by Anthology
“Really?”
“Sì.” He nodded. “When you were going through chemotherapy, they called me every week to let me know how you were doing.”
“Luigi and Rocco called you while I was ill.” Caught off-guard by his reply, I sat upright, more awake than before.
“They texted me photos and kept me up-to-date on your recovery.” His thin lips spread into a wide smile. “I had to make sure you were okay.”
“Why didn’t you come visit me then?” I asked in exasperation.
“The doctors had told us any added stress would weaken your immune system. I figured having a father around you hated would surely make you sicker.”
“Hate.” A cold knot formed in my stomach. “No, Padre. I could never hate you.”
“I love you, Jemma. You’ve made me so proud. All that you’ve accomplished. You’re such a survivor. Please, do me this honor and let me give you away today.”
His request, his words, his very presence mended a hole in my heart. Right there. Right then. I hadn’t realized it was even there. But it was, all along. Every day since Madre’s funeral, since he and I had stopped talking, my heart had ached. “I would like nothing more, Padre.”
As the day progressed, I was reminded by my loved ones how short life was and that every day, each moment, should be enjoyed to the best of our ability.
The next day, my two husbands and I traveled on to Moscow.
Then a few days later we were in Paris.
Then a week later Beirut.
And two weeks after that, Ibiza!
The sun and the sand with a drink in my hand. I’d never believed in love at first sight until I went to Ibiza.
We had nights I would always remember. Rocco topped Luigi. I topped Luigi, too.
My hair got lighter. My skin became darker. The water seemed warmer. The music sounded louder. I felt younger. Our lovemaking went on for ohhh…so much longer.
My life just got a whole of a lot better.
Chapter Nine
Frickin’ A! I can’t be preggers.
Jemma
The Ritz Carlton Hotel, Manhattan, New York
Six weeks later
Cazzo!
“Lick…harder,” I sassed, trying to overcome an odd wave of nausea I’d awoken to a few minutes before.
Rocco lapped his tongue around the sensitive flesh on my clit. The leather mask he’d worn the previous night at Taddy’s soiree was pulled up over his forehead, causing the long, black curls of his hair to frame his beautiful face.
We’d had so much fun dancing the night away. TV producers who’d been following us for weeks from country to country had asked us to do a reality show.
Can you believe it?
He buried his Roman nose, full lips, and thick tongue deep inside me.
“Sì, move over,” he muttered between grunts in Luigi’s direction. “Let me have her.”
Luigi brought my body over his as I spread my legs wider for Rocco. We were just waking up to another naughty day in the Big Apple.
“Cazzo. It’s too early for anal,” I cried out as Rocco started to finger my ass.
“Jemma, it’s never too early.” Luigi put on a condom, and slid himself inside my ass, filling me.
Up and down my entire body ran an erotic shiver. Curling my toes, I held onto Rocco’s torso. Guiding my body to receive him as well. Mind you, this takes a bit of effort.
“We haven’t even had espresso yet,” I contested.
But how could I resist them?
I bit my lower lip as Luigi slid deeper into me. Rocco climbed on top, slamming himself into my cunt. “Bello, slow down.”
“Jem. My Jemmy!” he cried out.
Luigi palmed the globes of my ass and shouted dirty things, sexy things, getting all alpha.
Each of them stiffened inside me, and I melted between them. Rocco thrust forward as Luigi pulled back.
“Oh, amore. Yes. Like that. Don’t stop.”
Wet. I started to get so wet.
“I’m going to come,” Rocco moaned.
Glancing down, my eyes caught his massive dick thrusting in. Then he’d pull back a few inches, his face longing to fill me again. And so he’d drive back in as satisfaction filled him just as it did me.
“Come,” I growled in his ear.
His hotness jetted inside me.
I closed my eyes and saw bright colors burst under my eyelids. An orgasm crashed over me, too. My body trembled.
Luigi held me tight and slowed his thrusts in my ass down.
I opened my eyes to see Rocco lowering his face under my pussy and to Luigi’s dick. He loved to taste him.
Pulling out of my ass, he threw the condom on the floor.
Rocco sucked him dry.
Unsure whose arms and legs belonged to whom, we laid in bed together entangled. I ran a hand over each of their chests.
Luigi spooned me from behind. His big hands, rough and callus grazed my back.
Rocco stared at me as if he wanted to say something. Something had been on his mind. Always sensitive, he’d been acting weird lately. Ever since we’d gotten to New York, actually. Total oddball. Instead, he grabbed a jar of a homemade cream he liked to rub on my skin after we made love. His Nonno had given it to me at my wedding. Said it would keep me healthy.
“What?” I leaned in kissed him on the lips.
“Nothing,” he said and started to apply a thin layer to my skin. First rubbing my shoulders, then my breasts and torso.
“What’s bothering you?”
“It’s not me I’m worried about. It’s you.”
“Me?” I asked, turning my head back to Luigi to see if he was paying the conversation any attention.
He was.
“How are you feeling lately?” Luigi asked.
“Great,” I replied and stretched my body out between them. I’d been in remission for a year, having passed what the doctor had called my ‘danger zone’. “I’ve gained a little bit of weight recently, but I like it.”
