by Penny Wylder
“I’m coming. I’m gonna come in your tight ass.” His voice is a growl, animalistic.
I arch my hips, give him full access. Cry out with him as he comes inside me, his hot cum coating the inside of my ass.
When he pulls out and flips onto the bed beside me, we’re both limp, exhausted. Soaked with sweat. I roll over against his side, and he cradles me in his arms, kissing the top of my head gently.
“That was amazing,” I murmur into his chest.
“No.” He cups my chin, tilts my face toward his. “You’re amazing. I didn’t know it could be this good, with anyone.”
“Neither did I,” I breathe. For a moment, we just watch each other, lost in each other’s eyes. I never want this moment to end.
Then he leans in and kisses my lips, softly. “Just one problem,” he whispers into my mouth.
I kiss him back. “What’s that?” I murmur.
His smile widens, and he reaches down to cup my pussy. “Next time we fuck tonight, I want to come in your pussy.”
I grin and wriggle against him. “Hmm. I think that can be arranged…”
10
Cassius is late for work today. I pad out of the office, where I headed to get an early start on some filing that’s overdue, and find him in the twins’ room, cradling Luca in one arm and Lucie in the other. For a moment, I hesitate in the doorway, not wanting to interrupt. They look so peaceful, the twins both awake but silent, not complaining or crying for attention. They’re beaming up at Cassius, worshipful and happy, making quiet little gurgles of pleasure now and then as he coos to them.
They look… natural. Like we’ve always had this. Our little family. Cassius looks every bit the doting father right now.
I shake myself. This feels like dangerous territory. The sex is one thing—one spectacular, mind-blowing thing. But starting to think of him as a parent, a father to my kids, that’s a whole new leap of faith. I’d need to really know he was in, all in. I’ve handled breakups in the past, seen guys come and go after swearing up and down they’d be faithful. But I couldn’t put my children through that. If the twins started to see him as their father, what would they think if he turned out to be like my exes? Just another asshole.
Looking at Cassius now, I can’t think that of him. I can’t believe he’d abandon me so callously.
But then again, we hardly know each other. This relationship is so new, so fragile. Maybe he wants someone else, someone uncomplicated, without babies in tow. I couldn’t blame him for that.
And maybe he doesn’t want to settle down at all yet. Maybe he still wants to play the field.
I force myself to square my shoulders and step into the room. I’m having fun with him, but I cannot let my guard down. I can’t let him in. Not yet. For the twins’ sake, I need to know him much better before I fully open up.
“Cassius,” I murmur.
He looks up at me, a happy, contented smile on his face. Luca and Lucie coo in his arms, and he squeezes them both gently. “Good morning,” he says, smiling.
“I hate to interrupt…” I glance at the twins, unable to stop myself from smiling too. I’ve never seen the babies take to someone else so easily. Normally I’m the only one they don’t cry for. “But, you’ve got that meeting downtown in half an hour…”
“Ah, shit.” He grimaces. Then glances at the babies. “I mean, poop.”
I stifle a laugh. “Don’t worry. I don’t think they’re quite old enough to understand swears yet.”
He grins. “Well, it’s good to get into practice now. For when they are old enough.”
My heart leaps again. Another promise. Another statement that says he means to stick around. To be here when they are older. “Fair point,” I say, which is the only thing I can manage to say around the sudden lump in my throat.
He seems to sense I’m feeling something. He stands and gently places Luca and Lucie back into their crib, then steps over to wrap his arms around me. “You all right?” he murmurs into my hair.
I nod against his chest, squeezing him back tightly. “Just a little tired, that’s all.”
He pauses for a moment, gazing down at me. I can tell he doesn’t quite believe me, but he’s not going to push the issue. He leans in to kiss me gently, and then squeezes my shoulders one last time. “I’ll be home after the meeting,” he promises. “You and the kids and I need some quality park time this afternoon.”
I grin. “Deal.”
