The Culmination (9 page)

He shifts gears. “You saw Little G today. She was a fucking hurricane—did you see how she spilled her crackers all over the floor? Jesus. Just imagine when we have
two
little hurricanes tearing through the house
.
”

“It’s gonna be insanity.”

“So why not have some help?”

I sigh. I’m not certain how I feel about that, but I’m pretty sure I don’t have to figure it out right now.

“We’re gonna need a live-in housekeeper, too,” Jonas continues matter-of-factly.

“Oh, really?”

“Yes. That one’s non-negotiable.”

“Oh, the lord-god-master hath spoken?”

“Yes. On this, yes. I need a well-ordered environment.”

I laugh. “Well, good luck with that when the babies come.”

Jonas looks earnest.

“Okay, baby,” I concede. “No argument here. I don’t have any particular need to do housekeeping, especially according to your standards of
excellence
.”

“Okay. Good.” His face lights up. “A housekeeper for sure; a nanny for sure; and a night-nurse to be negotiated.”

“Oh, this is a negotiation, huh? I didn’t realize that. Well, the nanny’s not for sure. That’s to be determined. And, as long as we’re negotiating, then I demand a personal butler for me—because I’m gonna need someone on-call at all times to wipe my ass.”

He rolls his eyes. “I just want to do whatever is necessary to keep you stress-free and happy and ready to fuck your husband night and day like the dirty girl you are.”

“Ah, so that’s what this is all about.”

“That’s what everything’s always about, baby.
Always.
”

“Jonas, I’ve told you a million times—sex with you is like eating, breathing or peeing. A given.”

“Well, I’ve just been warned by someone I trust that fitting in howling monkey sex gets a bit more challenging when babies enter the picture.”

“Of course, it does. You give some stuff up, sure—but you get other stuff in return. Even better stuff. We’ll make it work. I promise.”

“I’m gonna make sure of it.”

“If the day ever arrives when I don’t want to jump your bones every single night, then, yes, hire me a nanny and a night-nurse and a housekeeper and a sex therapist, too—whatever’s needed to get my mojo back. Please. Because I love our sex life as much as you do, trust me. Probably more so.”

He’s quiet for a minute. “I just don’t want to lose
us
when the babies enter the picture.”

“I know.” I touch his cheek. “Neither do I. We won’t.”

“I don’t want to become one of those couples that only has energy for their kids and play-dates and missionary sex on Saturday nights.”

“We won’t. Josh and Kat aren’t like that. We won’t be like that, either.”

“I was thinking maybe I could take you away, overnight, once a week?”

“Kind of like a date night?”

“Yeah, but overnight. That way, at least once I week, I’ll get to make you howl like a monkey without worrying about waking the kids.”

“Or the nanny or night-nurse or butler.”

“Or every neighbor within a half-mile radius.”

I laugh. “We’ll figure it out, love. We don’t need to know all the details right now. It’ll all work out. We’re the greatest love story ever told, remember? And we always will be. We’ll figure it out.”

He presses his hard-on into my hipbone. “We’d better figure it out. Because you turn me on, woman. So much.”

“I do?”

“So fucking much.”

“Even like this?”

“Especially like this. I told you I have a thing for women the size of exceptionally large condos.”

“Well, that’s my good fortune, isn’t it?” I say.

“It’s madness, I tell you.”

“So tell me more about what you’ve got planned for us, hunky-monkey husband. Sounds like you’ve been thinking a lot about our future.”

“I have.”

“Who knew?”

He shrugs.

“You know, I strongly prefer it when you actually talk to me about what you’re thinking, rather than stalking around here like a frickin’ caveman.”

“Trust me, you don’t want to know every thought in my head. You’d die of exhaustion if you were in my head for just one day.”

“Well, I’d rather die of exhaustion than loneliness.”

His face flickers with concern. “You’ve been lonely?”

I shrug. “Well, yeah, sometimes. Living with you can be lonely at times, to be honest—when you’re in one of your
moods
. I try to give you space, wait for you to open up—but, yeah, sometimes you kind of
disappear
for a while. And it makes me lonely.”

He looks genuinely pained. “Wow.” He bites his lip. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay, baby. I love you. This is who you are. This is who you’ve always been. I get it. I’ve just learned to wait you out. It’s always worth it.”

He exhales and purses his lips, but he doesn’t say anything.

