“You can’t,” shewhispered.
“What are the terms?” he asked. “When am I allowed to protect you myway?”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him. “We can fight about it later. We will fight about it later, I’m sure. Right now, I’d like to skip to the passionate lovemaking part, if you don’tmind.”
He set down the picture of their baby and scooped up her legs to gently lay her out on thecouch.
“I don’t mind,” he said, looking down ather.
“What are you thinking?” sheasked.
“I’m thinking that I’ve never looked at the mother of my childbefore.”
He rested his palm against her cheek. It was the face of his beloved. The mother of his child and all the ones that would comelater.
“I love you, Aria. You know that, don’t you?” heasked.
She nodded. “Now kiss me, willyou?”
He touched his mouth to hers and lingered on the pillowy softness of her lips as he slid his hand into the hair at the back of herhead.
He wanted to take his time with her tonight. To worship the body that would give birth to their child, the woman who would pass on all her love and strength and fierceness to their flesh andblood.
Her hands traveled up his chest and she wrapped them around his neck as she returned his kiss, slipping her tongue between his lips, inviting him into the warmth of hermouth.
He responded slowly, relishing the feel of her body under his, the way he fit into every hollow like she’d been carved out of marble forhim.
The kiss was no less erotic for its slowness. His cock jumped to attention as he nestled into the heat between her legs. Their bodies were only separated by the thin denim of her jeans, the thicker denim of his, and the knowledge set fire to his already feverishbody.
He knew what it would feel like to slide into her wet, swollen channel, to feel her hips rise to meet his as he drove intoher.
But he wanted to remember the night he found out about their child. It wouldn’t be a memory they could share with anyone else, but he wanted to hold close the image of Aria’s body by the light of the fire, the knowledge that their child was safe and growing insideher.
He dropped kisses on her cheeks, on her closed eyelids, on the bridge of her nose. He nibbled at her ear lobe, his hands traveling down her chest, gently cupping her breast as he kissed his way down herneck.
She wasn’t wearing a bra, and the fullness of her flesh in his hand was an epiphany: the heavy breasts and rounded curves of her body, the hours she spent sleeping… it had all been because she waspregnant.
The thought of her carrying the secret alone filled him with tenderness, and he stroked one of her nipples carefully as he dipped his head to the hollow at the base of herthroat.
He continued down her chest and she reached for his shirt, lifting it over his head and tossing it onto the floor. He disposed of hers next, then slid off herjeans.
When he was done he sat back on his knees, letting his eyes travel over the ripeness of her body. The changes were subtle: the luscious breasts, the slightly less flat stomach, the rounder curve of herhips.
“You’re more beautiful than you’ve everbeen.”
He was seized by a fiercely protective instinct that only took him by surprise because he’d already been protective ofAria.
Had already been willing to lay down his life forher.
But this was something else, a mandate to ensure her happiness and survival, to ensure the happiness and survival of theirchild.
She looked up at him through half-closed eyes. “Come tome.”
He stood to take off his jeans, then stretched out over her, sighing as her silky flesh touched his, her delicate feet stroking hiscalves.
She licked his chest as he kissed her neck and shoulders. His cock was so swollen he would have been in pain if not for the stroke of her hands on his back, the touch of her lips against hisskin.
He kissed his way from her shoulder down to one of her breasts, licked it slowly before taking it carefully in his mouth, sucking lightly until her back arched off thecouch.