So Much More: An Alabama Summer Novella Read online

  “I’d prefer you didn’t.”

  She gives me a cheeky look over her shoulder on her way out of the bathroom.

  And . . . cue erection.

  Yep. Like fucking clockwork with her.

  Jesus.

  We find the boys in the kitchen after Mia pulls on a pair of sweats.

  They’re sitting at the table—Chase on his knees as he pushes his toy truck back and forth and Nolan across from him, his drawing pad opened and colored pencils nearby.

  I watch him flip to a blank page, and I know he’s getting ready to draw another picture for that girl he’s absolutely fucking crazy for. I know it before he even taps out the pink colored pencil to use.

  He’s in love. Full-blown, out-of-his-mind in love already at six years old. And if this was any other kid, I’d laugh, knowing they didn’t mean it.

  Six-year-olds don’t feel love like this. Little kids don’t meet one time and feel what adults feel. It isn’t possible.

  But this is my son. And I know he loves that little girl as much as I love Mia. Crazy, but it’s true. He hasn’t been this obsessed with something since the first time he saw a knight on TV.

  Mia kisses the top of Chase’s head and looks across the table at Nolan. “What are you drawing, baby?”

  “I don’t know yet. I’m still deciding.” Nolan lifts his head and looks at me. “Daddy?”

  “Yeah, buddy?”

  “I’m gonna marry Ryan.”

  Mia gasps and grabs hold of my hand as something warm spreads underneath my ribs. “I know you are,” I tell him, smiling proudly.

  “I really am. I mean it. She says she’s my friend, but I just love her so much. Do you think she loves me too?”

  “Ben,” Mia whispers.

  I don’t need to look at my wife to tell she’s crying again. I know she is. Every sweet word out of Nolan’s mouth gets to her. So I keep my eyes on my oldest, and answer, “I’m sure she does.”

  He smiles then, the dimples caving in his cheeks, and nods once. “Yeah, me too. I think she loves me. Mommy, guess what she’s being for Halloween?”

  “What, baby?”

  “A princess!” Nolan’s eyes brighten as he sits up, leaning his elbows on his drawing pad. “That’s so perfect, right? I didn’t even tell her to be that! She’s so cool. She just knows.”

  When Nolan gets back to his drawing, Mia drops her head on my arm and squeezes my hand. “I love the way he loves. He’s just like you,” she says, quiet enough for only me to hear.

  I kiss the top of her head. “You ready to tell them?”

  “Yes.”

  I pull out the chair closest to me and guide Mia to sit down, then I pick up Chase and stand with him beside her.

  “Nolan, come here.”

  Nolan puts his colored pencil down, slides out of his seat, and stands in front of Mia. “Yes?”

  She grabs his hands and holds them in her lap. “Daddy and I have something very important to tell you.”

  His eyebrows shoot up. “Are we taking another trip to Chicago?”

  I shake my head, smiling.

  One-track mind—getting to see his girl.

  He is definitely my son.

  “No, not right now, baby,” Mia says, holding his cheeks. “I love your heart, Nolan. Do you know that?”

  “Yes. You say that all the time.”

  “Good. Because I don’t want you forgetting. And I don’t ever want you to stop loving the way you do. It’s really special.”

  “Well, I don’t know any other way, so . . .”

  Mia whimpers and pulls Nolan against her chest, crushing him into a hug. His muffled protest doesn’t stop her.

  I look to Chase and shake my head. “We do have news, little man. Not sure you’re going to hear it today, but we do have news.”

  “Oh, Ben. I can’t help it. Did you hear what he said?” Mia looks up at me with big, fat tears rolling down her cheeks. She wipes at her face, then eases Nolan back with her hands on his shoulders. “Okay. Okay. I’m ready to tell you the news.”

  Nolan blinks, looks up at me, and then back at Mia.

  “We’re having a baby, Nolan,” she shares. “You’re going to get another little brother or sister. Isn’t that exciting?”

  “Do I get to pick?” he asks.

  “Do you . . . get to pick what, sweetheart?” Mia cups his cheek.

