Falling for Fitz (22 page)

He flinched as his hardness passed
through her aching entrance, reaching for her hips and holding her
tightly. Her hands landed on his shoulders as she pushed back,
taking more of him inside as he thrust up to meet her. Finally
fully imbedded inside of her, his eyes opened wide and he took a
deep breath as she rolled her hips, moving at her own pace on top
of him. She watched as his eyes dropped to her small breasts which
swayed lightly as she moved back and forth on him.

“
There is nothing hotter
than you,” he murmured, staring up at her while his fingers bit
into the skin of her hips. “You’re a goddess, Daisy.”

“
I’m human. Touch me,” she
told him, and he moved one hand down the crease of her thigh to
press two fingers into the swollen folds of skin. His other hand
reached up to cup her breast, his thumb and finger rolling the
nipple until it hardened. Daisy gasped from the combination of
sensations, leaning back on Fitz, sliding back and forth on him
faster and faster.

He grabbed her hips again and she felt
him thrusting upward now, joining her as they moved toward mutual
pleasure.

“
Kiss me,” he panted, and
she leaned down, gasping as her sensitive nipples met the hardness
of his pecs. As their lips touched, he rolled, flipping her onto
her back easily, holding his weight over her as he pumped into her
harder and stronger. If possible, her body, which was already close
to climax, clenched onto him tighter, aroused like crazy by his
strength and possessiveness as he drove into her over and over
again.

“
More,” she moaned beneath
him, one of her fingers finding its way into her own mouth where
she bit down on it. Her body felt stretched and sensuous, used and
loved, the critical, fathomless pressure building below her tummy.
“More, Fitz.”

He pulled back almost totally, teasing
her entrance with his tip, and she whimpered in frustration, every
nerve ending wanting his thick heat filling her again.

“
Look at me.”

She opened her eyes, panting and
desperate, on the very precipice of coming.

“
I love you. Tell me you
love me.”

“
I love you,” she gasped,
tears sliding into her hair from the corners of her eyes as she
gazed at him.

His hips slammed forward and the tip
of his sex kissed her womb as her body exploded in shudders,
convulsing around him, contracting and releasing, sucking him as
deep as possible even as he collapsed on top of her, crying her
name and telling her that he would love her until he
died.

***

Fitz almost felt like he’d passed out
from the strength of his orgasm, and it took him several minutes to
realize that his entire body weight was resting on Daisy. His lips
pressed against her neck, lightly sucking on her skin almost
unconsciously as she continued to shudder with aftershocks beneath
him.

“
Daisy?” he
panted.

“
Yeah?”

“
I should—”

He moved his hips, hating like hell to
leave the tight warmth of her body, but knowing he needed
to.

“
Okay,” she murmured, her
fingers skating up his back to his face, which she cupped and
lifted, looking into his eyes. Hers were surprised, dazed, like she
couldn’t believe the heat, the electricity, the intensity of the
moment they’d just experienced together. “That was
amazing.”

“
Are you crying,
beautiful?”

She nodded.

“
Why?” he asked.

“
Because of what you said
when I woke up. Because of how much you love me. Because I felt
it—just now between us—how perfect we are together.”

“
We are,” he said gently,
pushing her damp hair off her forehead. “There’s never been anyone
for me but you.”

“
And you for me,” she said,
releasing his face with one hand to swipe at her tears.

“
Move in with me?” he
asked, leaning down to brush her lips with his.

“
Ask me tomorrow,” she
answered, a small smile playing on the corners of her
mouth.

“
Am I getting
closer?”

“
Mm-hm,” she
answered.

“
I won’t give
up.”

“
I know,” she said,
laughing softly as she cocked her head to the side, staring up at
him with eyes full of love.

He braced one hand on the pillow
beside her head and pulled out of her as gently as possible,
swinging himself to the side of the bed.

His fingers reached down to take the
condom off. “Let’s go have brunch and then come back for round two
in a lit—” Something didn’t feel right. He looked down at where his
fingers gripped the top and bottom of the condom and with complete
horror he realized it was empty. The tip had split in
two.

“
Oh, my God,” he panted,
his heart kicking into an insanely fast rhythm that made his head
swim.

“
What
?” she asked, leaning up and peeking around his
torso.

“
It broke. I don’t know
how…” he started to say, but his words ebbed off as he got a look
at her white, stricken face.

“
Oh, my God,” she said,
falling onto her back and reaching between her legs to the feel for
the truth of his discovery. “Oh, my God. Noooo. Oh, my God. Oh, my
God.”

She rolled away from him, off the bed,
and bolted into the bathroom, slamming the door behind
her.

He threw the condom in the trash and
ran around the bed to the bathroom, knocking on the door. “Daisy?
Daisy, are you okay? Come out. Please, beautiful. Please come
out.”

He leaned his ear against the door and
could hear her muffled crying and the sound of tap water running.
Finally, after several long, torturous minutes, the toilet flushed
and she walked out of the bathroom fully dressed, her eyes red and
swollen.

Her expression was cold and closed,
and she barely looked at him as she walked out of his bedroom
without a word. Shocked, he stood naked in the center of his
bedroom, completely unsure of what to do, before grabbing his
boxers off the floor and pulling them on. He ran into the living
room, grabbing her hand as she walked past him with her purse on
her shoulder and her bag in her hand, headed for the front
door.

“
Daisy, stop! Can we please
talk about this?”

“
No,” she sobbed, her
granite expression splintering into agony. “No. This is just
happening all over again. I can’t—I have to get out of here,
Fitz.”

