Chapter Seven

I stiflea yawn from my recliner, push my lap desk away, and reach for the green smoothie on the side table. With a frown, I sniff it and set the glass back down. "Promise me, Ry. After this baby comes out, no more green smoothies. Ever."

He chuckles from the counter, where he's studying a thirty-second video I pulled off a security camera late last night. "I make no such guarantees, little bird. They're good for you."

I roll my eyes. "They're disgusting."

"I'll add more fruit. Less kale." Pressing a kiss to the top of my head, he peers down at the laptop screen. "Nothing?"

"My web crawlers haven't uncovered any chatter," I say. "If anyone were looking for you, I'd know. The last hit was more than eighteen months ago, and you put an end to those guys."

A vein in Ry's temple throbs. He took West, Inara, and Graham to Istanbul after someone spent a week searching for Ryker McCabe on the dark web. They fell into every trap I set for them. All the false leads. The tax records proving Ry was in Dallas, Texas. Then paperwork showing his move to Canada. Barcelona. New Delhi. And finally, Istanbul.

The three men they captured were related to the guards Ry killed when he escaped Hell Mountain. They lived for eight hours. Long enough for West to be sure they were acting alone. Their bodies were never found. Knowing my husband, they never will be.

He sinks down onto the couch, close enough I can reach for his hand and lay it on my belly. The baby's hiccupping, and it's the oddest sensation.

"If my darkness touches you or Harlow," he says, his voice barely more than a whisper, "I won't…I can't…"

I cover his fingers with mine. "Ry, our daughter isn't going to care that you have demons. She's only going to care that you love her."

His arms wind around me—so gently now that I'm about to pop—and in his embrace, I can breathe, despite the near-constant worry someone's after him.

"I can't lose you, Wren. I can't do this without you."

"This?" His eyes hold so much pain. More even than they did when we first met. "You're scaring me."

He stares out the floor-to-ceiling windows. The sun and gentle breeze turn Elliot Bay into a sea of glittering diamonds in the distance. "After Hell, I didn't know how I was going to survive in the world. There were days I didn't want to."

My heart aches for him. I try to wriggle closer, but my belly gets in the way.

"And then I met you. I don't think I'd laughed in six years. Or smiled. Or done a single fucking thing that wasn't absolutely necessary. I worked out. I ate. I slept—or tried to—and I saved people. I didn't talk to anyone outside of missions or training."

"Horsepucky."

He flinches and stares down at me. "Are you calling me a liar, sweetheart?"

"No. But you forget. I know you, Ryker McCabe. You read four books a week. At least. And that didn't start when you met me."

"Those are necessary."

Arching a brow, I snatch his phone from the coffee table, unlock it, and find his eReader app. "So, Surprised and Sacked is a necessary read?"

He huffs out a breath, and his cheeks take on a slight tinge. My big, hulking mountain of a husband who doesn't let a single thing knock him off his game is actually blushing.

"You read it last week. I…should know what you like."

I nestle against his side, enjoying the feel of his arm draped over my shoulders. "I love that about you." We sit in silence for several minutes, until I remember what started this whole conversation. "Ry, you can't be with me twenty-four hours a day. Even with West running Hidden Agenda. And what about when it's time for Harlow to go to preschool? Or college?"

The terror written all over his face makes my heart ache. This man who once thought he was too broken to care loves so deeply, with so much of his soul, he doesn't know how to put it into words.

"Remember what I told you when we first met?"

"You're going to have to be a little more specific there, little bird. I remember everything."

My lips curve into a smile. "Of course, you do." I sit up a little straighter and meet his gaze. "You said you didn't know how to care. And I said…?"

"You'll learn."

"Well, you'll learn how to do this too. How to trust that I'm okay. That our daughter's okay. Even when you can't see her. Or me."

"Not when there's a potential threat out there." It secretly thrills me that he's so protective he's practically growling. Even if it probably is overkill.

"We have a whole server farm running twenty-four-seven at the warehouse. None of the cameras we have around the building have picked up anything. Cara and Evianna are flippin' gorgeous. The guy who followed us was probably a creeper. And what Ripper heard…I don't know. I can't explain it."

The baby lands a hard kick to something vital, and I suck in a sharp breath. Ry tenses. "What hurts?"

"Nothing." I shake my head with a little chuckle. "Well, nothing more than everything. Your daughter is tired of these cramped accommodations. She'd like a two-bedroom apartment with a view and all the toys she can play with. And at least three more dogs."

As if she heard me talking about her, Pixel runs into the room. She drops down to her haunches in front of Ry, and her tail thumps against the rug so quickly, it's practically a blur.

"No, fur ball. You are not going out right now," he says. "You'll wait for Rip to come up in an hour."

"Take her. I'm fine. She hates sharing her walks with Charlie. He gets the best trees."

Ry stares at me for a long moment. "If you're sure…"

"You'll be gone fifteen minutes. Even if my water breaks, the baby won't come that quickly." I settle back on the couch and eye the smoothie glass.

"Okay, pipsqueak," he says. "Get your leash." Pixel runs to the door, noses her leash out of the toy basket, and drags it over to him. "But we are not dawdling. Understand?"

* * *

Ryker slips backinto the condo with Pixel trotting ahead of him like she just won the lottery. And she has, because he gave her a fancy new chew toy. He started buying them when I moved in with him, hides them, and brings them out at the oddest times.

