Chapter 9

Nine

Gabriella

I got to live in my happy little bubble for six days. And they were the six best days of my life. Morning, noon, and night sickness notwithstanding.

Mac helped me move my stuff into his bedroom. And by helped, I mean when I got out of the shower the morning after we made love that first night, he'd moved all my stuff into his room.

"No more separate bedrooms and doors between us." He'd growled the words at me. Like I was going to argue with him.

Honestly, it was a little tempting, just to see what he'd do. But the thought that he might give in and move my stuff back to the guest room zipped my lips. I was glad I hadn't teased because the next words out of his mouth stunned me speechless.

"Besides, we should probably think about converting the guest room into a nursery soon. That room's closer to the master bedroom. We don't want Slugger too far away." He'd wrapped his arms around me and stroked a hand over my baby bump.

His words added fuel to the fire of my happy little family fantasy, firming up the walls of the little bubble I was living in.

The next few days, we fell into a pattern. Mac left for work early while I stayed in his house tidying up. At his insistence, I'd added starting a baby registry to my to-do list. He seemed to think his family would want to help with the baby stuff.

Instead of giving into my first inclination—to argue against the need for a baby registry—I jumped into the task wholeheartedly. I'd spend some time online every day checking out nursery décor and receiving blankets and nine thousand other pieces of equipment every website I could find seemed to think I'd need to care for one teeny, tiny baby.

Mac would come home in the afternoon. We'd have lunch together and then he'd bring me back to town with him. Some days I'd go to the tattoo shop, others I'd wander through town, and still others, he'd take me to the Kratos offices and I'd give Trinity a hand, the two of us chatting the whole time.

At night, Mac would make sure I ate every bit of food on my plate at dinner. That gave me a happy thrill right along with the rest of it. I'd never felt so taken care of in my entire life.

But the minute the last bite was eaten, he'd be on me. Some nights we wouldn't make it past the rug in front of the fireplace, just like the first night. Others he'd tug me up to his bedroom.

Some nights he made love to me, soft and slow, lingering over my body for an hour or more, driving me to a place where I was mindless with need before he'd slip inside me. Other times, he'd turn me over the nearest available surface and plunge inside me, sheathing himself to the hilt while my mind tried to catch up with the immense pleasure he gave my body.

I couldn't decide which way I loved best.

On the sixth day, I had an especially rough bout of afternoon sickness. It hit me right after I finished doing a tattoo for a tourist who wanted something pretty to commemorate her Hardwood adventure. Luckily, my late afternoon appointment canceled and Ivy, the girl who worked the front counter during the summer, offered to run me home so I wouldn't have to bother Mac during his workday.

I walked into the quiet house that felt more and more like home with every passing minute. I smiled when I realized I'd left a sweater over the back of the living chair last night.

A bit of movement from outside the wall-to-ceiling windows caught my eye and I wandered over. I still hadn't lost my fascination with the way the forest felt almost part of the house. I spent a lot of time sitting by the windows, trying to see as deeply into the forest as I could like I did with the ocean back in Lover's Cove.

But here it felt different. Like the place spoke to my soul as much as the man living here did.

As I watched, a bear stepped out from behind a stand of trees. My breath left me on a gasp and I pushed closer to the window. He was huge, his shoulders high. His coat a dark brown with a few lighter patches around his muzzle and back legs. It gleamed even in the muted sunlight the trees let in.

I stared in awe and wonder as he hefted up on his hind legs and used one of the trees as a scratching post, raking his claws down the bark. He was wild and beautiful.

Just how I felt.

I pressed my hands flat against the glass. I half expected fear to take over, but it never came. Instead, I felt like I got to witness a little bit of magic.

"Hey, baby, are you okay?"

Mac's gruff voice startled me at first. I hadn't heard him drive up or come inside, but I soon relaxed into his arms as he slid them around me.

"You looked like you were caught up in a spell," he murmured so close to my ear, his words made me shiver. I finally opened my eyes and looked at him. "I feel so...so..."

If I told him I felt like home, that gave him power over me. But he'd been nothing but accepting and kind to me since the day I dropped news of our little surprise on him.

Damn my parents for giving me so much fear and robbing me of the one thing I wanted to give Mac most—my full trust.

He scanned my face and a small grin touched the corner of his lips. "Something you want to share?" He paused. "What's bothering you?"

"How can you tell?"

"Your eyes are the most incredible blue I've ever seen. The blue turns electric, dark, and bright all at once when you're torn about something. Your first day here I witnessed what had to be five different shades with how your emotions bounced around so much."

I stood, transfixed by his touch and his words. And then his scent came to me. I inhaled deeply, pulling in the freshness of the forest and the musk mixed with the sweat drying on his skin. He'd been out running by the looks of it. Or at a gym.

I pressed my face into his chest and inhaled again, nuzzling his bare skin. "You smell so good."

He laughed. "I need a shower. Sawyer had me running around town all damn day. Then he wanted to go for a jog and talk." Darkness crossed Mac's face and for the first time, I wondered about his demons. What could possibly have put such a dark, haunted look in his eyes?

