by Molly McLain
“His whole life is serious,” she said, hoping her compassion came through. “His job and the Army don’t allow a lot of living on the more fun, colorful side of the fence. Just the black and white of right and wrong.” She gave a what-can-you-do shrug that made Anne smile.
“I’m guessing that’s why it took him so long to bring you here. I know it not might seem like much, but it’s a big step for him to entertain having a full-fledged personal life.”
Yeah, well, nothing flung a guy into ‘full-fledged’ faster than getting his low-key, weekend-only girlfriend pregnant.
“I know,” Ally said. “But him and I aside, I’m glad he took this time to visit you, too.” More than once, he’d confessed guilt over not seeing his mom as often as he could and usually Ally ended up feeling her own guilt at keeping him busy in the bedroom on his weekends off.
“Me too. It’s times like this”—Anne reached out and tapped Brianna’s nose—“I wish I still lived in River Bend.”
The gleam in Anne’s eyes brighter and Ally stiffened. “What do you mean?”
“Oh, I don’t know.” The older woman sighed. “Just that both Mark and Tony are settling down now. Tony’s like a son to me too and, by association, this little girl is like a granddaughter. I’d love to see her more often, and of course if Mark ever has kids, it’ll kill me being so far away.”
Fabulous. Anne would hate her before they had a chance to get to know each other because Ally’d be giving her a grandchild she’d hardly ever see. So much for getting off on the right foot.
“Do you want children?” Anne asked, her smiling eyes still glued to Brianna.
“I do.”
“How many?”
“Three.” Where the hell had that come from?
Anne looked up and her, eyebrows raised. “Why three?”
Because Mark was an only child and she and Luke had always wanted more siblings.
“Tell me,” his mother prompted gently. “I saw the answer flash in your eyes, so I know you have your reasons.”
“It’s silly.”
“I don’t think it is.” Anne covered Ally’s hand and squeezed.
She glanced down at Bri and tried to pretend her face was burning. “Luke is my only brother and, while he certainly made my life as miserable as two brothers might have, I always wished there was one more of us.”
“That’s not the only reason, but I’ll accept it for now.” Anne winked and stepped away to check on the turkey.
Ally blew out a silent breath. Mark’s mother had laser sharp intuition and that would make keeping their secret all the more difficult.
Yay. Two whole days of keeping her nausea on lock down.
God grant me the strength...
***
“She’s going to figure it out. And then she’ll tell my mother, who will, in turn, tell my dad. Then he’ll string you up by the balls while Luke smashes your face in. And then you’ll probably die and I’ll have to raise this kid by myself.”
Mark shook with silent laughter later that night in the darkness of his mother’s second guest bedroom. His Aunt Grace lived in the first one and Tony and Brianna were camped out in the living room.
“Even if her Spidey-sense does go off, she’s not going to say anything until we come clean and tell her. At that point, she’ll make damn sure we know how long she’s known, but that’s about it. She’ll respect our wishes to wait.”
“I hope you’re right.” Ally snuggled against his side, one hand splayed over his bare stomach. He was glad she hadn’t balked at sharing a room under his mother’s roof. After so much time apart these past couple of months, he wanted her as close as possible, as often as possible.
“I am right, babe. My mom is cool like that.” He kissed the top of her head. “How are you holding up otherwise? You didn’t look as green as you did at your parents.”
“No, I’m really good actually.” Her fingers began to flutter softly against his abs and his muscles twitched involuntarily. Like always, Ally’s touch was like a jump start straight to his central nervous system. His synapses lit up like a city at night and his blood pumped faster, too. Naturally his cock perked up and, in seconds, he was rock hard. “Seriously? You’re breaking wood under your grandmother’s antique quilt?”
“I like when you touch me,” he whispered. “Feel free to move your hand a little further south.”
“Your aunt is in the next room,” she whispered back.
“She’s hard of hearing. Now touch me.”
“She can hear just fine!” Ally laughed, her face buried in his chest.
