The Bourbon Thief(87)

Levi grinned. “Good news. You want to go riding tomorrow? Real riding?”

“What do you think Rex and I have been doing this past month?”

“A Walker walks. You used to run Kermit like you were in the damn Derby. Can’t do that on the island. Too many trees in the way.”

“I don’t know if we should,” she said, watching as Levi raked the old dirty straw to the edges of the stall. “Might not be safe.”

Levi looked sharply at her. “Safe? This from the girl who used to stand on Kermit’s saddle and pretend she was in the Ringling Brothers? When did you start caring about being safe on the back of a horse?”

“When I got pregnant.”

Levi dropped the rake.

He stared at her.

Tamara tried to smile. “You gonna say something?”

“How?”

“The usual way.”

“But you... We went to the doctor and—” He paused and buried his fingers in his thick dark hair and pulled it away from his face. She couldn’t read his expression. Was it shocked and happy? Shocked and horrified? Shocked and shocked?

“Remember the snake?”

“I remember the snake,” Levi said.

“I’d only been on the pill three days that night. Not enough time for it to start working. Anyway, that’s the doctor’s guess. He did the math.”

“The snake. Right.” Levi rubbed his temples. “Wild night.”

“Levi, are you happy?” she asked, tears burning the backs of her eyes. “Or are you mad at me?”

“Why the hell would I be mad at you?”

“I don’t know. I know you didn’t want kids. And I—”

“Oh, my God. Tamara...” He walked to her and took her in his arms. She sank into his embrace like she was sinking into soft earth. He held her close and tight, rocking her against him.

“I didn’t mean to, I swear.” She’d been good. She’d taken her pills. She hadn’t meant for it to happen. But she couldn’t be sad about it.

“I know, Rotten.”

“I want to be happy about it.”

“So do I. I’m scared, but I’m happy.” Levi rubbed her lower back and she finally started to relax a little.

“Me, too. Scared, I mean. But happy. Scrappy.”

Tamara laughed against his chest, which hurt, since she was crying, too, and it wasn’t easy to do both.

“How long... How long have you known?”

“A week, I guess. I was gonna tell you Saturday, but Bowen showed up. I’m two months along.”

“I can do the math.”

Two months since the snake. Strange to know the exact night. Strange to have a snake to thank for their child. That was the night she told Levi she was in love with him still. And the first time she’d told him had been right here.

“You know, we were in this stall the first time we kissed,” Tamara said.

Levi raised his head and looked around.

“We were, weren’t we?”

“My birthday kiss,” she said, grinning at him. “My first real kiss.”

“You were good at it.”

“I was?”

Levi slowly nodded, wide-eyed. “Rotten, if your mother hadn’t interrupted, you would have gotten that roll in the hay you’d been begging for. I was ready to strip you naked and have you right against the wall, which would have been my preferred choice of birthday present.”

“So what’s stopping you?”

“It’s not your birthday.”

“We can pretend it is...”

“Is that safe?”

“My doctor says it is. We can have sex all the way up to the last month if I feel like it. He said I won’t be, but he said we could. In theory.”

“Well, if we’ve got a fast coming in a few months, we better feast while we can.”

Before she could say another word, he’d lifted her off her feet and deposited her next to the back wall of the stall, right where she had been on her birthday.

He tilted her face up to meet his and kissed her. They’d made love fifty times or more since their first time and kissed a thousand. But this kiss burned her the way their first had, burned her right to the core. She was weak with relief that Levi was happy about the baby, overjoyed that they’d finally won and at peace that they could finally start their real lives together. It was right they should do this here and now, finishing what they’d started on her sixteenth birthday.

Levi reached under her dress and cupped her bottom, squeezing it in his large hands. He ran them up her back and down again as he kissed her neck, down into her panties, and then they were coming off, down her legs as he knelt in the straw. He lifted her dress up and Tamara thought she knew what he would do, but he surprised her. He didn’t kiss her between her legs. He kissed her stomach instead, massaging it with his mouth, pressing tender kisses from hip to hip. A soft sob escaped her lips. They would be happy together. They would be. After, Levi dipped his head lower, pushed her legs apart and found her clitoris with his tongue. He worked it gently until she panted, until her head fell back and her hips strained forward, silently begging for more. He lifted her leg up and rested it on his shoulder as he licked deeper in her, opening her up until she felt wetness release from her in little bursts. He stood up finally and kissed her mouth again as he slipped his middle finger into her and curled it forward, finding that tender sensitive place inside her that made her clench and cry out. He swallowed her cry as he stroked her insides and soon she was as wet as she’d ever been. Wet and burning for him. The last time they were here, she’d been a girl, a virgin, and she’d been too scared to do what she wanted. But she was older now, a wife, his wife, and she reached down and opened his jeans, pulling him free and gripping him hard with her hand.