When he noticed me looking, he pressed a kiss on top of my head and let me go, walking into the kitchen.

With a little distance between us, I could see him better. He wore only a pair of mesh basketball shorts. His feet and chest bare. His skin glistened with sweat. Between the scent of him that filled my head and the sight of him, that made my pulse leap, a desire unlike anything I'd ever felt washed through me.

I stalked toward him, my gaze glued to the muscles of his chest and abdomen as they rippled with his movements as he got a glass of water from the tap. My eyes tracked the movement of his throat as he swallowed the water in a few big gulps.

By the time I rounded the end of the kitchen island, he placed the glass in the sink and finally realized I was headed his way. "Gabriella?"

"I don't want to wait until after you shower." My voice sounded sexy and sultry in a way that made it barely recognizable as my own.

When I reached Mac, I didn't hesitate. We both needed this release. I lifted my hands to his shoulders and slid them down, giving in to my desire to feel the hard muscles there. I slid my hands down over his pectorals, lower over his ribcage, and lower still, lingering on the eight pack that covered his abdomen.

"I love the way you feel. Every bit of you is so hard," I whispered and then leaned forward and flicked the tip of my tongue over his nipple. "And the way you smell. Fuck Mac, I have to have you. Now!"

I stretched up on my tiptoes and captured his mouth with my own, flicking my tongue over his lips until he let me inside.

His hands moved to my hips and clenched once and then again while I kissed him with a ferocity I didn't know I possessed.

I pulled back. "I love the way you taste."

His eyes blazed down at me. The only sound he made was a growl that came from deep in the back of his throat.

"I want to taste more of you." I kissed my way down his chest, lower to his abdomen, slowly licking and teasing my way down to the waistband of his shorts.

I wasted no time pushing them down and urging his hard cock out of them. His erection bobbed up and I couldn't help myself. I licked the tip dripping with pre-cum and moaned when the first drop of the salty liquid hit my tongue. I opened my mouth and eased as much of him inside as I could, stopping only when he hit the back of my throat.

"God, Gabriella." He buried his hands in my hair, pulling me back and forth on the long length of his shaft.

I looked up at him from underneath my lashes as my tongue caressed the length of him on the way up to his tip and then I immediately slid my mouth back over him, swallowing as much of him as possible.

He groaned again, and his control snapped. He pulled me off his dick, reached down, and grabbed me under the arms, hauling me up to sit on the kitchen counter. He made quick work of stripping me of my jeans and the little black panties I put on that morning. And before either of us thought of a bed or couch, he was in me, filling me until I had not a bit of room left inside me.

"You're so wet," he growled in my ear. "I think my beautiful girl got off on sucking my cock."

Small mewling sounds escaped me as I slid my hands over his back, digging my nails into the skin there. I titled my hips forward to take him even deeper.

"Tell me, Gabriella. Tell me how much you love sucking me off."

I clasped him harder as he slid in and out of me. "I do. I love sucking your cock. Oh, God, Mac ..."

At my words, he started thrusting harder, plunging in and out of me until the only sounds that came from me were incoherent moans. In minutes he brought me to a shuddering peak of pleasure that had me screaming out his name.

"That's it, baby. I've got you." His words whispered in my ear as I rode out my pleasure and as a second shockwave drove through me, he picked up his pace and joined me. He jerked his hips over and over until he spilled every last bit of his hot seed deep within my channel.

I collapsed against him, weak and boneless.

He braced his lower body against the counter and tucked his face into my neck, his breath coming in harsh pants.

After a few minutes, he stood and looked down at me, grinning. "That was a nice welcome home."

His low chuckle vibrated through me sending tiny aftershocks shivering over my skin. I pressed a kiss to the top of his shoulder and then I thought about what I'd seen right before he came inside.

"I'm not sure what overtook me but, you those shorts, the smell of all your... maleness?" I shrugged when he pinned me with a cocked eyebrow. "Yeah, that even makes me puzzled."

I bit at my lip. "Earlier, when you spoke of Sawyer, there was something you didn't say. A dark look in your eyes. Care to share?" I know I had no right to ask, but I couldn't help but want to help him as much as he wanted to help me. Besides, a driving need to comfort him took hold and I couldn't shake the feeling he needed me.

He froze for a long moment and then pulled back. The laughter left his face and the careful way he looked at me made something inside me go on high alert.

"There are things I can't talk about. Things from my past," he finally admitted.

A careful blankness stole over his face. He pressed a kiss to my temple, this time it was more absent-minded than affectionate. "But nothing you need to worry about."

His tone said end of discussion. I wanted to argue, but a little niggling fear started to grow in the back of my mind. There was a reason he didn't want to share. I couldn't help but think it had something to do with the way he felt about me. About us. I mean why open up to someone who won't be around for long, right?

And for the first time in almost a week, I felt a tiny crack on the surface of my happy little bubble.