Until the End (Sea Breeze #9)(56)

Another beautiful thing about pregnancy was that she always felt swollen inside, too. It was incredible. “So good,” I told her, reaching up to grab her br**sts in my hands as she began to ride me.

Her soft moans and sweet little cries made it hard for me to lie back and let her control this. I didn’t give her this control often, but sometimes I needed her to take the reins.

Letting go of her br**sts, I slipped my hands around to grab her ass while my eyes stayed glued to the sight of her tits bouncing in my face. Fucking gorgeous.

“I love this ass,” I said, squeezing it. She fell forward on both her hands, and her tits were in my face. My mouth went to work eating them up while Willow said my name and told me how good it felt. When she sat back up, the hard tips were wet from my kisses, and my c**k throbbed at the sight.

“I’m gonna come,” she said, looking at me as her eyes began rolling back in her head. “I’m . . . coming,” she wailed, and the silky walls encasing my dick squeezed and spasmed, pulling me right into the release with her. I jerked my h*ps and met her thrust as I spilled inside her. Marking what was mine.

Willow

Three days after my sister had decided to run off and leave her daughter, Larissa moved into Amanda Hardy’s old bedroom. With the help of Amanda, Margaret, and me, Larissa made the room her own. She even seemed clingy with Margaret, like she knew that this was the woman who was going to take care of her. Who was going to love her. She trusted her already. My sister had denied her so much.

Margaret Hardy would fix that, though. She would love with that big heart of hers, and everything would be okay. Marcus had even calmed down and accepted that his parents were back together.

Amanda had reacted very differently from her brother. She had squealed and jumped up and down. She had been upset about Tawny leaving Larissa like she had, but she was beyond thrilled that her dad was moving back in to be with her mother. Marcus didn’t understand it at all. Since I hadn’t really had a life like the one Amanda had grown up in, I didn’t understand it completely. But I told Marcus my guess was that after growing up with two parents you love, it’s never something you give up on. She was a little girl who had lived a fairy tale, and then it was jerked away from her. She had just been handed that life back. A week before her wedding, too.

I couldn’t imagine there was a bride-to-be as happy as Amanda Hardy was right now.

“Still hard to believe they’re back together,” Marcus said, walking up behind me and slipping his hands around to rest on my stomach. “But I’ll admit, deep down it feels good. Even if it scares me because I’m not ready to trust Dad, seeing my parents together makes things seem right again. I just wish Larissa had that.”

I thought about my sister, who had never been happy about being a mother. Even when Jefferson Hardy had decided to give her the family life, she had only stayed happy for a short time. She didn’t like playing house. And she didn’t like being stuck with an “old man.” I know because she told me that just a few weeks ago when I went to visit Larissa.

I wasn’t sure anything could make Tawny happy. And Larissa deserved a life with love from her parents. Tawny and I hadn’t gotten that kind of home life. Maybe that was why she was so screwed up. But I wanted Larissa to have a chance for more. I didn’t want her to end up like her mother. I wanted her to love life and not live always searching for something.

“Larissa really likes your mom. She’s her little shadow. I think she knows Tawny is gone. Margaret said the last time she asked about her mother was the first night she spent here. When Jefferson was here to tuck her in, she seemed content. She hasn’t asked again.”

Marcus sighed and rested his chin on the top of my head. “Mom loves her. I haven’t seen her this happy since Amanda and I were living at home. She’s baking cookies and making cakes with Larissa just like she used to do with us. I think it’s going to be good for both of them. If Tawny comes back, then she’s going to have to fight Dad for Larissa. He already said he’s not agreeing to joint custody. He’s filed abandonment charges against Tawny and gotten full custody of Larissa. He said he’ll allow Tawny every other weekend, but that is it. He doesn’t trust her not to come back into Larissa’s life and turn it upside down and leave again.”

“Good. Because that’s what she’ll do. I think deep down, in her own weird way, she loves Larissa. But having a child isn’t something Tawny ever wanted.”

I turned around in his arms and kissed the man who gave me my fairy tale. I had never expected a Marcus Hardy in my life. I’d had a friend in Cage York and I had thought that was all I would need. Cage had been my protector. But I had found out that I needed all-consuming, wild, magical love. And that’s what I got with Marcus.

My fairy tale wasn’t over. It was just beginning.

Amanda and Preston from Just for Now

Amanda

When I was sixteen years old, I was positive that I would never love anyone as much as I loved Preston Drake. Sure, he was my brother’s best friend and only saw me as a kid, but I loved him. Every daydream I had was of Preston. Even though he was a major player and he flirted with all females, I loved him. Not once did I think I could love a man as much as I loved Preston Drake.

And I was right. Even at sixteen I was so very right.

In three days I was supposed to be marrying the man I had loved for the past seven years.