“
Stop. Listen to me.
Daisy?” He tried to pull her closer, and she didn’t resist, but she
didn’t reach for him. She was limp, her back shuddering with
violent sobs under his fingers.

“
No,” she said in a broken
voice, then, “What?”

“
Listen carefully to me,
okay?” He leaned back and raised his hands to her face so he could
hold it as he looked into her bloodshot eyes. “I love you. I
love
you, Daisy. And if
our baby is growing inside of you right now? I love that baby
too.”

Her face collapsed as more tears
poured out of her eyes and she dropped her head. “No. No, Fitz.
This is exactly what happened last time. I can’t think. I can’t
breathe. I can’t—”

He felt her breathing
quicken until he started to panic that she was going to
hyperventilate and faint. “Daisy, listen to me: This is
not
what happened last
time. You are
not
seventeen and you are
not
alone. I’m not going away this time. We’re not
scared kids. I
want
this. This is all I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember.
I’ve wanted to want to marry you since I was—”

“
Stop,” she begged
him.

He winced, but to his relief, she
sucked in a big deep breath. It was loud and messy, but she was at
least getting air. She took another breath, then another before
stepping away from him, her head still down.

“
I can’t get my head around
this,” she said softly. “I can’t—”

“
You can.
We
can. It’s a little
messy, but it’s also perfect. It’s us, Daisy. It’s our second
chance.”

She looked up at him with shattered
eyes as tears streamed down her face. “I have to go, Fitz. I just…
I have to go.”

“
I don’t want you to go
alone. Let me drive you home. I’m worried about you.”

She took a sobbing breath and cleared
her throat. “I’m okay. Don’t worry.”

“
I’ll come with you,” he
said, taking a step back to the bedroom to get dressed
quickly.

She put a hand on his arm. “No. I need
to go alone. You need to let me go.”

You need to let me
go.
A vise squeezed his chest until all of
the air was compressed from his lungs, which ached.

“
I love you,” he rasped,
blinking furiously as his eyes burned with tears.

“
I love you, too,” she
answered, sniffling and sobbing softly as she dropped his arm,
walked down the hallway and let herself out of his
apartment.

When the door closed with a soft thud,
Fitz realized he’d been holding his breath and let it out, groaning
as he would if he had the most painful—the most unbelievably
painful—stitch in his side. He placed his hand over his heart,
sliding to the floor before burying his head in his
hands.

Daisy hailed a cab in front of Fitz’s
apartment, her body shaking with shock and in chaos. Over the
years, her brain had been able to dull what had happened between
them so long ago, but when he said the words “It broke” just as he
had that fateful summer night, every feeling—every frantic,
terrified, heartbroken feeling had rushed back, assaulting her with
such a fierce, unforgiving, pounding force that she could barely
breathe.

It was too much—the past and present
colliding too jarringly for her to process. Objectively, she knew
that she was a twenty-six-year-old woman with a good business, a
solid life, and a man who loved her. But, in his apartment, faced
with the identical words that had caused her so much heartache, she
had reverted back to her seventeen-year-old self. She needed some
space to remember that she was a fully-grown adult who could handle
things this time, but it felt like she could only make that mental
jump on her own.

She rolled down the window of the cab,
taking deep gulps of fresh air as her tears continued to
fall.

What were the chances that
this could happen again? Goddamn it!

She’d been so hasty when she put the
condom on—she hadn’t even bothered to pinch the end. She wasn’t
thinking about anything but feeling him inside of her, feeling the
pleasure and completeness of their bodies fully joined together. It
was her fault this time. All hers.

Remembering the sick, desperate look
on his face as she left made her take her phone out of her purse.
She needed to give him some sort of reassurance, especially since
she’d used the words “You need to let me go.” It made her eyes burn
all over again to imagine what was going on in his head, and she
tapped on the messenger app quickly. Taking a deep, ragged breath,
she opened a new text box on her phone and typed a simple
message.

Fitz, it wasn’t your
fault. I just freaked out. I love you.

She pressed send, then shoved her
phone back in her purse.

Passing a CVS pharmacy, Daisy
realized, for the first time, that she had a very real decision in
front of her today. Unlike when she was seventeen and the “morning
after” pill wasn’t around yet, it was now. She could easily have
the cab stop, run into a pharmacy and use emergency contraception
to ensure that she wouldn’t get pregnant this time.

If that’s what she wanted.

I love you, Daisy. And if
our baby is growing inside of you right now? I love that baby
too.

In a flash of blinding clarity, she
knew that’s not what she wanted to do. If Fitz’s baby was growing
inside of her again right now—cells splitting and replicating and
binding—she wanted that baby without any shadow of doubt. She
pressed her hands flat against her abdomen and said a quick prayer
that it was happening, that Fitz English’s baby was already a
reality in her body, even though she wouldn’t know for sure for
weeks.

She thought of the way he made love to
her, the way he took every chance to reassure her that he loved
her. The way he wouldn’t give up asking her to move in with him.
And she realized something else that she couldn’t process earlier
in his apartment when overpowering memories were crowding her
head.

This is
not
what happened last time. You
are
not
seventeen
and you are
not
alone. I’m not going away this time. We’re not scared kids.
I
want
this. This
is all I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember.

She knew he was telling the complete
and absolute truth. She wouldn’t be alone this time. A few weeks
from now when she knew for sure that they’d made a baby this
morning, he’d be right by her side as he promised. She knew it. She
knew it with every fiber of her being. He loved her. He’d never let
her down again.