"Who's a good girl?" I ask when she brings me the toy and drops it at my feet. "You're going to have to pick that up all on your own, sweet pea. Mama can't bend over right now. Maybe in another week or so, that'll change."

"Maybe?" Ry asks. "You don't think you'll still be pregnant in a week, do you?"

"No, but my stomach doesn't magically deflate when I give birth." I offer him a weak smile. "It might be months before I fit into my pre-pregnancy clothes."

The concern in his eyes touches me. "It's fine. But even after everything's…back the way it's supposed to be, I'm going to look different. My boobs won't ever be the same."

"Your breasts are perfect. Absolutely perfect." He cups one of them, dragging his thumb over my nipple.

"Fudgesicles," I moan with a shudder. "I've never been this sensitive. If I didn't have a doctor's appointment this afternoon, I'd say we get naked. Right now."

"We don't have to be at the medical center for two hours." He scoops me into his arms and carries me into the bedroom. "We have time."

"Ryker McCabe. Put me down right now!" I slap at his back, but it does me no good. Not that I want it to. The idea of one last roll in the sheets before the baby comes is more appealing than I can put into words. Who knows how long it's going to take before my body is ready to have sex again. Or my emotions.

Exhaustion. Worry. The idea of sex with a baby in the next room… At least we have a third bedroom now—one on the other side of the condo.

Ry lays me on the bed and shifts my long, blue maxi dress up my thighs.

I shiver, my nipples tight under my bra. Arousal floods my core. His black pants strain over his dick, and I unbuckle his belt. "Strip, soldier. I want you naked."

His black t-shirt falls to the floor. I'll never get tired of looking at him. At the ridges of muscles. The evidence of his strength over fifteen months of torture. His scars are a part of him. Some deep, some shallow—but no less painful. He remembers all of them. Every cut. Every burn. Every bone broken and set. But all that pain led him to me. Led us to this moment when we're about to start a family neither of us thought we'd ever have.

His pants are next. Black briefs can't hide the outline of his need. His thighs are as big as two of mine, and the veins…I could stare at him all day.

"Like what you see, sweetheart?" he rumbles.

"Oh, very much. But you're not naked yet. I'm not thrilled about that bit."

"Neither are you."

"True, but I'm on my back with a twenty-pound beach ball on my stomach. A little help?"

In a heartbeat, he's on top of me. Undoing the buttons so I'm left in only my bra and very unflattering maternity panties. I can't stifle my cringe fast enough.

"You," he says, dropping to his knees next to the bed, "are fucking perfect." His hands smooth over my belly, down my hips, and along my thighs. "I love you, Wren. No matter what size you are."

"You're just saying that to get into my very large underwear," I tease. But there's a kernel of truth—or sadness—in my tone I can't wipe away. No matter how much or how deeply I believe him.

"I'm saying it because it's true. Because I'm in awe of you, sweetheart." His lips skim my belly, then move higher until he closes his teeth over one of my nipples through the cotton bra. The sensation rockets my arousal up to a million, and I writhe on the bed, arching my back—as much as I can being this huge.

He cups my other breast, and as his thumb keeps time with his lips and tongue, I think maybe I could come from this alone.

I'm so needy, I dig my heels into the mattress. "Please, Ry…"

Lifting his head, he gives me a wicked smile. "You want something, little bird?" He slides one hand under me and flicks open the catch on my bra.

My breasts are so very heavy and aching for more. I don't have to answer him. He knows what I need. He always knows what I need.

"I will never get enough of you," he says with his lips against my nipple. "I can't believe you didn't run away. That you saw me—the real me—and didn't run."

"I still see you," I manage. If he doesn't take my panties off in the next few seconds, I might implode. "Now help me off with these."

I tug at the cotton, and he obliges, baring me to him.

Then he's between my thighs. His tongue laps at my folds. Slowly at first, then quicker as he finds his rhythm. The sensations…they're so very different than they used to be. But somehow, they're still like coming home in a way I never knew I needed.

He slides one finger inside me, then another, pumping them in and out as he licks, sucks, and bites until I can't remember my own name. Nothing exists but the two of us—and the pleasure building to a peak so quickly, it takes my breath away.

Ryker growls against my clit, and I fly.

I don't know how long it takes me to come down. Two minutes? Five? But when I do, he's holding me close. And he found time to remove his briefs.

A bead of precum glistens at his tip. "Well, don't just lie there, soldier. Take me."

He doesn't move. "You don't…you have to go to the doctor…"

It takes me a full minute to figure out why he's suddenly embarrassed. "Flippin' flapjacks. You think I'm the first pregnant woman who had sex right before going to the doctor? Who came in with…err…?"

"Maybe?"

My eyeroll is worthy of an Academy Award. "Get inside me. Now."

He lays me against the pillows and straddles me—as best he can with my belly in the way—but when he slides home, I don't care that my legs are almost folded in half.

He's gentle—and not—thrusting with a punishing rhythm that would shake the entire bed if he hadn't bolted it to the floor not long after I moved in.

The feel of him inside me, of his dick getting harder with each thrust, is something I'll never tire of. When his eyes start to roll back in his head, I grab his ass and pull him closer.

He shouts my name as he flies apart over me. He doesn't see it. What he looks like when he lets go. How all the darkness he carries with him every other minute of every day simply vanishes when we're connected.

Knowing I can give him this—even briefly—is all I'll ever need. Besides him and our daughter.