“Don’t be. I needed it. Couldn’t even be driven over a fucking bridge without having a panic attack. At least knowing how to swim, it gave me a sense of comfort. And then The League ... well, they didn’t fix the fear of the water. They just taught me how to accept the death I’d find if it happened again.”
“Jesus Christ, Chris.”
His laughter skipped over the lake in front of them. As though his admittance didn’t bother him at all, and maybe he just needed to say it to someone else.
Valeria understood that all too well.
“So, we’re not going to skinny dip in the lake, then?” she asked, winking.
She wanted him to smile again.
Just for her.
The way he did.
Chris did exactly that. “Probably not, babe.”
Then, she had another idea.
“Race you back to the lodge?” she asked.
He hummed under his breath. “What do I win if I catch you?”
“I said a race, not a chase.”
“I like mine more.”
Valeria laughed. “Fine—whatever you want if you catch me.”
“Anything? Is that a deal?”
A shiver worked its way through her at his suggestion. How was she supposed to refuse? Instead of even trying, she simply nodded, and leaned forward to catch his lips with her own in a kiss as she whispered, “You got yourself a deal.”
She stood up and Chris told her, “I’ll give you a three second head start.”
There was quite a way to run.
Then, he added, “And Maria was down for the count when I checked on her.”
Good.
Her kid could sleep through a hurricane.
“Head start is now,” Chris said.
If he thought his little show would put her off her game, it didn’t. Valeria knew from the beginning of this game of chase that she was doomed to lose, if that’s what one wanted to call losing. But she’d be damned if she wouldn’t give Chris a good run for his money even so.
Val’s bare feet hit the cold grass, and she heard his loud, taunting one and two before she chanced the first peek over her shoulder. A laugh pealed out of her when she saw him get up, turn around, and brush his pants off before he came after her.
The man was fit.
All fucking muscle.
She’d come to learn he liked to mountain climb, and he did one marathon a year just because he wanted to do something normal. He made it halfway across the back grass of the lodge property before she even made it three quarters of the way to the porch. He caught her before her feet even touched the rear steps with a strong arm wrapped around her waist.
She shrieked.
His laugh came out huskier.
Apparently, anything meant her back against the wall of the lodge while he stripped her naked, and then kneeled down looking like sex on a stick to eat her until she was breathing his name into the sky like the prayer that it was.
It was only then that he let her help him out of his clothes. Or rather, just enough so that she was free to stroke his cock between them when he lifted her up against the wall. Hard and hot in her hands, he jerked forward with every stroke. It only took a slight shift of his hips when she fit the head of his cock at her slit, and he was filling her.
Anything meant making her moan.
And scream.
It meant fucking her until her back protested against the smooth logs that made up the lodge’s wall, but she couldn’t tell him to stop when it all felt so fucking good, too.
His kisses ravaged.
They tasted of her.
Suddenly she was reminded that sex was more than just trying to have a child. It felt like she’d forgotten that over the last while. She loved that Chris was able to drag her back into being a woman with lusts and needs when it was just him and her like this.
She loved her husband.
Entirely.
18.
Chris
“WHY do I always bruise like this whenever I have to get my blood drawn?”
Valeria’s question had Chris glancing her way in just enough time to see her pull off the gauze that had been taped to the inside of her elbow. Sure enough, a bluish-brown bruise colored the majority of the spot under the gauze, but he’d seen worse.
“It’s normal,” he said.
She sighed. “Maybe I just don’t like the whole—”
“Everything is going to be fine, Val.”
Just like that, she quieted. Her big brown eyes looked to him, and he gave her a small smile that he knew would help to settle her nerves a little more. She was putting on a brave face, considering their current circumstances, but that was just Val. Inside, he had no doubt she was a raging war of anxiety and worry.
“And everything says we just need to give it some time,” he reminded her.
“I know, but at least if a doctor tells me that, I won’t constantly feel like something is wrong with me.”
God.
He hated that she felt such a way at all.
Though it was uncomfortable to do in the waiting room’s plastic chairs with their barely there cushioning and metal arm rests, he leaned over to sling an arm around Val’s shoulders. He drew her in close to his side, and she tucked her head against his shoulder. There, he could press a kiss to the top of her head and feel the way she calmed in his hold.
He continued holding his wife like that until their names were finally called by the woman behind the receptionist’s desk. Once he’d helped Val to gather their things, they followed the nurse who came to stand at the entry of a hall with a clipboard in her hands. She smiled their way, greeting them by their first names and a cheerful the doctor will be with you in a few minutes after she had showed them which room they would wait.
Well, it was more like an office. There wasn’t even a bed. Then again, Chris assumed a lot of the procedures that happened within a fertility clinic wouldn’t take place in regular patient rooms but a better, more sterile environment.
“Sit,” Chris murmured, pressing on Val’s lower back.
She took one chair, and he took another. The two of them settled into a comfortable silence, and Chris took a moment to look over the different things hanging on the wall. Other than the rows of medical texts sitting on shelves behind the large desk facing their chairs, the walls were mostly filled with pictures of babies and medical licenses.
All good signs, he supposed.
Thankfully, the nurse hadn’t lied. Within a few minutes, a knock on the door that hadn’t been entirely closed behind the nurse had Chris and Val turning to see a man smiling as he pushed open the door. With lines around his eyes and more white in his hair than gray, the doctor greeted them right away.
“Christopher and Valeria Guzzi, right?” he asked.
“That is us,” Chris said.
“Dr. Kennis.”
He didn’t wait for Chris to stand from his chair before sticking out a hand to shake. He did the same for Valeria who still hadn’t said a single word.
“So, you had some blood drawn today, right?” the doctor asked Val as he rounded his desk. “Just to check for some standard stuff, and I was going to have them run a few hormonal checks because oftentimes, that can be the cause of the issues noted in your file. Mind you, you’re only a few months into trying for a child, so this wouldn’t be concerning for us to begin with.”