“Then I’ll be quiet.” He shoved her hand down to his junk and she shook harder. “You think my dick is funny?”
She couldn’t answer him for a solid thirty seconds. “You are so bad,” she murmured against his chest when she could finally speak.
“We haven’t had sex in forever, and your tits are plastered against my side. It’s like your nipples are branding my skin, for fuck’s sake. And then you had to go and touch me. If I’m bad, it’s your fault, baby.”
She said nothing, just teased her fingers down the center of his stomach, playing lightly along his happy trail.
“Ally, don’t toy with me. If you start this, we will finish.”
She giggled, then nipped playfully at his pec. “Oh, I’m hoping we will. Or at the very least that you’ll repeat that above-the-belt orgasm you gave me last week.”
“I’ll do you one better.” He jerked upright and flipped her over onto her knees so fast that she gasped. Looming over her back, slid one hand beneath the hem of her tank top and one into the front of her panties. When his fingers found the pearl of a scorching little nipple, she arched her back and shuddered. “Damn, woman, I love how easy it is to get you riled up these days.”
“I hate you,” she murmured, pushing back and writhing against his cock, as he parted her pussy folds and sought out her clit.
“You don’t hate me, baby.” Pluck, stroke, pluck, stroke... He got lost in the rhythm of his fingers, the throbbing ache in his balls and the slippery wet playground between her legs clouding his awareness.
“Oh, fuck...” She buried her cries in a pillow when he slipped two fingers inside and began pumping. The scent of her arousal perfumed the air around them and he took a long, deep breath, letting it fill his lungs. He loved the smell of Ally turned on. Loved how quickly he could get her off even more. Her body was like an instrument he’d perfected, one he could make sing with only a few tweaks. Two beats later, she slammed her hips into the air, her tight channel clenching around his fingers as she came hard.
Shoving his briefs down enough to free his cock, he stretched her panties to the side and buried himself in her wet heat. The last pulses of her orgasm tugged at his shaft and he gave himself over to the primal urge to fuck hard and fast. The squeaky mattress and Ally’s barely audible moans got his blood boiling, but it was the liquid slap of skin on skin that finally did him in. He leaned forward, stuck his face in her neck, and, teeth bared and hips locked, he shot off inside her.
She shook so fiercely that he wrapped an arm around her waist to keep her upright, pressing kiss after kiss along the line of her neck and the sweet curve of her shoulder.
“I could fuck you every hour of every day,” he murmured in her ear, unabashedly addicted to how friggin’ right it felt to be with her. When they made love, they connected on a level that far surpassed the physical sensation of body joining body. He felt her in his fucking soul. A feeling that reached in deep, gripped hard, and branded him. All Ally’s.
There was no better time...
“Ally...” He rolled her over and lowered himself to his elbows above her. Her eyes were sated and wet with emotion, and he kissed her so long and hard, he lost his breath. “Marry me, baby. Tell me I can have this for the rest of my life and marry me.”
Chapter Twelve
I love you after he found out she was pregnant and a marriage proposal after the best sex of t
heir lives.
Mark Dunn sure knew how to mess with a girl’s heart, didn’t he?
In keeping with their lighthearted banter before the fastest orgasm she’d ever had, she laughed. He laughed too, falling to her side and holding her tight.
He said nothing more. Neither did Ally. And she fell asleep not sure if he’d really meant what he said.
Waking up the next morning, Ally replayed that unexpected moment over and over again her head. Mark might’ve followed suit with her amused response, but there had been a rawness and sincerity in his voice that couldn’t be ignored. If he’d really meant to propose, wouldn’t he have said something more? Prompted her for an answer?
When he stumbled into the kitchen after his shower with a scowl on his face and a chip on his shoulder, her concern quadrupled. And she officially felt like shit for reacting the way she had.
“Morning, honey.” Anne toed up to kiss his cheek. “We’re just waiting on Gracie and then we’ll head out for breakfast.”