“Yeesh, my feet are so cold,” I finally say. “They feel like ice blocks.”

“Oh no,” he says. “Send those dogs up here. I’ll warm ’em up for you, baby.”

I curl into a ball as best I can and he rubs my feet with his warm hands.

“Better?”

“Yeah,” I say. “Thank you, love.”

“Any time. Although warming your feet is against my better interest.”

“How’s that?”

“Because I happen to like my women as large as exceptionally large condos
and
with icy-cold feet.”

I press my cold feet onto his warm thigh, giggling, and he jerks back.

“Gah! Sarah! Don’t do that! They’re freezing cold.” He leaps out of bed, rummages in a drawer, and returns with a pair of fuzzy wool socks—and then he reaches under the covers and slides the socks onto my icy feet.

When he scoots back next to me in the bed, his skin is cold to the touch.

“Aw, you sacrificed your own warmth for mine. Lemme warm you up, baby,” I say. “Scoot closer.”

He does.

I hug him to me and run my hands through his hair. “So tell me more about your big plans for Faraday, party of four?” I say. “Sounds like you’ve got a million of ’em.”

He shrugs.

“Aw, come on, love. I’m listening. Tell me anything and everything. Big or small. Serious or silly. I’ve been dying to hear every thought rolling around in that gorgeous head of yours.”

“Well...”

“Yes?”

He scoots even closer to me and wraps his muscled arm around me. I can feel his body warming next to mine. “I was thinking that, when the kids are two or three years old, we should get a puppy.”

I can’t keep myself from laughing. “A
puppy
? That’s not at all what I was expecting you to say.”

“Every kid should have a puppy.”

I smile broadly. “Really? I didn’t know that rule.”

“Yes.”

“Did you have a puppy?”

“No.” There’s a beat. “Did you?” he asks.

“No.”

“Well, see? Case in point. Happy, normal kids have puppies. I’ve seen it in movies.”

I laugh.

“I only
look
like a serial killer, you know. I don’t actually feel even the slightest impulse to maim furry creatures. I’m really quite nice.”

“But puppies track dirt into the house, baby—they’ll mess up your ‘pristine environment.’”

“Hence, the live-in housekeeper.”

“Ah. And just like that, it all makes perfect sense.”

He smiles. “There’s always a method to my madness.”

I run my hands through his hair again. “So what kind of puppy should we get to make our family movie-perfect, hubsters?”

“I don’t know.”

“A Maltese named Kiki?”

“Fuck no.”

“Aw, come on. You have to admit that’d be frickin’ hilarious.”

“There’s not enough ‘frickin’ hilarious’ in the world to make me say yes to a Maltese named Kiki.”

“A dalmatian?”

“We’re not firemen.”

“A yellow lab?”

“Kinda obvious.”

“Well, damn, you’d better get cracking on figuring this puppy-thing out, Jonas. We’ve only got two or three years to decide. Time’s a’ wastin’.”

He flashes me a look of mock annoyance.

I laugh. “What else you got planned for us, Super Dad?” I kiss his jawline. “Tell me every little thing. I love hearing this stuff.” I reach around and stroke his muscular back.

He’s thoughtful for a moment. “Well... “

“Yes?”

“We’ll take the kids camping and hiking on the weekends. I’ll put one kid in a baby-backpack and the other one in a carrier on my chest, and off we’ll go. We’ll teach them to hike and climb as soon as they can walk. We’ll be a modern-day Swiss Family Robinson.”

My heart leaps out of my chest. “Oh, Jonas.”

“What?”

“I just swooned.”

“Why? You’ve always dreamed of being a modern-day Swiss Family Robinson?”

“No, because you’re so frickin’ adorable. You’re just...
adorable
.”

He rolls his eyes.

“You really are.
Adorable
.”

“No. Fuck that.” He leans over and bites my nipple, hard, making me shriek. “Adorable men don’t want to fuck their wives the way I want to fuck you right now.” He brushes his hand between my legs, finds his target, and slips his fingers into my wetness.

I gasp at the sudden sensation.

He massages me until I’m moaning and then, without further ado, he slides his erection into me, slowly, deeply, biting my neck as he does. “Adorable men don’t want to fuck their wives ’til they pass out,” he whispers in my ear, burrowing deeper and deeper inside me, making me gasp. “Would an adorable man dream every single night about eating his wife’s sweet pussy?” he says, his lips warm against my ear, his fingers massaging my clit.

