“Yeah, baby?”
I turn in his arms and wiggle my hips until my dress pools around my ankles. I’m standing before him in nothing but a white thong that has Mrs. Jennings embroidered on it. “You’re taking too long.” I reach for his shorts, and manage to get the button undone before he’s stepping back and removing them himself. I watch as his shorts and boxer briefs are kicked to the side. His thick cock juts out like a beacon; he doesn’t bother with the buttons of his white shirt; instead, he rips it open. Buttons fly around the room, but we’re so lost in one another, in this moment, we don’t even care.
“Fuck, you’re gorgeous.” Reaching out, he traces the swell of my breasts with his index finger, running his thumb over my pebbled nipples. “I want to devour you and I don’t know where to start first.”
“How about here?” I fist his cock in the palm of my hand and stroke him.
“You’re going to have to stop that. This will be over before it starts.”
“Then you better step up your game, Mr. Jennings.”
“I want to cherish you, take my time loving every inch of you, Mrs. Jennings.”
“We have the rest of our lives for that. I need you inside me. I need to feel connected to you, to my husband.” His eyes soften and I know I’ve got him.
He drops to his knees and slips his fingers under either side of my thong, carefully removing it. He peers up at me and grins. “I’m keeping these,” he says as I step out of them. I watch as he holds them up and grins when he reads Mrs. Jennings. Reaching behind him, he places them on the suitcase before turning back to me. “On the bed, wife.”
“Oh, is that how it’s going to be? What if I said I wanted you on the bed?”
He stands, and with his hand on mine, he guides us to the bed. He climbs on and moves to the middle, placing his hands behind his head. “Well, you got me here, now what are you going to do with me?”
He makes me feel brazen and bold, something I’ve never felt in my life. To know that this man is mine for eternity, it does something to me. It gives me a confidence like I’ve never known before. Slowly, I climb on the bed, settling on my knees beside him. I run my hands over the ridges of his abs and find my way to his cock. I grip him, causing him to moan. Lazily, I stroke him.
“Mara, baby, I thought you said we didn’t have time for this?” he pants.
“Did I?”
“Tease,” he grumbles good-naturedly.
“What do you want, husband? Tell me what you need.”
He sits up, slides his hand behind my neck, and pulls me close. “I want you, Mara. All of you, and preferably coming all over my cock.”
“Like this?” I move to straddle him.
“You’re getting close,” he says, wrapping his arms around me. My breasts press against his chest as his lips make themselves at home in the crook of my neck. “Let me help you.” He breathes the words into my ear.
Lifting to my knees, I wait for him to align himself at my entrance. When I feel him, I lower myself, painfully slow until he’s deep inside me. “Now what?”
“Fuck me.”
“Like this?” I swivel my hips and lift myself off him only to have his hands settle on my hips, pulling me back down.
“Like this.” His lips crash to mine as he lifts me and then pulls me back down. We easily find a rhythm as we make love for the first time as husband and wife. Fast, slow, intimate, or wild, it’s still love.
“Mara,” he growls as his hand slides from my hip to settle between us. As soon as his thumb brushes across my clit, I explode. Light flashes behind my eyes, as an electric current courses through my veins.
Together, we cry out before collapsing onto the bed. Our bodies are slick with sweat, but neither one of us seem to care. We’re celebrating.
“I never thought that sex with you could get any better. I was wrong.”
“Yeah?” I ask, barely able to form words.
“Yeah. Must be the new title and the new last name.” He pats my ass and we both laugh. “Come on, wife, let’s take a shower and then do that again.”
“We’re not getting any sleep tonight, are we?”
“Nope.”
The night is magical, and one I’m sure neither of us will ever forget. Although it was nice to get away from it all, we miss our girl and head back to the beach house the next morning.
“You ready for this?” I ask the girls. We’re all standing hand in hand in our bathing suits staring at the ocean.
“I’m not really a fan of swimming with fish, or sharks, or snakes, or… creatures,” Dawn admits.
“The water’s warm. We already know that,” I say as it laps at our feet. This is one of the final items on Amelia’s bucket list, and we wanted to be there with her to mark it off, not just to watch, but to make the memory. Our husbands—it’s not even been forty-eight hours, and I’ve already said it a dozen times; I can’t seem to help myself—anyway, our husbands and Seth’s dad are on the beach with the kids. Seth’s mom is on one side of Amelia while I’m on the other. Ladies unite as we stand tall beside an amazing woman, who is fighting to bring a healthy baby boy into this world. Fighting to leave a piece of her behind after she takes her last breath.
“Okay, on the count of three,” Kendall says.
“One,” Reagan counts.
“Two,” Dawn calls out.
“Three!” Amelia cheers, and we move forward into the water.
We walk until we’re about waist deep and stop. Amelia stands still with her eyes frozen on the horizon. I can’t begin to imagine what’s going through her head right now. We’ve successfully marked off everything that we’re capable of making happen but the tattoo and having a baby, which she’s working on. The tattoo, we have picked out. We decided on a heart that also appears to be two hands that are locked together. We know where we’re going to get it and have already made arrangements that if Amelia is too sick to go there, the guy is willing to come to us.
“It’s beautiful,” Amelia whispers as I wrap my arm around her shoulders.
“It really is.”
“Hey, what are you two gabbing about over there?” Kendall calls out.
“I thought we were swimming?” Dawn asks.
I love her for pulling us out of this sadness that is threatening to take over the moment. Instead, Amelia turns to her and splashes, and just like that, the water fight is on. We move closer into shore, where the water is just at our a
nkles, and the kids join us. The guys stay back and snap pictures. Every single one of them has a camera in their hands, and it’s a moment that touches deep in my soul. They’re capturing this, savoring the little things in life to be shared with our kids later. They probably won’t remember it since they’re all under the age of four, but they’ll see it. They’ll hear the stories and know about this day. The day Amelia got to swim in the ocean for the first and more than likely, last time.
After frolicking in the water with the kids, we head back up to the house where the guys again man the grill, and with full bellies, and the kids snuggled in their beds, we watch the sunset. Dawn, Amelia, and I are huddled together on a blanket on the beach, while Kendall, Reagan, and Shannon are on another right beside us. I can hear the guys chatting, and the echo of their laughter fading into the dusk of the day.
“Thank you,” Amelia says quietly. “Thank you for today, for this trip, for all of it.”
Before I can form words through the lump in my throat, Kendall, Reagan, and Shannon are surrounding us, and we’re all in one giant group hug. No words are spoken, but we don’t need them. She knows we’re here for her and we love her. She knows that today will be forever in our memory and in our hearts.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Seth 23
* * *
“If you don’t stop staring at me, I’m going to have them put you on the ‘not allowed to visit’ list,” Amelia says. Her eyes are closed, but she can feel my stare.
“Do you have one of those?” I ask, not fazed by her threat.
Slowly her eyes open, and I can see the exhaustion plain as day. “No, but you’re first on the list.” She sighs heavily. “Seth, I’m fine.”
“You’re in the hospital. You’re not fine,” I fire back.
“I’m dying, Seth. What do you expect?”
“Stop.”
“No. I won’t stop. It’s my reality. No matter how unexpected this diagnosis is, it’s my truth, and you have to face that. Our son needs you to face that. I’m going to be here until he’s born, maybe longer. Who knows if I’ll ever get to leave, but you know what? I’m okay with that. I’m okay with it because these tubes are giving him what he needs since my body seems to be revolting at anything I put into my mouth. You sitting here staring at me is not going to work for me. Go home to your wife and your daughter.”