He grunted. “I’m not hungry. In fact, I think Ally and I are gonna head out a little earlier than planned.”
What?
From her perch at the island, Ally watched him stalk to the coffee pot, tension rolling off his shoulders. This was not good. And the ride home would be worse, because what could she say? She couldn’t pretend his proposal didn’t terrify her as much as it excited her, and something told her Mark wouldn’t want to hear about that lingering fear.
Anne frowned. “You promised me two full days of visiting, Mark Robert.”
“Yeah, well, Ally’s not feeling well, so...” He turned with his coffee cup in hand, his eyes going right to hers. A challenge. Revenge?
God, they needed to work on this communication thing. They would tear each other apart if they didn’t.
Anne swiveled her way. “You’re sick? You didn’t say anything.”
“Um...” Ally cleared her throat and waved Mark’s accusation away. “It’s nothing, really. Just too much stuffing yesterday, I think.”
Mark snorted behind his cup. “Stuffing. Yeah.”
Ally’s face went from cool to scorching in a second. A ball of pressure crept up her chest, settling low in her throat. Why was he doing this?
Anne looked from her son to Ally and back again. “Oh, dear God.”
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
All the color drained from Mark’s face, regret for opening his big, fat mouth, flashing in his eyes. Too late, Sheriff.
“Sorry for the hold up.” Grace breezed into the room with Tony and Brianna on her tail. “Bri decided she hated her outfit so much, she needed to throw up on it.”
Neither Ally nor Mark moved, the two of them caught in a web of hyper-awareness with his mother.
Anne cleared her throat. “Grace, why don’t you and Tony head out with Brianna? We’ll meet up with you at the restaurant.”
Five minutes later, the front door closed, leaving the house in complete silence.
Anne spoke first, her sharp focus on Mark. “Is that why you finally brought Ally to meet me?”
He rubbed a hand around the back of his neck, his eyes on the floor. “Ma, this is between Ally and I.”
“How far along are you?” She turned to Ally.
“Almost eight weeks.”
“Do your parents know?”
“No.” Breathe, girl, breathe. “We wanted to wait until the first trimester was over before we told anyone.” Maybe the whole nine and a half months before they told her dad.
“Will you get married?”
Mark grunted and dumped his just-poured coffee down the kitchen sink.
“I’m not suggesting you should,” Anne clarified. “But it’s a reasonable question for two people who obviously care so much about each other.”
Mark kept his back to both of them, his focus falling on some point beyond the window. “Again, that’s for Ally and I to discuss. Or maybe not. Who knows?”
Okay, so he’d made his point. He was hurt and acting like an ass because of it. But she was hurt too, dammit. They hadn’t even made love last night—they’d fucked. Having a guy pop the question you’ve been dying to hear with his dick still buried inside wasn’t exactly how she’d dreamed it would go down.
Not that she expected roses and a freakin’ carriage ride. But their relationship was based on sex, and the proof was growing inside her. It’d be nice to know she was more to him than a warm and willing body for him to fall into when the mood struck.
“I’m going to pack up our stuff,” he said to Ally without looking at her. “Sorry, Ma, but I’m not in the mood for company over eggs this morning.” He stalked out of the room just as heavy footed as he’d come in.
Ally kept her for composure for all of five seconds before she crumbled. Damn, her hormones!
Anne folded her arms around her and whispered consolations in her ear. “You know how pigheaded some men can be. He’ll come around.”
But it wasn’t a matter of being strong-willed. It was a matter of him realizing she needed more.
Tell me what you need then!
His words from last week rang loud in her memory and she sucked in a shaky breath. “I don’t think he will.” At least not on his own like she’d hoped he would.
“Then make him.” Anne pulled back and held Ally’s face in her hands. “Show him how lucky he is to have you.”
“I’m lucky to have him, too, but we’re never on the same page anymore. Maybe he doesn’t really want this. Maybe it’s not meant to be. Maybe...” She broke off, shaking her head.
