by Abby Knox
For our three-year anniversary, Luke says he has something extra special planned.
The first thing I see when I step through the door from the oceanfront cottage onto the long thin boardwalk that stretches from the cottage to the beach, is the top of a large cabana that doesn’t belong there.
The boardwalk crosses the dunes and the protected grasses along the beach. I hope the impromptu cabana is allowed out here on the secluded stretch of coastline.
Luke convinced me to rent three cottages right in a row on this island in the Outer Banks—one for us, one for Lucille, and one for her best friend Laney. I thought it was excessive but he said it was important.
When the man who stays home to raise our babies, who we were finally able to adopt last year, says something is important, then I listen.
So, three cottages it is.
I had thought, when he told me to put on this bikini, that he’d meant for us to go skinny dipping. And I was kind of looking forward to it.
But what I see is a single massage table inside the cabana, and no masseuse.
“What’s going on? Did you order me a massage?”
Luke’s arm grasps me gently and his other hand caresses my growing belly. He’s the only person allowed to touch my swollen belly. Anyone else trying that gets a throat punch. Fortunately I haven’t yet had to employ that move on any grabby-handed person.
Luke’s hand on my belly, however, feels like safety and sends beams of love lighting up my skin.
His soft kiss plays like a gentle symphony against my lips.
“One problem though,” I say. “I can’t lie on my tummy.”
My husband’s fingers brush through my hair. “Not a problem. You lie on your side and let me take care of you.”
He gestures to the massage table. I touch it and it’s been warmed with hot stones that he removes from under the blanket and drops on the sand.
“What now? I don’t see a massage therapist anywhere.”
Luke growls possessively as he leans forward for another kiss and another belly rub. “You think I’m going to let just anybody touch my wife?”
I have to giggle when he gets like this. The truth is, I go for massages at least once a month and he knows it. But I like it when he turns on the alpha at the right moment. My body, especially my pregnant body, really likes it.
He helps me get comfortable on my side, on the table, making sure I’m covered up by the thin warm blanket and massages my lower back muscles over the blanket. My arm is tucked under a full body pillow that supports my belly as I lie on my side.
Luke hasn’t always been the best at massages, but he’s been improving. A few weeks ago I saw him looking up pregnancy massage tutorials, and the mere fact of it warmed my heart because I’d never even asked him to do this for me.
The sound of the waves and the breeze rustling in the seagrass, combined with Luke’s massaging strokes, has me feeling totally relaxed and forgetting about my back ache. I feel like I’m floating on a warm cloud and I could stay this way forever.
Luke has this way of making foreplay less about sex and more about making me feel safe, loved, and pampered.
“This is nice,” I sigh, letting my eyes flutter closed.
“Is this going to make you fall asleep?”
I laugh while stifling a yawn. “No,” I lie.
“It’s fine,” he says, working the meat of his palm into the muscles between my shoulder blades. “Go ahead and drift off. I might have to wake you up in a very special way, though.”
“Hmm. You may wake me up however you choose. Talk to me about your day,” I murmur.
I hear him chuckle because he knows how much I like to listen to him talk while I fall asleep. “While you and Laney were doing your thing, Lucille and I took the girls shopping for the little bean,” he says. “They picked out some toys for her. Cam tried to tell me the baby needed a game console.”
I have to laugh at that. “Sounds about right.”
“Cynthia picked out some pajamas and socks for you to have at the hospital when the baby comes,” he continues.
A tear finds its way into my eye at the thought of that sensitive and thoughtful little one who always puts others first. “She’s such a dear, just like her daddy.”
As I drift off to sleep under the spell of a scalp massage, I feel Luke’s soft lips press gently against my temple. I completely zonk out in the middle of him telling me about Lucille taking the kids for a walk down to the ice cream stand and making plans for them to stay at her cottage tonight. And something about Laney deciding to go to that party that the hotel guy invited us to earlier.
Probably due to the sound of the ocean waves, I have some crazy dream about surfing with my baby strapped to my chest. It’s not a scary dream at all but leaves me with the same feeling I have when I dream about flying.
I have no idea how long I slept, but it must have been a couple of hours because when I wake up, it’s sunset. But that’s not the first thing my brain registers.
No, the first sensation to pop into my awareness is the fact that my entire body is hot. I’m still lying on my side but my top leg is no longer resting on the body pillow that was tucked between my legs. Luke’s big hand has me splayed open, bracing my thigh, and his face is between my legs.
I can’t see him because of my big belly—and because he’s under the blanket—but I can feel his mouth on my warmth, kissing and licking my lips, my bikini bottom stretched to the side.
