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I only rise a couple of inches, just enough to get the angle right, and then I’m sinking down. “Maintaining a balanced diet and staying hydrated is… it’s important,” I try, picking out any random sentence on the page. I could be reading about anything. It’s random words and sounds, all drowned out by the enormity of him filling me.

Even after all this time, my body still needs to adjust to the size of him, and when his hand squeezes my hip hard enough to leave a mark, I know he’s feeling the same thing I am.

Ecstasy.

Warm and bright.

Nestled close.

We’re not animalistic—not like Lex can be—but we’re still animals here. Coiled up tight around each other, seeking heat, taking comfort.

I settle on him with a shuddering sigh, his cock buried deep. “Additionally, regular exercise and relaxation techniques can help manage the physical and emotional changes…”

Pace takes a beat too long to continue, his chest billowing with an inhale against my tender back. Deep inside, his cock twitches. “One of the most delightful aspects of this stage is that by week nineteen, expectant mothers can often feel their baby's movements, commonly referred to as quickening.” He pushes a kiss into the sensitive spot below my ear. “Have you?”

I disguise my rock into him as a shrug. “I don’t think so.” He disguises his grunt as a mere acknowledgment.

We read like that for a while, mindless and too blissed out to care if any of it makes sense. Beneath the blanket, he keeps a hand between my thighs, thumb stroking my clit in a maddening, slow circuit. When he takes the lead, his voice stoking fire in my ear, I lean back and breathe in the scent of him, masculine and crisp. When his pause lingers too long, I take over, only to feel the hot, slick glide of his tongue along my neck.

I wish we had more time, but when he whispers, “Ready?” I’m oddly relieved.

At least I’ll get that.

When I nod, going on about prenatal care providers, he buries his face in my neck and inhales, quiet but sharp, and then his thighs tense. He swells inside me first, and then the first pulse comes, the heat flooding into me with each twitch. His breath grows ragged against my skin, and the finger dipping into my folds must catch whatever drips out, because when he returns to my clit, it’s sticky and warm, the perfect friction.

My breath hitches against my will, and I struggle to concentrate on the words, which are swimming in and out of focus, a muddy blur. It’s impossible with the way he’s driving me closer, his cock surging with more and more cum, until I’m so full that I feel like I could burst.

The moment he raises his head and begins taking over the passage, I tip my head back and finally let it take me, biting down on my lip as his fingers coax the orgasm right out of me.

It’s sharp and too intense, exploding behind my eyes like hot static, and when I clamp down on his thigh, I feel his cock give one last twitch.

The sound I make can’t possibly be called anything other than a cry.

He hums, reaching up to tuck my hair away. “Sorry, did I get your back?”

I nod stiffly, still seizing, and then it’s nothing but silence and the sound of my own breath.

* * *

I sleep like the dead.

* * *

Despite how Ifelt my first day, I try not to care about the passage of time too much. I know it’s my last day, but I don’t know how long it’ll be until Pace—or someone else—comes down to… collect me.

So I spend the fifth day walking.

From one end of the cell to the other, I stalk aimlessly back and forth, my feet numb against the chilled stone. Pace came with breakfast, seeming reluctant to leave me when Thad called him away, so it didn’t happen then. There’s no reason to believe it’ll happen during lunch, which Pace rarely brings down anyway. Usually, it’s Thad or Danner. So I don’t expect to see Pace, and I don’t expect to leave.

I don’t.

Only, the second I hear footsteps in the distance, I’m plastered right up against the door, hands clutching the bars. “Pace?”

When I get no answer, my stomach sinks.

I slink back toward the cot, but freeze when the sound grows closer. I’ve been deprived of sound down here long enough to have memorized Thad’s heavy footfalls and Pace’s long strides. These footsteps are quiet and slow—stilted like someone is trying to find their way.

“Hello?” I call out again.