-protective.”

“Like a dick,” he said. “Like you said, this is your kink. It may not be mine, but if Sara likes it, why do you think it has to be different just because you have a baby at home?”

I leaned back in my chair, shook my head at him. “This is a pretty intense heart-to-heart we’re having. Breast milk, kink, marriage, and sex with children in the mix. Can you handle it? When did you become a man, William?”

“Ha. This is nothing compared to some of the shit Hanna wants to talk about,” he said and then laughed. “I mean, look. Anna is four months old. You know when you go to a matinee and come out and it’s still light out and you’re blinded and disoriented for about five seconds until your photoreceptors—”

“Will. Fucking focus.”

“What I’m saying is, you’re still stuck in those first five seconds. You’ve walked out of the building and have no idea what it looks like outside yet.”

“Right. Good metaphor.”

“You want to see some of your life you recognize. You want barely-inside-the-door sex. You want breaking-furniture sex. You want club sex. And you want to do it with those amazing tits.”

I gnawed my lip and then admitted, “Right.”

“Let us watch the kiddo. We’re her godparents, right?” He held up a hand, keeping me from answering. “I mean, I know you haven’t decided yet, but we’d be way better than Chloe and Bennett because let’s be real: they’re assholes.”

I burst out laughing. “Bennett knows kids, though. He has a niece.”

“He’s terrified of newborns. Henry says he held Sophia at arm’s length until she could walk and then he never let her out of his sight. He’s sure he’ll break Anna with a stern glance. Which I don’t doubt, if I’m being honest. He is scary as hell sometimes. Hanna and I . . . we’ll figure it out.” Leaning forward, he winked. “We’re scientists.”