  “If I get a brother or a sister, because I want another brother.” Nolan looks between Mia and myself. “I think sisters are cool and everything, but Ryan has two sisters and I want us to match. So, I’m gonna need another brother. If I get a sister, we won’t match.”

  “Buddy, we don’t really have control over that,” I tell him.

  “Just do what you gotta do, Dad.”

  I laugh.

  “Baby, whatever is in my belly right now, that’s it,” Mia tries to explain to him. “We can’t change it. I might have your little sister growing in there.”

  “She’s growing in there right now?” His eyes light up.

  Mia nods. “Yes. He or she. They’re really tiny right now.”

  “Can I feel them like I did when Chasey was in there?”

  “Not yet. But as soon as you can, I’ll let you know, okay?”

  Nolan nods and looks up at me. He smiles. “Cool. This is the best Halloween ever, and I haven’t even gotten any candy yet.”

  Smiling, I crouch down beside Mia. I put my hand on her belly, and grin when Nolan puts his hand on top of mine. Chase reaches out too, and Mia takes his hand and rests it next to Nolan’s.

  “Chasey, say baby,” Nolan prompts.

  “Baby,” Chase repeats, the word getting muffled around the thumb in his mouth.

  Mia smiles at me with tears in her eyes again.

  “Angel.”

  She leans forward, meeting me halfway, and we kiss until Nolan whines and tells us to stop.

  “Okay. Now, who wants some special Halloween pancakes?” Mia asks.

  “Me!” Nolan yells.

  “Me!” Chase echoes. “Pamcakes! Pamcakes!”

  Reed

  Staring up at the ceiling, I toss one end of the rope I’m holding over the exposed beam above me and catch it when it drops through.

  The bar is quiet. McGill’s typically doesn’t close on Saturdays, but with Danny and Hattie, Beth’s uncle and aunt, being out of town most of the day, they decided to keep things locked up so Beth wouldn’t be running things alone.

  I appreciated that. I didn’t want her stressing out or worrying she wasn’t handling things. And it worked out with the Halloween party tonight. We’ve had time to get everything ready.

  “I don’t know about this,” I say, giving the two ends of the rope a tug. “I get making this place look creepy for the party, but what about Nolan and Chase? Isn’t it kind of fucked up having nooses hanging from the ceiling with kids here? It’s morbid, right? What if Nolan is like ‘Uncle Weed, what’s that for?’ What am I supposed to say? No. Yeah, no, we’re not doing this.” I pull the rope off the beam. “The spiderwebs and ghosts we got up are enough. I’m not traumatizing kids and then getting my ass beat when I do traumatize them.”

  Ben wouldn’t hesitate. He’d kill me. I know he would. It doesn’t matter how long we’ve been friends or how much my death might upset people—mainly the girls in the group.

  I can’t imagine Luke shedding a tear over my demise.

  Beth doesn’t respond, not even with a reassuring, “You’re being silly. Ben would never kill you,” and when I turn around to look for her, expecting an empty bar behind me to explain her silence, I see her standing in the same spot she was in a minute ago.

  Behind the counter, rag in one hand and an apple she’s wiping off in preparation for tonight in the other. Bobbing for apples is one of the games she’s putting together for the kids. I didn’t think it was necessary to clean off the apples since they’re going in a big bucket of water anyway, but Beth thought it was important, and while I’ve been decora
ting, she’s been wiping pesticides off fruit.

  Up until this point, she’s moved through the process rather quickly. Now, though, with her eyes fixated on the rope in my hand, she seems to be slowing down. Or maybe she just found the world’s dirtiest apple. I don’t know, but if she doesn’t move on soon, she’s going to take the skin right off that thing.

  “Sweetheart.”

  Beth’s eyes snap up, and her hand holding the rag stills. “Mm?”

  She’s fresh-faced, no makeup on yet, has her hair pulled back in a messy pony with several pieces falling out by her ears, and looks one bend away from busting out of the Nirvana shirt she’s wearing. The material is stretched tight across her belly.

  I smile at her.

  My wife is sexy as fuck pregnant.

  “What are you doing, Mrs. Tennyson?” I ask.

  Beth smiles then, and fuck, what that smile does to me.

  That’s her Reed smile. She calls it that, so it’s not weird that I call it that. And fuck anyone who says it’s weird.