“Wanting is the easy part, sweetie.” His mother smiled, pushing Ally’s hair from her face. “And making it work is hard. But that struggle? The one you two are in the middle of right now? This is where the real magic happens. Keep trying. He’ll figure it out.”
***
Ally spoke less than ten words to him the entire two-hour drive back to River Bend. Fine by Mark, because he needed to clear his head and calm the hell down before they had the conversation they needed to have.
He’d asked her to marry him and she’d laughed at him. Fucking laughed. Now he was a thick-skinned man and he could handle a few nervous giggles. But when the laughter faded last night, Ally fell asleep in his arms without a single word in response to his question.
He didn’t know what to make of that, so he’d lain awake for a good hour after she’d drifted off, wondering what the hell he’d done wrong. No, he hadn’t offered the glitz of a pretty ring, but he hadn’t acted completely off the cuff. In fact, he’d done quite a lot of thinking about the ring he’d eventually give Ally. He just hadn’t expected that elusive right moment to sneak up on them in his mother’s guest bedroom. After sex.
In a vain attempt to make himself feel better, he’d decided maybe Ally had just been tired and she’d fallen asleep before they could talk about it. Not the reaction he’d expected to the most important question of his life, but since he was the one who’d made her so tired, he kissed her forehead and let her dream.
But then they’d woken to that uncertain tension between them again. Ally looked ready to burst into tears and she went out of her way not to touch him as they passed each other in the bedroom, getting dressed for the day. By the time he’d showered, she’d claimed a seat in the kitchen by his mom, doing her damnedest to avoid being alone with him.
And that pissed him off. She’d chosen not to answer him and then she wanted to pretend everything was okay.
Tons of reason why that might be ricocheted around in his head, but only one really stuck—Ally didn’t believe he’d really meant to propose. For all he knew, she didn’t believe he really loved her either and that...that one fucking hurt.
Of course, acting like an ego-wounded child hadn’t helped matters either and now his mother knew about the baby, which only magnified the sizzle of tension between him and the woman who didn’t trust his intentions.
He wanted to talk this out ASAP, but it was probably for the best they didn’
t do it while he drove, so he kept his mouth shut, too. Until they reached River Bend anyway.
“Back to your apartment?” he asked her at the stoplight, praying she’d decide to come home with him instead, so they could hammer this out once and for all.
But she cleared her throat and nodded. “I think my place is a good idea.”
Yeah, well, he didn’t. “Ally, what in the hell are we doing?” he asked, his hand tightening around the wheel as he reluctantly turned toward his apartment complex.
She wet her lips and stared out the window for a long beat. “Right now, I’m trying to convince myself that I’m not hurt about what happened last night. That I’m just...confused.”
Goddammit... “Can you explain that a little more, please?”
She folded her hands together in her lap, but not before he saw her fingers shake. “I’m just going to come out and say this and maybe I’m wrong, but...you told me you loved me after you found out I was pregnant, and now you’ve asked me to marry you after we had sex. I just...” She blew out a breath and pushed a hand through her hair. “I love you, Mark, and being with you for the rest of my life?” She gave a light, watery-eyed laugh. “There’s nothing I’d love more. But I need to know that you’re asking for the right reasons.”
She really had no idea how fucking much he loved her, did she? “I don’t say shit I don’t mean, Ally. You know that.”
“What I know is that you’re a guy who does the right thing. And maybe seeing your mom and your family this weekend...maybe it gave you a taste of what things could be like for us if we took that next step. But I’m scared you’re going to wake up five, maybe ten, years down the road and realize the only reason you’re with me is because of the kids.”
“Kids?”
“I want a family, Mark.”
Something stirred deep in his gut. A longing. A primal urge to give her exactly what she wanted, filling her up with babies and growing their family until she couldn’t possibly doubt what she meant to him. “You’d have more than one kid with me even though you doubt how I feel about you?”