Then he’s gone, and I’m left staring at my babies, uncertain once more. Am I just being paranoid? Is it just my past experiences with men making me expect the worst?
Or am I right to worry, because these babies are my everything? They deserve the best, and they deserve for me to stay vigilant, and not get them tangled up in my heartbreak.
I feed them and get them settled in for their mid-morning nap. But I’m still feeling restless, disjointed. I finish the filing for Cassius, and get his next month of meetings entirely booked. Then I wander around the house, looking for things to tidy. It’s how I handle feeling stressed or unmoored. Cleaning puts me into a better mindset, makes me feel productive, instead of just anxious.
I start in the living room, put away all the clothes I’ve left strewn around, and the baby toys and supplies. Then I move to the kitchen, and finish washing up from breakfast.
There’s a stack of old mail and papers on top of the fridge, which has been there since I started staying here a few weeks ago. It’s an eyesore, messing up the otherwise neat and tidy kitchen. I pull the stack down and start to sort it into piles—obvious junk mail to be tossed, possibly important mail from credit card companies.
Then I reach a file at the bottom of the stack. A blue and white folder, stamped with the logo for A New Chance.
I recognize it at once, because it’s the same fertility clinic I used. The place where I conceived the twins. The company that gave me the best thing in my life.
Curious, I flip it open. Why is this here?
Then I freeze on the first page.
There’s a standard application form for Cassius, complete with a photo of him looking devastatingly handsome, and his personal information completed. But beside it, on the other side of the folder, is someone else’s application.
A woman.
She’s gorgeous. Long blonde curls, blue eyes, high cheekbones. A model type, you can tell just from her headshot. Claire Donoghue, says her name on the personal information profile, and under her address is an address I don’t recognize. A street in a small town, less than an hour drive from Austin. But when I glance over at the other form, at Cassius’s form, it’s got the same address on it.
I think about the clothing in the spare room. About the money Cassius has. About the work trips he takes overnight to Dallas, supposedly.
My stomach churns in horror.
The application is clear—it has “Approved for Treatment” stamped right across it.
He has another life. Children with this woman. A house outside of town. A whole other family. No wonder he seemed so natural around the twins.
No wonder he seemed too good to be true.
Tears spring to my eyes. I collapse onto the kitchen chair, staring blankly at the folder, as those tears fully form and slide down my cheeks.
I’m still sitting there when the elevator opens hours later. Startled, I inhale sharply, sniffing, and slam the folder shut, throw it back on top of the fridge, then add the mail on top of it, a haphazard, messy pile.
“Honey, I’m home,” Cassius sings from the elevator, joking, and it almost sends a whole new rush of tears down my face. I manage to hold it in, only barely, by digging my nails into my palms.
He sticks his head into the kitchen a moment later. “What’d I miss?” he asks, his voice lighthearted.
I stand with my back to him, unable to turn around. When he sees my face, he’ll know. This whole beautiful fantasy world will collapse around us. He’ll realize I’ve found out, he’ll throw me out. And fuck, this jo
b.
I need this job. I need the money.
But I can’t put the kids through this. Through the pain of a breakup. They’re still young enough that they won’t remember this, thank god, if I can put him off now… Get out of this while there’s still time.
“Manila?” He’s walking toward me, concern in his tone again. “What are you doing?” He rests his hands on my shoulders and leans in to kiss my cheek.
“Nothing,” I say, my voice strangled. Tight. “Just cleaning.”
But he hears the sorrow in it. Spins me around before I can react, and of course, my face is still streaked with leftover tears, my eyes still red from crying. “Manila. Something’s happened. Tell me.”
I shake my head, unable to speak. Unable to voice the truth.
Unable to call him a liar. Just like every other man who’s ever broken my heart.
“What’s going on? You can talk to me, Manila. You can trust me.”
“Can I?” I finally snap. I push his hands off my shoulders, stride away from him. “I’m an idiot.”
Now he’s frowning, concerned and confused at once. “You are far from an idiot, Manila.”