After years of being uncomfortable in my own skin, that day I was able to say I loved myself.
“When was the last time you had your period?” Rocco’s thick, black eyebrows shot up as one.
“I don’t know…”
“Think.” Luigi pulled me closer to him.
“A month or so ago. Maybe two.”
Maybe three.
That didn’t mean anything. Ever since chemo, my periods had been sporadic. Sometimes they wouldn’t happen at all, and other times they just wouldn’t seem to let up.
“You are pregnant,” Luigi muttered in my ear. His hands came over my stomach.
“Don’t be silly. You both know I can’t get pregnant.” I swatted him away, sat up, and turned around to face them.
Hands behind their necks, they were both spread out in bed glancing up at me. So beautiful. So sexy. So mine.
“Only one way to find out.” Luigi tossed the sheets back.
“I’ll run to the corner store and get a pregnancy test.” Rocco jumped out of bed, slipped on his slacks, a polo, loafers, and was out the door before I could even tell him to freeze.
“Don’t act surprised, dolce. We haven’t used condoms since we started our sabbatical.”
“My darling, I’m not surprised because I’m not pregnant. We’d agreed, no babies. No convention. Just us out for fun.”
“Sì, but maybe the universe has other plans,” he said.
“I make the plans around here, thank you very much.” Not entertaining the notion, I left Luigi on the bed, made my way to the bathroom and closed the door.
In the shower I let the hot water beat on my back, washing the morning’s lovemaking off my skin.
Pregnant.
Well, that’s utterly impossible.
Fingering a citrusy shampoo through my hair, I thought about what the doctor had said to me before I’d started treatment.
“I strongly urge you to have your eggs frozen before chemo,” he’d suggest
ed.
“That won’t be necessary. I have no room in my life for children.”
“Are you sure you won’t change your mind?” he’d asked.
“I get that this chemo is going to change me from the inside out.” I’d checked off the box on the form that I understood all the treatment would entail.
“Sì, I’m afraid so.”
The real reason I didn’t get my eggs frozen was because whose baby would I have? Rocco’s? Luigi? I knew Rocco wanted a baby, but did Luigi? I doubted that then as I do still. But Rocco’s face seemed happy. Like ecstatic. WTF! I didn’t want to disappoint him, but he’d have to get himself another wife. Or we could adopt.
The water collected at my feet as I stared down, looking at the drain. I thought about my Rocco. He was almost thirty, the age where if he had any urges to become a padre it would be then.
I soaked my hair under the spout, the sudsy bubbles running down my body. I then ran a fruity scented conditioner through my hair.
Life has been full of so many surprises lately. First my fashion brand tanked, then Padre and I made up, now I’m married, and my new designs for the next season are going to be a hit. I can almost taste it. But pregnant? Really…
***
Rocco
Inhaling a deep breath, I tried to remain calm and count back from one hundred.
99, 98, 97, 96
That was what Nonno had urged me to do every time I felt the onset of a panic attack.
And gurl, was I feeling one right about then or what. In a good way.
Holy moly!
The idea that Jemma could be pregnant…I couldn’t possibly explain the emotions running through my body as I stood in line at the drugstore waiting to pay. All good. I wanted to break out into a song like in that Broadway musical we’d seen a few nights before, and start line-dancing up and down the aisles that my wife could be pregnant.
Staring at the blue-haired elderly lady ahead of me, she had in her basket canned fruit, joint cream for pain, and a protein shake which promised to build her bones. She fumbled with her coupons in her hand, demanding some of the items were on sale.
What did I have in my basket?
A pregnancy test! Correction, four pregnancy tests. We had to be sure. Didn’t we? Nonno predicted this would happen.
Well, Nonno sorta helped.
He’d said at our wedding, “Rocco, if you’re going to go monogamous with Luigi and Jemma then maybe you three should think about having a baby.”
“Not biologically possible. She can’t get pregnant,” I’d argued, telling him about Jemma’s chemotherapy.
Nonno loved Jemma like she was his own granddaughter. Having a gay grandson like me come home one day and introduce him to my boyfriend and my girlfriend sorta sent Nonno on cloud nine.
Nonno had loved my triad relationship. Thought it was the best thing that could’ve ever happened to me, and I wholeheartedly agreed. Luigi and Jemma have changed my life, brought me so many blessings. I’m blessed to have them.
“Miracles happen, son. Sure she can get pregnant.” He’d handed me a gold jar of cream. “This is a special blend I’ve prepared for Jemma. Rub it on her skin every morning and night. She’ll get pregnant.”
Aside from being a mental health doctor, Nonno was always a bit of a self-taught holistic practitioner. The neighbors called him a witch doctor. Either way, that was just Nonno.
I stepped up to the cashier and asked, “Which one works the best?”
“Hard to say. Try these two. They have a ninety-eight percent accuracy.” Her acrylic nails pushed them to the front.
I paid and head back to the hotel where I found Jemma drying herself off in the bathroom. Her wavy hair blew back and forth as she combed it. Kissed by the sun in Ibiza, it was golden in some areas. Beautiful.
