Knox Read online

  Inside, I feel the flutter of the baby moving from one side to the other, and I pat my stomach to tell him or her to settle down. My stomach is doing flips as it is, so I don’t need any more commotion going on inside there.

  The doorbell rings in the silence, nearly sending me into a full-blown panic attack. It’s too late to change my mind now, so it’s time to just face the music. I hurry over to the door, unlock it and pull it open.

  Ah, jeez.

  My hormones do cartwheels at the sight of Knox’s thick, tattooed biceps shown off in a white wife-beater that’s snug across his wide chest and flat stomach, paired with well-worn jeans that are slung low on his hips. I’m so busy checking him out that I don’t consider the fact that he may be checking me and my bump out.

  Swallowing so hard his Adam’s apple bobs, he says, “You, ah, been going a little heavy on the doughnuts?”

  “Yep, that’s exactly it,” I reply with a brush of my palm down my belly since I know he’s joking.

  “Congrats, I guess?” he asks when those deep blue eyes raise to mine, making me wonder if our son or daughter will inherit his eye color or my pale green ones. Maybe a combination of the two.

  Wait. Did he just say congrats? He obviously hasn’t yet figured out that he’s the one responsible. Rather than respond, I just stand there and wait for him to put it all together. Several emotions pass over his face in the silence — anger, then confusion, and finally, yep, there it is, the one I was expecting would be the strongest.

  Fear.

  Chapter Twelve

  Knox

  The first emotion that hit me when I saw Jade’s pregnant belly was, oddly enough, jealousy. She’s even more beautiful than my memories recalled, now practically radiating sexiness and…fertility from her open doorway. Thinking of her with another man, though, makes me want to rip my brain out of my skull just to avoid any torturous images of her and someone else from popping up.

  I mean, I get that she would quickly move on to another man. It’s not like I was a catch or anything. To her, I’m a criminal, after all, and she can do a helluva lot better with, well, anyone else. But fuck, does it sting my ego to think of her handcuffing and banging some other man right after me…

  Which then leads to confusion as I try to figure out how soon after we fucked she was riding some other man’s cock. I wish I had the balls to ask how pregnant she is so that I could know for sure. Was Jade fucking someone days after me or weeks? Her belly that I remember was completely flat when my tongue was on it is really sticking out there, so she’s at least a few months along, right? And we were together in November…

  Oh. Fuck.

  “How long…when-when did you…who’s-who’s…” Covering my stammering mouth with one hand, I point in the direction of her stomach to convey what I can’t figure out how to ask.

  When Jade doesn’t respond, I look back up at her face, her raised eyebrows conveying the answer.

  “Holy shit! Holy shit, it’s me? I-I did that? Why didn’t you tell me? This is why I don’t fuck women!” I exclaim as I grip either side of the door frame and bend over at the waist to try and breathe through the lack of oxygen in my lungs before I pass out. My slow mind finally comes around to the most important question after finding out I knocked her up. “Are you keeping it? I’m so fucking sorry I did this to you, but just, please don’t give it away, okay?”

  “Really, Knox. How can you even ask me that?” she responds with an indignant hand on her hip. “I’m a financially secure, twenty-eight-year-old woman, not a homeless teenager. I can take care of this baby by myself, thank you very much.”

  “Baby,” I repeat. Hearing and saying that word makes this news even more real. There’s a tiny human growing in Jade’s stomach because of me. I’m gonna be a father when I have no fucking idea what that means since I’ve never had one. I don’t think I even know any actual fathers!

  “Why don’t you come inside so we can talk,” Jade says, opening the door wider for me to stumble inside, drunk on the buckets of reality that I just guzzled. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you,” she starts. “Honestly, I really don’t think you should be involved in their life.”

  Hold the fucking phone.

  “What?” I ask, sobering up at that newsflash. “Why the fuck don’t you want me in their life?”

  “You’re only nineteen, Knox, living on the shady side of the law. Besides, I didn’t think a guy like you would even want to be a father.”

  “I turned twenty a few weeks ago, and how would you know if I wanted to be a father unless you fucking asked me?” I yell at her for assuming all kinds of shit she shouldn’t have.

  Rather than cower, Jade’s lips purse in anger as her hands brace on her hips. “Right, because clearly a guy who spends all of his time at a strip club fucking whores is perfect father material!”

  Reeling back from her ugly accusations, I tell her, “I haven’t…how do you know if I’ve been to Escapades?” Then it hits me. “Have you been following me?” I ask in disbelief.

  Lowering her eyes, Jade crosses her arms over her now even fuller chest and says, “No. I just assumed, and your response confirmed I was right.”

  “That’s bullshit,” I scoff. Pointing an accusatory finger at her, I say, “Admit it, you’ve been stalking me.”

  God, why does the notion of her watching me without me knowing make me so damn happy? Probably because I’ve thought about staking out her house more times than I can count but talked myself out if it because I knew it was crossing the crazy stalker line and she would lose her shit if she caught me. I mean, she is a cop, after all.

  “I wasn’t stalking you!” Jade replies defensively. “We…we always keep an eye on Escapades because it’s a known haven for drugs, prostitution, and everything else under the sun that’s illegal. You sure do pop up there pretty damn often!”

  “Why do you even care what I’m doing?”

  “I don’t!” she replies with a huff.