“Then why do I keep falling for this?” I fling my arms wide, angry. “Why do I think that I can be happy? Why did I believe this could work? Every relationship I’ve ever gotten myself into is doomed. Why on earth would this one be any different?” I’ve raised my voice; I’m shouting now, but I can’t seem to stop myself.
Cassius stares at me, wide-eyed, shocked. “What are you talking about?”
But I can’t do this. I can’t listen to his explanations, his denials, his excuses. I can’t watch him turn into the same man as all my exes, a liar and a cheat.
The babies have woken up, startled by my shouts, no doubt. They howl from their room, and those cries echo the pain in my heart. I push past him, storm out of the kitchen and scoop them up. Before I realize what I’m doing, I’m packing them into their stroller.
“Manila, please, talk to me. What’s going on? Where is this coming from?”
“I think you can figure that out yourself,” I snap.
His eyes go cold. “If you won’t let me in, I can’t help you.”
“I don’t need your help,” I spit. “I don’t need anybody’s help. I can do this on my own—I always have.”
It barely takes me ten minutes to pack the essentials. I’ve gotten used to this, over the years. I’m practiced at running. I push the stroller out of the apartment, the babies’ travel bag over my shoulder. The rest of it, the clothes he bought me, the toys he bought them, we can do without all of that. We don’t need his charity, any more than we needed him to support us.
We can do just fine on our own.
Anger replaces sorrow for the moment. Just for long enough to get me through this, and I’m grateful for it.
He tries to stop me one last time at the elevator bank. Curls his hand around my wrist and looks into my eyes, pleading. “Talk to me about this, please! What happened?”
“I fell for you,” I say. “That’s what happened.”
Then the elevator arrives. He’s still standing there, eyes wide, mouth open in shock, when I step into it and let the doors swing shut behind me.
11
Three missed calls. All since I got home last night. I stare at my cracked cell phone screen from the discomfort of my tiny, lumpy bed. It used to be fine, until I spent a few weeks sleeping on the comfortable, heavenly bed in Cassius’s room.
My apartment used to feel warm enough, too, until I found myself missing the familiar sensation of his arm around my waist, his body snuggled up against mine.
I squint through the morning gloom across the single bedroom at the twins’ crib. They’re still sleeping soundly, unaware that everything has changed. Unaware of my pain.
But that’s good. This is the only way I can protect them from feeling the same kind of pain.
The phone buzzes again in my hand. Him. Again. I tap Ignore, send it straight to voicemail, then hold down the power button until the phone shuts off. I can’t deal with this right now.
Eventually, I’ll need to. I’ll have to decide if I can face him again. Take the job—only the job, not the life I once dared to think might come with it.
Or if it’s too much, if I can’t handle seeing him… then I need to start applying elsewhere. Polish up that résumé. Get back into the hunt. The hunt that was going abysmally before he agreed to take me on.
Ugh.
Luca fusses quietly, and I slip out of bed. Pad across the room to scoop him up. I pick up Lucie too, then head back to my own bed. I curl up around them, feeling their warm, comforting weight in my arms. Gazing into their bright baby blue eyes, starting to go gray as they age. They’re changing every day, my little darlings, becoming more and more aware of the world around them. I want nothing more than to shelter them from it forever. To keep them from ever feeling the hurt I do right now.
I curl around them and close my eyes. I’ll feed them in a minute. I just want to hold them right now, cuddle them. Luca curls his fingers in my hair, Lucie hangs on to my fingers for dear life, and we cling like that to each other, three lost peas alone in this crappy pod of an apartment.
I don’t remember falling asleep.
I don’t realize I have until the knocking startles me awake. The door. I groan and untangle myself from the kids. Luca cries as soon as I let him go, which sets off Lucie. I try to hush them, even as I hop around the room pulling on a pair of pants over the panties I slept in.
The knocking continues, louder and louder. Crap. Is it my landlord? I’m not behind on rent again. Am I?