  I get that smile. Not them. Never them. So fuck off. I’ll call it what I want.

  “Cleaning off the apples for the party,” she answers with a sweet tilt of her head.

  I chuckle. “I think that one you got there’s good. You can probably move on.”

  Beth blinks, looks down at her hands, and then quickly drops the apple into the large tin bucket on the bar. She huffs out a breath.

  “You all right?” I cross the room and stop in front of her, folding the rope and setting it down between us on the bar top. I keep my hands wrapped around either end. “Beth . . .”

  Lips parted, cheeks flushed, eyes wide and glassy, she stares at the rope.

  I can hear her breaths leaving her. Ragged. Wanting.

  Hungry.

  “Uh . . .”

  “I miss getting tied up,” she shares, lifting her chin to look at me.

  My eyes widen.

  She clears her throat, pausing for a breath. “Not that the sex we’re having now isn’t amazing, because it is,” she continues. “But it’s not you, Reed. You tie me up and you spank me and you do really dirty things, freaky things, awesome things, and you’re not doing them anymore. We’re having Beth is pregnant sex. And I miss Beth is just as much of a freak as I am sex. Because I am. I mean, you know, with you I am. And watching you with that rope is driving me crazy. Because I know what you can do with that rope, Reed. I know exactly what you can do with it. And I want that. So, yes, I agree with you. Hanging nooses from the ceiling is a bad idea. But you tying me up with that right now is not a bad idea. It’s a great one. It’s an idea that needs to happen before I explode.” Her shoulders sag. She places her hand on her swollen belly and nods once. “There. I said it.”

  Eyebrow cocked, I look from her face to the rope in front of me and back up again.

  Jesus. That shit almost sounded rehearsed.

  “You been wanting to say that to me?” I ask, needing to know if it was.

  “Yes.”

  “For a while?”

  “Yes.” She drags her teeth across her bottom lip. “I know you’re worried, but I checked with my doctor and she said we’re fine. A lot of pregnant women spot in the beginning. It had nothing to do with you restraining me the way you did that night. She said it didn’t.”

  What the . . . “You told your doctor about the way we fuck?”

  “I needed to make sure it wasn’t what caused the bleeding. And it wasn’t.”

  I run my hand down my face, a heavy breath leaving me.

  Jesus Christ. I suspended Beth from the ceiling that night and took her ass while she rode a dildo. Now the entire Obstetrics department at St. Joseph’s Hospital is probably aware. News like that travels.

  I’m sure my name will be mentioned in textbooks now.

  Reed Tennyson—the man who took his kink too far. Don’t do what he did.

  I exhale slowly. “Beth—”

  “I miss you.”

  Her whispered confession lowers my hand and presses a heavy weight on my chest.

  “I know you need that stuff,” she continues, her shoulder lifting with a jerk. “I know you love doing it. And . . . well, I need it too.”

  “I need you,” I correct her, needing this to stick since she’s obviously questioning it. “I don’t need to tie you up to get off, Beth. I feel like I’ve made that point pretty damn clear. You smile at me and I’m like . . . fucking there, just from that. You know how you get to me. I’ve told you. It doesn’t take much.”

  “I know. But it’s not the same.”

  “Sweetheart . . .”

  “Reed, please.”

  “What if I hurt the baby?” I throw my fear out into the open between us. “What if I go too far with it and something happens? The last time we played, you started bleeding, Beth. I can’t . . .” I shake my head as that same worry forms a knot inside my stomach. “I can’t stop picturing that. It scared the fuck out of me. I didn’t know what the hell was happening. I thought I was losing you both.”

  The sound of Beth calling out from the bathroom—I can still hear it. The panic in her voice. The fear. I can still see the tears in her eyes. I can’t do it.

  “I can’t,” I tell her.

  She pulls her lips between her teeth and looks away, blushing in her embarrassment for bringing this to my attention. For wanting it, maybe.

  I frown.

  She’s disappointed now.

  Fuck though. Not as much as I am.

  My wife needs something and I can’t give it to her.

  My hands grow tighter and tighter around the rope as I take in a deep breath, thinking, weighing the consequences. I play devil’s advocate with myself.