He’s rendered me speechless. I close my eyes and let the movement of his body and fingers and his confident whispers in my ear take me away. I’m having visions of us hiking with two infants strapped to Jonas’ muscled body, a Boston terrier named Buster in tow. I’m imagining Jonas in the pool with our baby boys, his muscular arms keeping both of our sons afloat as I take photos. His fingers are working their magic. He’s sliding in and out of me at just the right speed and depth. He’s whispering things to me that make my heart race and my clit flutter.

And yet.

Something’s off with my body. I can feel it. I’m aching all over—and not in a good way. I’m just so frickin’
tired
—have I ever been this
tired
in all my life? I just don’t feel right. For the first time ever, literally, I don’t think I feel well enough to ‘surrender’ to my pleasure, no matter how much I want to do it. Not well enough at all.

Chapter 8

Sarah

Jonas apparently senses things aren’t ramping up for me the way they usually do, because he pulls out of me and moves between my legs to lick me, apparently hell-bent on making sure I get mine.

“Baby, no,” I whisper. I put my hand on his shoulder to halt him.

He pauses, unsure.

“It’s not gonna happen for me tonight.” I shake my head. “I’m sorry—I just don’t feel all that great.”

He’s obviously alarmed. He climbs back up to my face and cups my cheeks in his hands. “You don’t feel well enough for me to
lick
you?” He’s astonished—this is a first.

“I’m seven and a half months pregnant with twins,” I say. I try to smile, but my face feels heavy. “Don’t freak out. This isn’t a preview of our future, I promise.”

He looks concerned. “You look pale, Sarah.”

“I’m just tired.”

“Are you feeling pain?”

“No, not pain. I’m just achy. Kind of crampy. We’ll talk to the doctor about it in the morning. Come on, get back inside me.”

He rolls his eyes. “I’m an asshole, but I’m not
that
big an asshole.” He stretches himself out next to me, nose to nose. “I don’t come if you don’t, remember?”

I grin. He hasn’t had the need to say that particular phrase to me in a very long time.

It occurs to me I should wrap my thigh around his muscled body and coax him back into me, but I don’t have the strength to do it. Or maybe I should bend down and take his hard-on into my mouth and finish him off? I’m sure he’d appreciate a little Fellatio-Christmas in April. But I don’t have the energy to do that, either. I feel like there are lead weights strapped to my limbs and eyelids.

He pulls me close. “You’re sure you’re okay?”

“I’m sure. I’m just sleepy.”

There’s a long beat.

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

He exhales. “So what would you name them?” he asks quietly, running his hand over my back.

“Hmm?”

“If we have boys. What would you name them?”

My mind jolts to consciousness. After all these months of watching Jonas retreat into himself and pull away, I’m not gonna let a little sleepiness deprive me of finally having this magical conversation with my husband. “Jeremiah and Jack,” I whisper softly.

He grins.

Damn, he’s a ridiculously handsome man.

“Which one is Crazy Monkey?” he asks.

“Jeremiah.”

His smile broadens. “That’s what I figured. Jeremiah sounds like he’d be the crazy one.”

My heart is soaring. I didn’t realize just how much I’ve been aching to talk to Jonas like this. My heart feels like it’s going to burst. “Those names are just my ideas, though,” I say. “I’m open to whatever names you’re thinking about.”

“No, no,” he says. “Those names are perfect.” He inhales sharply but doesn’t speak.

“What?” I ask.

“What if we have girls?”

“I truly think we’re having boys.”

“I know you do, little Miss Bossy-boots. But humor me. If you’re wrong about that—which I know is
impossible
since you’re Sarah Fucking Cruz, for Chrissakes—what are your girl names?”

I feel the sudden urge to cry with joy and relief, but I stuff it down. I can’t believe Jonas is finally—
finally—
talking to me like this. Why he picked now to do it, when I’m about to pass out with fatigue, I’ll never know. But when it comes to Jonas, I’ll take whatever he can give me. Always.

“Come on. I know you’ve thought about it,” Jonas prompts.

He’s right—I have. But only in the beginning. Once I became convinced I was carrying boys, my brain quickly disallowed itself from fantasizing about girls. Why imagine babies I’ll never get to hold? “The thing is, I’ve only got two babies in there, right? I don’t like imagining an alternate set of twins. I don’t want to be bummed out when I don’t get to have all four of them.”