Finally, I yank a shirt over my head and pad across the dingy floor to the door. I fling it open, not bothering to peer out through the peephole first.
Mistake.
Cassius stands in my doorway. Framed against the dim apartment hallway, a dingy light illuminating his crisply pressed white work shirt and suit pants, he looks as out of place as a fairy tale prince in a bad cop show.
Meanwhile, I look like a monster, having just rolled out of bed, my hair sticking up on end, eyes red from crying myself to sleep, cheeks puffy from the same. I move to close the door on him, instinctivly, but he blocks it with his foot.
“Please, Manila. Let me come in.”
Just that simple phrase, just my name on his lips, makes my insides melt. I’ve never been able to resist him. Not even now. Not even knowing what he did.
So I step back and open the door wider. Let him into my hovel of an apartment.
To his credit, he doesn’t make a face when I lead him into the bedroom. He takes a seat on the single chair across from the bed, a rocking chair where I cradle Lucie to sleep on fussy nights.
I perch on the bed, one hand resting protectively on each of my babies. “What do you want?” I say, and my voice comes out harsher than I meant it to, choked with sleep deprivation and grief.
“I want you to come to work,” he says simply.
I laugh. Sharp and bitter. “You don’t need me. You never did.”
He doesn’t respond. Just watches me, intense and quiet.
“You saw an opportunity in me,” I guess. “Someone you could take advantage of. You knew I was in a bad position, you knew I had nobody else, so if you helped me, I’d be dependent on you. You could hide me and shame me into silence when your real woman came calling, if she ever found out.”
Now, he reacts. His eyebrows hit his forehead. “What are you talking about?”
I look at my lap. I can’t meet his eyes for this. Can’t watch the lies form in his eyes. “I found the folder,” I say as I rub Luca’s stomach gently. Slow, concentric circles. Focus on him, on my baby. Not on this man who gutted me. “The one from A New Chance. For you and…” I shake my head. I can’t say her name. Can’t make this real.
Before I even finish, Cassius is beside me on the bed, his hand on my shoulder. “Manila.” He’s laughing. Actually laughing.
H
ow could he, at a time like this?
But he cups my face in his hand and turns me to face him, and I see genuine warmth and amusement in his eyes. “You’re wrong, Manila. It’s not what you think.”
I pull away from him, tears springing to my eyes again. I can’t watch him laugh at me. Mock me for trusting him. “If I’m wrong, then explain it to me. Tell me why you lied, why you pretended to care about me, about the twins. Why did you lie and pretend you wanted more babies—you already have children with her, don’t you? You have a family with a woman I’ve never even heard of.”
“Yes you have,” he whispers.
My eyes widen. Is he actually admitting it? Unable to help myself, I look back at him.
There’s a quiet, sincere seriousness in his gaze, one I can’t turn away from. “You’ve met her. You know who the mother of my children is.”
“I never met the woman in that photo,” I snap. But he’s already shaking his head, half laughing, yet with a spark in his eye. Something bright that catches the light as he shakes his head no.
“It’s you, Manila.”
I stare at him blankly. I don’t understand.
He grabs my shoulders, his expression turning darker. Wild. “You are the mother of my children. The twins… They’re mine.”
My lips part, slowly. Moving without permission from my brain.
But…
“That’s impossible,” I whisper.
Cassius closes his eyes, grimacing. His hands hold onto my shoulders, tighten to the point where his grip is almost painful. But I welcome it. That little spike of pain is the only thing tethering me to reality right now. The rest of the world is fuzzy with confusion.
“My ex… Claire, the woman in that photo. She was not a good woman. She was an alcoholic, a user, an abuser. I saw that in her, but I was so desperate for a family, I thought we could make it work anyway. I thought she would change, if we had kids together. So we went to the clinic. That’s the file you found. It’s from years ago, when we were first tested. They told me it was unlikely I’d be able to conceive, but we tried some experimental procedures. I gave them samples, and they finally got some viable samples from me, sperm that would work…”