He realizes I’m awake when I gasp in realization and arousal, and immediately knows what to do next. I feel my clit being sucked into his mouth, and then his tongue diving into my pussy. I relax easily into the rhythm of his magic mouth, letting the pleasure wash over me in tandem with the now-more subtle sounds of the waves lapping the shore.
I don't want to come yet, but Luke pushes me closer when he moans against my sensitive skin. “Mmm, baby, you taste so good, so fucking good like this.”
His licks, sucks and moans continue warming me up, so hot I have to throw off the blanket because I’m starting to sweat. In doing so I end up thrusting against his mouth, which provokes a growl from my big bear, my lion, my love, who drives his mouth harder against me, devouring me. The moan this elicits from me only provokes him further, deeper, harder until I completely fall apart. I feel the involuntary clench, the release, and the squirt.
“Oh my god,” he groans with intense pleasure. His hands caress my ass, the outsides of my thighs while he drinks me in, his mouth continuing to claim me through my orgasm and not letting up until the last of the aftershocks have subsided. “Thank you,” he whispers, making me shiver.
Feeling me tremble, Luke mistakes the movement for an indication that I am cold and immediately stops what he’s doing to wrap me up in the blanket.
“Come on, let’s go get a shower and then we can go sit under the stars.” He lifts me up to carry me in his arms and starts up the wooden walkway.
I don’t argue because, well, it’s my birthday and I’m eight months pregnant.
“Babe, are you gonna let me take care of you at all on this vacation?” I ask.
“No,” he says a little gruffly as we tromp toward the cottage. “I’m going to take off that bikini, wash off all that massage oil, and then it’s naked hot tub time.”
I nuzzle his neck, dappling the strong cords with kisses. “You’re so good to me. I feel bad about Laney being alone.”
“Oh, she’s not alone. She’s meeting up with the hotel guy, remember?”
I begin to protest as he sets me down on the edge of the tub to start the shower. “What? Wait, no, I haven’t even had a chance to run a background check on the guy. He could be a creep!”
Luke laughs. “Don’t worry about it, babe.”
“This is what I do; I screen guys for her.”
The whole time he’s testing the temperature of the spray, he never lets go of my hand. He gives it a squeeze. “You have to trust me.”
I goggle at him. �
�What, you already had him checked out? I gotta stop showing you how to hack into things.”
He chuckles. “No. I checked him out my way.”
“Luke, what does that mean?”
“After you texted me after lunch and you and Laney went for a swim, I paid a visit to the hotel.”
“Luke, no.”
“Oh, yes. I shook his hand, looked him in the eye and told him in no uncertain terms that he was not to fuck with our Laney or I would come over and give him a one-on-one tutorial of an old-fashioned hog farm castration.”
“Geez, Lucas. My way is a bit more elegant.”
He laughs. “Your way is borderline illegal. Anyway. Laney’s fine. He looked me in the eye, gave a solid handshake, and gave the completely right response.”
I stare up at him, waiting for him to tell me. “Well, what’s the right response?”
He shrugs, but his lip quirks up on one side, which tells me he’s not going to tell me.
“You’ll have to wait and see what Laney says tomorrow.”
I stomp my foot but my face gives away my playfulness. “I could throttle you right now.”
Luke crowds me against the tile, his hands on either side of me. Leaning into me, his hard length makes contact with my pelvis and I can’t help but squirm.
“Throttling? I’m into it.” His grin is full of mischief.
“You’re trying to distract me from being angry at your alpha bullshit behavior.” But I can’t deny that it’s working. I want to get my hands on the long, hard distraction, and he knows it.
“Yes, I am. But it worked to keep my wife from opening her work laptop on her birthday vacation.”
He has his ways of doing things, and his ways are not always my ways. After three years together we still have the same little dance as always: my obsession with work to the detriment of everything else; his way of barging in and making order out of chaos.
It works for me and it works for our little family.
I smile against his lips when he leans down to kiss me. “How did you know I brought my laptop? I kept it well hidden.”
He laughs and teases my lips with his. “As I’m the one who repacks your jumbled suitcases, don’t think I don’t know about your secret hiding places.”
I pout. Luke laughs. “You got me,” I say.
His arms slide down to my hips and he claims my mouth in a sweet kiss while he strokes my belly.
“For the rest of your life, I got you,” he says.
About the Author
Abby Knox lives a dual life. Fantasy Abby would love to live on a farm with goats, bees, chickens, donkeys and alpaca, making her own soap, yarn, honey and cheese. Reality Abby has no desire to do actual farm work. So, the ever-pragmatic Reality Abby keeps Fantasy Abby happy by putting her into adorable little works of romantic fiction with her pretend hobbies. Both Abbies hope you enjoy her sweet, sexy — sometimes a little over the top and weird — storytelling.
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Also by Abby Knox
Coming soon … Bake Sale Queen (a new Greenbridge Academy book!)