Luigi was in a robe and drinking espresso. He sat at the table in the room’s living area with a focused expression set on his features. He didn’t speak but his eyes, hazel and brilliant, always said enough to me. We were both on edge.
“Jemma, I got you the test.” I placed two boxes next to the sink.
“I’m not taking it,” she stated and continued getting herself dressed.
“Of course you’re taking them,” I argued and crossed my arms in the doorway.
“Do you two really want this?” Her eyes became glassy.
Trying to relax, I wrapped her in my arms and shushed her.
“Why are you getting upset, Jemma? It’s just a test,” Luigi said as he came into the bathroom.
“Answer my question. Do you two want this?”
“A bambino?” I clarified.
She nodded.
Glaring at Luigi, I hoped he’d say what I wanted to hear.
“Sì,” he replied. “I want us to be a family. Whatever that looks like for us.”
“We already are. We don’t need a child to define that for us.” Jemma wouldn’t let up.
“For me, Jemma, take the test. If it comes out you’re not pregnant, we’ll forget we ever brought this up and make our way to the airport.”
Our flight back to Italy was leaving in a few hours.
“Listen, fellas. I get you’re both sad our holiday is coming to an end. Berlin. Paris. Moscow. We’ve had fun. But I have to get back to work.” She tossed the pregnancy tests in the trash.
Oh, brother.
Luigi reached down and pulled them back out. Jemma could always say no to me but to Luigi, not so much. He stepped forward and I pulled back, giving him space. He kissed her on the lips, shoved the boxes in her hands and then said, “Jemma. Damn you. Take the test. Now.”
“Fine. Get out. Let me pee.” She pushed us out of the bathroom.
I heard the boxes being opened and the rummaging of the instructions.
“Do you want us to help you?” I asked through the crack in the door.
“Grazie. No. Give me two minutes.”
We waited.
Two minutes later, she opened the door. “I can’t look at the sticks. You look and tell me.”
“Okay.” I went to go into the bathroom but she stepped out and closed the door.
“Before you go in there…I want to ask you both something and you better be honest with me here.”
Luigi nodded.
“Sì, of course,” I agreed.
“Let’s assume I am indeed pregnant. Are we going to get the kid tested to see which of you is the padre when he or she is born?”
“I dunno.” I hadn’t thought that far ahead.
“One of you is the padre. One of you isn’t. Will that change the love you have for the baby if you aren’t?”
I drew a quick breath. “No. Not in the slightest.”
“Luigi?” She eyed him, waiting for an answer.
“I assumed if you got pregnant, Rocco would stay home with the bambino until it goes off to school.”
“Right,” I said. “Just as we’d talked about.”
“And that we’d raise the child with the understanding that it has two daddies. Not just one.”
“I don’t think we should ever get the baby tested to see who he or she is related to. It won’t make a difference. We’re going to love this baby like our own because it will be ours.” Tears streaked my face.
“Bueno,” Jemma said, and she opened the door.
My heart lurched into my throat as I rushed in and grabbed the stick. “How do you read this thing?” I shouted.
She leaned up against the door. Luigi came up behind her. I held it out to both of them and asked, “What does this symbol mean?”
“Silly, I’m pregnant.” She smiled.
About Avery Aster
New York Times bestselling author Avery Aster pens The Manhattanites, a contemporary erotic romance series of full-length, stand-alone novels, and the naughty new adult prequel companion series The Undergrad Years. As a resident of New York’s Upper East Side and a graduate from New York University, Avery gives readers an inside look at the city’s glitzy nig
htlife, socialite sexcapades and tall tales of the über-rich and ultra-famous.
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Dedication
To my tenth-grade galpal Sara K. There are no words to describe our twenty-five year friendship other than freakin’ fabulous! There are, however, three songs which have stayed top of mind.
For all the dance clubs, raves, and boys we kissed, Personal Jesus by Depeche Mode. For the night you protected me from being beat up, I’ll Stand By You by The Pretenders. And for those quiet times when we just laid on the plush carpeting, staring up at the ceiling-fan, and discussed what our lives would be like when we were grown, Somewhere by Barbara Streisand.
Every time I hear them, I pause, grin, and thank the heavenly stars for having you in my life. I love you, Greg, Dylan, and Cole more than New York City, chocolate, and red wine combined. Come visit me soon.
Love Always,
Avery
Special Acknowledgments
Huge hugs to my family George, Pauline, and Adam for loving me. Thank you to my friends Shane, Julie, Sara, Kelly, Shari, Edward, Manuel, Brenda, Holly, Pat, Michele, John, Ron, Nicole, Nackie, Bailee, Hector, and Lynn for not taking it personally when I’m locked up in my cave writing.
Fashionista praise to Jennifer, Christine, Joe, Adam, and Lesly for helping with my fashion show references.
Author love to my beta-readers Nicole and Miss Diamond. And much praise to Kristin and Becky at Hot Tree for editing this novel.
Add Avery’s Releases to Your Goodreads TBR List
http://www.goodreads.com/AveryAster
The Undergrad Years
Love, Lex
Yours Truly, Taddy
XO, Blake
Always & Forever, Vive
