Page 59 of Who’s Playing You (In The Nick of Time #1)

I shook my head. “No. I’m not. Earl and I were trying for a baby for a while, and I just… I couldn’t get pregnant,” I shared with him while feeling the shame that I couldn’t perform one of the most fundamental things a woman should be able to do.

“But…” he began, “How do you know that not getting pregnant was an issue that solely lay with you?” He asked hesitantly and without judgement.

I cleared my throat and sat up a little straighter, effectively ending his breast massage. I brought my knees up and tucked them under my chin as I wrapped my arms around my legs.

“We went and spoke to a fertility doctor,” I began and he nodded.

“So they advised that we both get tested. Earl said he’d get tested first, and if everything came back ‘normal’ for him, we’d know it was a me problem.

We somehow went with that logic, and so he told me a week or so after he went and got his test done that he was just ‘perfect’, those were his words.

So then that meant that I was the problem. ”

He fixed his posture and sat up straighter too, his eyes looking quizzical.

“But, sweetheart, that doesn’t mean that there’s necessarily something wrong with you and that you can’t ever have kids.

You didn’t go to the fertility doctor to get checked out…

You don’t know if you might have a hormonal imbalance, or something more serious, or you could be perfectly fine. You don’t know for certain.”

“No, you’re right. I don’t.”

“But then… Why? Why didn’t you go to get checked out?”

“Because Earl convinced me it would be a waste of time and money. That we’d just keep trying for a little longer and then maybe in another six to twelve months we’d revisit it if by then I still wasn’t pregnant.”

“So why didn’t you? Go back to the fertility doctor?”

“Because there was no need,” I replied simply. “He left.”

Nicholas just looked at me, his hand then grabbed one of mine while his thumb stroked the skin on my hand.

“I can’t even imagine what that must have felt like, my love. And I’m so fucking sorry that you went through that. That that selfish prick put you through all of that. I hate him even more for doing all of that to you. Alright?”

A lone tear spilled over my eyelid without my consent and streaked down to my chin. Nicholas being Nicholas, wiped it with his featherlight touch. And he then caught the second one that followed it.

He leaned forward and gently kissed my lips.

“He’s an asshole, alright?” I nodded my head as I sucked in a fortifying breath.

“And sometimes things work out for a reason. You weren’t meant to mix your beautiful DNA with his ratchet DNA.

He didn’t deserve you. And he certainly didn’t deserve to create a life with you.

That’s both an honor and a privilege. You realize that, right? ”

I nodded my head again, trying to gather my emotions, still in disbelief at this beautiful and kind man who was stark-naked in front of me, comforting me.

“If you want, we can go to the fertility specialist together,” he said almost bashfully.

My eyes snapped to his.

My brain wasn’t grasping his meaning… I mean, how could it? We’d known each other for barely a minute, yet… Was he proposing… No .

“Yes. I am,” he replied as if he could read my mind.

“Yes you are, what ?”

“Saying that I’m in ... That if you want to have kids, or look into it further, we’ll go see the best doctors there are. We’ll go see the best fertility specialists - if we need to. But, honey, you’re perfect. I highly doubt there’s anything wrong with you.”

I couldn’t but smile at this kind and beautiful man. He looked at me with his steel grey eyes and his ink-black hair that we’d made a mess of. He’d known me for such a short period of time, yet… He wanted some version of forever with me. Or the potential of it.

Because to me, having a child was the most incredible forever that there was. There was no going back from that. No returns or takebacks.

“I’m all in. However you want me. However you’ll take me,” he said in the most sweet, possessive, growly and intimate way you can imagine as his grey eyes bore into mine.

I smiled at him, as I leaned forward and kissed his lips. “I appreciate that, all of it. Honestly. But we don’t have to decide on forever right now,” I told him as he kissed me back.

When he released my lips I said, “Thank you for listening, for understanding, and for allowing me to tell you my secrets.”

“My love, anything. Anything you want or need, I’m your man,” he said as he sealed it with a kiss.

I couldn’t help but smile, despite him kissing me. He pulled away, only to kiss down my jaw, to my neck. I lifted my head to give him better access as my hand found his cock and I started stroking him and he groaned into my skin.

On a breathy whimper of need, I asked, “You said you were clean though?”

He immediately stopped sucking on my neck, his head raising and eyes snapping to mine. “As clean as any man has ever been,” he replied so quickly it made me giggle.

“Well alright then, good to know,” I replied teasingly.

He groaned, “Don’t tease me, were you asking that because of what I think you were asking me?”

I smiled coyly and devilishly back at him, “Oh, whatever do you mean?”

He quickly maneuvered himself and pulled me down flat on the bed, caging me in below his large muscular and deliciously smelling body, and I shrieked in surprise before laughing.

He bent his head down and sucked my nipple into his mouth before letting it go with a pop.

“First off, don’t play with me. You know exactly what I was asking and for the love of all that is holy, please - please dear God - tell me you’re telling me you’re okay with me taking you without anything between us!

Please Scottie, tell me that’s what you were meaning. ”

I eyed him skeptically, putting him on the spot on purpose. He lowered his forehead to my chest and groaned, while I cradled his hips between my legs and I felt his hard erection poking against me, asking to come out to play.

“You’re literally killing me, woman,” he growled out.

“I trust you when you tell me you’re clean, but,” I barely offered the ‘but’ when he growled again. “ Buttt , it would be awfully careless of us to have unprotected sex.”

He sucked my other nipple into his mouth as he started thrusting his pelvis into me and the tip of his cock found my already-wet pussy lips. It was like his cock was a heat-seeking missile that locked in on my pussy and found it every time.

He hummed his agreeance - or was it contemplation - as his tip entered me. He proceeded to play a game of “just the tip”. Ever so gently the head of his cock went in an inch, only for him to withdraw it to be pushed in again by two inches - and so on and so forth.

The man was driving me insane.

“Oh, what the hell will one more time hurt?” I said on a moan. “Stop toying with me and fuck me already!”

He lifted his head and looked at me, grinning like a fool. “Yes, ma’am,” he replied as he thrust himself all the way in, literally balls deep.