The Greenbridge Academy series
Swim Coach (book one)
Grumpy Dad (book two)
Benefactor (book three)
Headmistress (book four)
Queen Bee (book five)
The Very Good Boy Duet
Fencing Her In (A bad neighbors to lovers story. With a lot of dogs. You need this in your life.)
Doing Him Good (An insta-love, sowing-his-wild-oats whirlwind romance.)
Need more?
From the Small-Town Bachelor Romance Series
(each can be read as a stand-alone, but if you want to read in order … this is the order)
Take Me Home
Game Face
Written in the Stars, a special Christmas edition
Walk With Me
Stay the Night
I’ve Got You
Come And Get It
The Windy City Holiday Duet
Pumpkin and Spice
Comfort and Joy
Beach Avenue Babes
His Vinyl Vixen (a stand alone for the rock ’n’ roll nerd in all of us)
Her Hi-Fi Hunk (Dusty and Jed from His Vinyl Vixen)
Stand alone short reads and novellas
Doctor Dave
Fighting For Dylan (book four in a six-author MMA series!
Hot Off The Press
The Halloween Bet
One Good Woman (a stand-alone mistaken identity/conspiracy/political drama)
Naughty Irish Heart (a time-hopping Saint Patrick’s Day Romance — two couples and two HEAs in one book! Part of a four-author themed collection!)
Sweet Jane
(An over-the-top amnesia story about being lost, and then found.)
The Christmas Pickup (a holiday short read full of feels, quirky characters and one hot tow truck driver!)
Saved for Me
(a special Holidays with Alexa Riley story)
Matched for Me (A Valentine’s Day story with Fletcher from Saved for Me)
Off-Season Stud (a fun and sexy vacation trope with an OTT ending!)
The Sisters of Enchantment series (a paranormal collection of stories about … yes … witches. I know you want more of these … they’re coming!)
Some Basic Witch
Witch, Please!
An excerpt from Bake Sale Queen
A brand new Greenbridge Academy story!
Bake Sale Queen
Chapter 1
Mal
The supermarket is about as busy as I would expect on a Friday night, and I get jostled in the snack cake aisle by a runaway shopping cart while I’m reaching for the Twinkies.
“Oof!” I cry, nearly losing my footing at the impact.
“Oh, I’m so sorry, are you all right?” The deep voice from behind me is accompanied by the electric touch of a strong hand on my side, steadying me.
I regain my footing and swivel around, nearly gasping at the sight of a wide, beflanneled chest.
“I’m fine,” I tell the chest, adding a “whoa,” silently with my mind.
My eyes travel upward, landing on a pair of kind, gray-blue eyes with crow’s feet that put this man almost in the category of silver fox.
Only he isn’t all the way silver, but a warm brown wavy hair. Just a little bit of salt nixed in with that pepper. The shaggy mop hangs just above his ears.
He holds out the box of Twinkies to me. “You were reaching for these?”
I snatch the box away. “Yes, for a client, not for me!”
The flannel guy shakes his head like he does not care who eats the Twinkies. “OK?”
I laugh a little too hard and reply, “I’m not eating these. I would never.”
His lovely eyebrows raise in mild surprise. “Oh. Too bad. I kind of like those. Would be nice to have a new friend to eat them with.”
I’m taken aback at his forwardness. But not turned off.
“Oh, are you new in town?”
“Yeah. Really new. So new that I haven’t found a place to live yet and I’m shopping in the highly processed snack food aisle because I don’t have a kitchen yet.”
I chuckle and enjoy the view of his shoulders, and the way his forearms look extra sinewy with his sleeves folded up, his arms casually crossed in front of himself.
“Oh, well, good luck on the home search,” I say. “What brought you to town?”
“Work. Well, I’m going to teach poetry at the local prep school.”
My earlier conversation with my neighbor Meredith comes crashing down on me.
It’s him! And Meredith was not wrong about this dude being a snack and a half.
I put out my hand. “I’m Mallory.””
He seems to be reluctant about ending the hand shake. Do I tell him my daughter attends his school and will most likely try to register for that
class?
We stare stupidly at each other for a moment.
“Well. I suppose I’ll see you around,” he says softly. He looks like he’s waiting for me to say something else.
“Yeah,” I say, smiling. His magical smile dares me to take the leap and give him my number.
But ultimately I have to think of protecting Shelby. The bake sale queen can’t give any of the student body any more ammunition to taunt her daughter.
He turns to walk away and I finally see how silly I’m being.
“Quinn, wait.”
He spins around, his rogueish grin nearly knocking the wind out of me. “Yeah?”
I grab an extra box of Twinkies and hold it aloft. “If you help me make a delivery tonight, I’ll have Twinkies with you.”