  I could do this with Beth and everything could be fine. That incident was a one-time thing. It wasn’t even related to what we did. Listen to the doctor. Doctors know everything.

  Or . . .

  Fuck that doctor. She doesn’t know shit. I was too rough with my wife and nearly cost us our baby. The best thing to do is wait the five months we have left. What’s wrong with regular, standard-issue sex? With Beth? Nothing. That shit’s fantastic.

  But she’s right. I do love the really dirty things we used to do. The freaky things. Awesome things. God, do I love it. She’s so right.

  The act of sex isn’t the only thing that gets me off. It’s the lead-up with Beth. The prolonged, almost agonizing wait. The way she looks with her hands above her head or behind her back. Her skin—wrapped in rope. Glistening with sweat and red from my mouth. How she quivers and drenches my hand the second I touch her. The begging. The begging. How we’re both shaking and panting when I finally . . . finally take.

  Okay, so maybe we don’t go all in.

  Fifty percent kink. Fifty percent normal fucking. That might work.

  “Maybe we just don’t involve any dildos,” Beth murmurs, her eyes slowly meeting mine again.

  I laugh under my breath, feeling lighter, like she somehow plucked the worry right out of me. And when I open my mouth to tell her “Okay,” or “Maybe, we can try it,” she cuts me off.

  “It isn’t me, right?”

  My brow furrows. “What?”

  Hands resting on her belly, Beth looks down at herself. “I know this gets in the way a little,” she says. “I already look so different. My face is rounder and God, my butt—”

  “Don’t even finish that thought, ’cause that’s fucking crazy,” I interrupt, lifting her head. “Your ass could be the size of this room, and I’d still want to do you at all times. You being pregnant, Beth? I am into that. I am into that in a big fucking way.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes. Are you kidding?”

  She blinks, and I can see on her face how much doubt she’s holding onto.

  I could tell Beth anything right now. I could say how unbelievably attracted I am to her, looking the way she does. I could tell her she’s never looked more beautiful to me, and it wouldn’t matter. She wouldn�
��t hear it.

  I look down at the rope again and run my thumb over the harsh fibers. “Fuck,” I groan, pushing it aside. “I can’t use that. It’ll hurt you.”

  Her shoulders pull back. “What?” she whispers, voice racing with excitement.

  “That isn’t like the rope I use and I don’t have any with me, so . . . I mean, if you want to do this now, I’m gonna have to use something else. Or we can wait until tonight when we get home, which I think is the better idea. Hattie or whoever could walk in and catch us. I can’t imagine explaining to anyone why I have you tied up on the bar. Or what that would do to business here.”

  McGill’s Pub would close. I would be to blame for it.

  That’s nice. I’m sure Danny would really warm up to me after that.

  “There’s always the storage room.”

  My brow lifts at her suggestion.

  Beth wets her lips and steps closer, reaching for the rope. “Hattie and Danny won’t be back until later after the party starts. And nobody else is coming in. The door is locked. But just to be on the safe side, we could use the storage room. It’s private.”

  “And what are you doing with that?” I ask, tipping my chin at the rope as she clutches it against her belly. “I told you. It’s too rough.”

  “You’re wearing a belt, right?”

  “Yes.”

  “I have an idea.”

  “Do you?” I smirk, bringing my arms across my chest and standing tall. “A kinky one?”

  “I think so.”

  “That’s fucking hot. Care to share, Beth Davis from McGill’s?”

  Her eyes narrow as she fights a smile. “That’s not my name anymore.”

  “I know. It’s just a habit.”

  “Have you changed it in your phone yet?”

  I nod my head, grinning. “No.”

  “Reed,” she giggles.

  “What? It makes me happy when I see it.”

  “Oh, and seeing Beth Tennyson from McGill’s wouldn’t make you happy?”

  “That would make me lose my mind.”

  “Then change it.”

  “I will. I just like remembering you and your dick deprivation. Oh, how far you’ve come, sweetheart.”

  She throws her head back and laughs, hand to her chest.

  I like to tease my wife about her little autocorrect mishaps. Telling me she didn’t get dick very often instead of sick very often right after we first met isn’t something I’m ever likely to forget about.