She rolled her eyes as she held out a hand. He knew she was uncomfortable and achy and exhausted, but she was also happy. Pregnancy and nesting suited her. She was glowing and calm and cuddly and he couldn’t wait to see what she’d be like with the babies. The girls. He and Rhodie were going to be outnumbered.
Jethro helped his wife up from the couch and admired the view as she made her way to the bathroom. Yeah she was in pajamas and slippers, but she looked beautiful to him. She always did.
When she got back, Sable scolded him for eating the popcorn. “What are you doing? That’s for garlands, not for eating. There’s no butter or salt or anything on it—it’s not even good!”
He offered her a hand as she flopped back into the cushions and groaned.
“What’s the matter, baby?”
Something shifted in her expression and she looked vulnerable, pleading. Little. “Everything hurts, Daddy.”
“I know. Those girls are just plain rude, taking up so much room, making your back sore and your feet hurt.”
Sable gave him a pouty nod.
He kicked an ottoman in front of her and grabbed the bottle of lotion from the side table they’d started leaving down here around her second trimester. Sable was wearing fuzzy slippers that he took off along with her socks before taking her feet into his lap and squirting some lotion into his hands, rubbing it between his palms to warm it up before starting to rub one of her feet.
Sable groaned again, leaning her head back agains the couch and closing her eyes. “Oh my god that feels amazing. But I feel bad. All I did all day was eat and sleep, string some garlands and go to the bathroom every five minutes. I should be giving you a foot rub.”
Jethro dug his thumbs into the sole of her foot and she made a noise that sounded suspiciously like the ones she made in the bedroom. “All I did was carry around trees and wreaths. You’re growing two whole human beings and carrying them ’round the clock. I feel like I can give my sweet girl a foot rub.”
“’Kay.”
It never took her long to give in. To almost anything, really, but definitely not to a massage. While he worked, he told her about the customers who had come in that afternoon, and when he’d finished both her feet, he helped her up and had her kneel on a wingback chair with her arms resting on the top so he could get her back. Poor thing, she wasn’t kidding when she said she hurt all over.
And poor thing, too, because she’d sent her parents a letter to tell them about the twins and they hadn’t replied.
For as shitty a person as it made him, he was somewhat relieved. Duncan and Deirdre were terrible. If Sable wanted them in their lives, he’d accept it and do anything he could to keep the peace and be supportive but…goddamn he’d rather spend his time doting on his wife than trying to be someone he wasn’t for people he’d never impress.
Duncan had kept his word and fired Sable a few days after she announced their engagement, and hadn’t talked to her since. Deirdre had made one last ditch effort to keep Sable from marrying him but when that failed, she’d been the same. Not a word.
He knew it wasn’t the same, but he was grateful his family had stepped up with heaps of congratulations. His parents had invited them to visit in Florida and he didn’t think his mom had stopped sewing and knitting since she found out about the girls. He could swear they got a new box of baby stuff every week that Sable cooed over before stowing it in the girls’ room.
Also, Hudson and Ian threw one hell of a baby shower, and even Ryker had solemnly given them a gift—a box of cards with black and white animals and letters and numbers on them.
“They like high contrast patterns,” he’d said gruffly and then walked off. But he’d also come to help when the nursery furniture needed putting together. God help the dates these little girls brought home because their uncles were scary as fuck.
Sable let out a satisfied sigh as he rubbed her back and dug into the muscles alongside her spine. They’d cooled it on a lot of the punishments and other pain they enjoyed, but they’d found other ways to play. And looking at her hips that had spread into a luscious heart-shape and her bowed head, Jethro wanted to play with her now.
“Could I interest you in some fooling around?”
Sable had had some bouts of morning sickness early on, but other than that, her sex drive hadn’t waned, not one bit, nor had her interest in kinky shit. If anything, they’d had to get more creative.
“Yes, Daddy, please,” she said, as she arched her back.
He had to be the luckiest man alive.
They’d gotten more into role-play and one of their favorite scenarios to act out was that he’d taken Sable captive to breed her. Looking at the gorgeous shape of her carrying his babies made that the first place his mind went. It was a total caveman thing, but thinking about this woman having his babies totally revved his engine.
“Wait right here, baby. Don’t be naughty and move or I’ll spank your bottom when I get back.”
Sable let out a pitiful, pleading noise that made his dick hard in a second.Not yet.
He washed the lotion off his hands in the kitchen and herded the dogs into the kitchen too. He loved Marigold and Rhodie but he wasn’t a fan of having a canine audience when he was so thoroughly ravishing his wife.
Sable had not, in fact, moved while he’d been washing up—occasionally when he threatened her like that, she liked to be bratty and he’d find her lounging on the couch. Not today.
Jethro stood behind her and without a word, gripped the waistband of her pants and panties and yanked them down almost to her knees in one swift motion which made Sable gasp.