He struggles to keep me around him as he scraps with his knee-length boots and then finally we get to his tight black pants. He drops me so that I can unpeel them from him and discard them along with the rest of his clothes. I linger on my knees for a minute, but he drags me back up, his hands skimming my stomach as he does so. We both jolt when the bolt of electricity flashes between us and he removes his hands quickly.
“Fuck,” he mutters and turns his back to me.
That action alone is chilling me more than the subzero water. My heart feels like it has turned to ice, and I reach for him, needing to know he won’t turn his back on me and this pregnancy.
“Frederick,” I say quietly.
He doesn’t answer me.
“I know it upsets you…”
He spins back around. “It doesn’t upset me, Aefre, it scares me. Do you know what he will do to you if he ever finds out?”
I nod slowly and reach for the hot water tap, just for something to do with my hands. I turn it up until the steam is billowing around us, obscuring our view of each other standing more than a cock-length apart, to my dismay.
“I do know, which is why I have lied to him,” I say slowly, almost as if he is dense and needs it.
“It’s not enough,” he says, shaking his head.
“Then what do you suggest?” I yell suddenly. “That I come clean?”
“No!” he roars at me, closing the gap between us and taking me roughly by the shoulders. “I just got you back, no way am I letting you die now!”
My blood runs cold again. Having it put so bluntly is truly terrifying.
“Then what?” I stammer.
“You need to give into your Dark side. Completely. It has to overtake you so that it can explain why this baby will come out all Dark Fae and no Vampire what-so-ever.”
“We don’t know that. I am still a Vampire,” I point out, but I know he is right.
“Are you willing to take that risk?”
“I don’t know if I am willing to lose myself to the Darkness,” I confess.
“I will be your anchor,” he starts, but I shake my head at him.
“Don’t be ridiculous. You are the last person who can keep me from going primal. It will arouse your own black side.”
I see the flash in his eyes as he takes that in, but it is gone in a second. “No, I won’t let you become like me. All you need to do is accept the magick and use it.”
“Easier said than done. The urge to become like them is strong when I use it now,” I say sorrowfully. “I will never forget what happened to Sebastian and that it was my fault to begin with. I won’t put any of you through that just to hide this.”
“Then we must leave,” he states coldly.
“I can’t…” We have had this discussion a thousand times.
“You don’t leave me much choice, Aefre. I must protect you. I cannot do that from him without dying myself and then what good am I to you?”
“Are you saying you are going to abduct me?” I ask with a small smile. It soon gets wiped off my face as, yes, that seems to be exactly what he was suggesting. “Don’t be ridiculous,” I scoff. “He will find us. Quite apart from the fact, that I am not leaving my daughter, and nor do I want to leave him.”
His face turns sour, but grim. “Then you know what you have to do.”
“What I have to do is not have this conversation while we are both naked and soaking wet,” I point out with a sassy smile, trying to get away from this subject and back on track.
He gives me a once over, the lust firing up in his eyes. “Tabled. For now,” he states and then swoops down to claim my mouth in a kiss.
I groan in happiness as his hands lift me up and once again, I wrap my legs around him. We both feel the electric shock, but now we both ignore it, lost in each other and our kiss.