Just Kidding (SWAT Generation 2.0 1)

She rested her head against my chest and sighed.

“I thought you said that you weren’t stopping. That you were too tired,” she muttered.

I squeezed her a bit tighter and felt the baby kick me in response.

Smiling at the small life that she carried within her, I pressed my hand to her belly and waited.

The baby, like always, never kicked me again.

It was as if he or she knew what I wanted and refused to give it to me.

Like mother like child.

“I was, and still am,” I admitted. “But the tea sounded really good after spending the last four hours outside in the hot sun. And then I thought you might really like it. So I got you one. And a cookie.”

She sighed.

“You’re right. I would’ve liked it.” She paused. “Had I not eaten like eight of those cookies already. I don’t have any room left.”

I looked at the cookies that’d barely had time to cool, and grinned.

Putting my food into the fridge, I gathered my sandwiches that she’d made me, salted my avocado, and ate the shit out of the food she’d prepared for me.

Her smile was soft as she watched me demolish all twelve of the leftover cookies.

“At least,” I said as I took a gulp of milk between cookies. “With the deli, I wouldn’t have gorged on all these cookies.”

She snorted. “I’m sure that my bread was about half the carbs than the stuff they use,” she said. “It’ll wash.”

I rolled my eyes, then got a good look at the lawn again.

Eyes narrowing, I turned to her.

“So…” I said. “Did you mow today?”

She opened her mouth to deny it, then thought better of it.

“You’re always gone, Dax,” she said. “I just wanted to see it nice and mowed. And if it makes you feel better, I used the riding mower.”

I rolled my eyes and gathered her to me, then placed one hand on her head while the other curled into her back.

Her hair had grown out over the last seven months we’d been together.

We’d gotten married last month at a small, intimate ceremony with only our closest family and friends in attendance. She’d put it up in the cutest updo I’d ever seen. And even now, the short spiky tendrils that barely touched the back of her neck made my heart ache.

God, she must’ve had gorgeous hair when it was long.

I couldn’t wait for it to grow back.

Thank God for her pregnancy, because her hair was growing so fast that I might have to get her pregnant all over again just so I could have the stuff wrapping around my fist while I took her from behind.

“You’re not being very nice.” She pouted.

I wasn’t.

A month ago she was ordered to go onto light duty thanks to her placenta being very close to her cervix. They’d even had to sew her cervix shut to keep the baby baking a bit longer.

Which also meant no sex for the time being, either.

“Sorry,” I murmured, pressing my lips to hers. “That was pretty mean, wasn’t it?”

She sighed and pressed her mouth to mine once more, then got up to clean up the dishes.

I helped her in silence, then went to the laundry room to strip out of my gear.

Once it was all where she liked me putting it, I came back out in jeans, a t-shirt, and some boots.

She grinned at me.

Then watched me while I weed-whacked the entire yard despite being tired as hell from the day.

But the sweet way she kissed me, all sweaty with grass sticking to me everywhere?

That’s what made it worth it.

Rowen was worth it.

The baby she was carrying?

Worth it.

My life she’d given me?

Worth it.

“Let’s shower,” she ordered. “There was a new scary movie that released on Netflix. I want to watch it.”

So we did.

And I enjoyed every single second of her pressed up against me, face half hidden behind the blanket, while she watched the scary movie through the gaps of her fingers.

That was my girl.

Hard as steel on the outside, but all soft and gooey on the inside.

All. Mine.