  “Sure sounds like you do! But just to remind you, you’re the one who said you were done with me and told me to get out after we fucked however many months ago…”

  “Whatever,” Jade says with a shake of her head as she runs her fingers through her long auburn locks.

  “You basically said fucking me was a mistake and not one you ever wanted to make again,” I finish.

  “And I meant that too,” she says, gutting me.

  “Then why the fuck were you following me?!” I exclaim in confusion.

  “Because I wanted to be wrong about you!” she shouts back, making my heart crack right down the middle.

  So she was watching me, hoping that I was a better man than she assumed, and all I did was prove she was right about me. Boy, does that piss me the fuck off, because it’s not like I was ever offered the chance to live a life of luxury or knew I was even being tested by her to win a chance at being a fucking father!

  “Do you think this is how I want to be?” I ask, holding my arms out to the side to gesture to myself. “Do you think I was ever given a choice? That I liked growing up without a family because my parents didn’t want me? Or that I chose to spend my childhood being forced to train to fight for the fucking mafia to keep a roof over my head? I didn’t ask for any of this! I’m doing the best I can with the shitty hand that life dealt me!”

  “I-I didn’t know,” Jade responds softly. “And I’m sorry those horrible things happened to you. But they’re no excuse for you to fuck strippers.”

  “Why not? Who else would want me other than drug addicts with low self-esteem who want to make a few dollars? That’s right. Mario and Liam pay the girls to fuck their fighters!” Stepping toward her until her swollen belly stops me, I point a finger at her chest before I put the final nail in my coffin. “And you know what? You’re no better than those whores are because you fucked me just to help your career, so save your self-righteous, hypocritical bullshit for someone who might buy it!”

  I expect Jade to shove me away
or slap me for calling her out.

  Instead, she hits me with the last reaction I would’ve guessed.

  …

  Jade

  I had no idea that Knox was an orphan or that he didn’t choose to fight illegally. Ever since the day I met him in his bedroom, he’s been so upbeat and funny. I had no idea what lay beneath his big, muscular exterior. Now I know why he was so adamant that I not give the baby up as soon as he found out. He was already trying to protect it, which is unexpected and so damn sweet.

  Reaching up, I grab a handful of the back of Knox’s hair and bring his mouth, which just insinuated I’m a whore, down until it crashes against mine.

  Knox isn’t wrong about me.

  I treated him badly, used him even, without bothering to find out his past from him.

  And sure, when I first found out I was pregnant, I partially blamed him for ruining my career in law enforcement; because once I become a mother, I won’t be able to put in the hours needed to keep moving up the ladder. Not that I’m even sure I want to move up if it means making the same sacrifice as it did to get my detective badge.

  Knox’s lips move against mine, kissing me back just as frantically as our tongues begin to tangle. And god, that tongue of his! I haven’t been able to forget the times we were together no matter how hard I tried, not because of the baby we made, but because it felt so good to let go with him.

  Gripping my shoulders to separate us, Knox says, “Stop, stop, stop!” Wetting his lips, he adds, “I don’t know what fucking switch I flipped to make you go from pissed off to horny, but I’m glad I did it. It’s just, now you’re trying to distract me with sex and shit when we need to talk about all this...” His palm comes down between us to gently rub across my belly. And that one touch is more affectionate and intimate than any I’ve ever experienced before.

  “I know, and I’m sorry. I promise we’ll talk,” I tell him as I look up into his blue eyes. “But I need you right now so bad. I haven’t been with anyone since the night you came over months ago…”

  That’s apparently the right thing to say to convince Knox to take this to the bedroom. His mouth slams back down on mine, kissing me while both of his hands grab my ass and lift to carry me down the hallway.

  Since he’s never been beyond the foyer where he fucked me against the front door, Knox stops kissing me to flip on the light switch at the first bedroom that’s been recently furnished.

  “Oh, wow,” Knox says as he looks around the room in awe. “You-you’ve already set up a room for the baby?”

  “No, this is my room. I curl up and sleep in the crib,” I tease while still gripping his shoulders and kissing my way up his neck. “Now, let’s take this to the bedroom, and then afterward we’ll come back to all of this.”

  “Fine,” Knox says on a sigh before he flips the light off and carries me further down the hall. I yank his wife-beater up and over his head to get my hands on his warm chest and chiseled abs before we finally reach my room. My back hits the mattress first with Knox following me down.

  “Wait,” he says against my lips while I reach between us to undo his jeans. I only succeed in popping the button. “Is this okay for the baby?”

  “It’s fine,” I assure him, reaching for his zipper.

  “Are you sure? I weigh a lot more than you,” he argues. “Maybe you should be on top. That’s how you like it best anyway.”

  “How do you know that?” I ask him in confusion.

  “You told me in the interview room. Unless you were lying,” he says with a smirk.

  “Oh,” I mutter as I think back to that crazy conversation so many months ago. I had no clue that it would lead here…

  “On top works for me,” I reply, rather than continue to reassure him that fucking me missionary style isn’t going to hurt the baby. I push on Knox’s muscular shoulders until he rolls to his back so that I can climb on top of him.

  “There, that better?” I ask. Instead of waiting for an answer, I sit back on my knees to unzip his pants and tug them down, releasing his half-hard cock that’s just as mouthwatering as I remember. Since Knox doesn’t make a move to remove my clothes, I peel my tank off and toss it aside before shoving my yoga pants and panties down my legs.

  Behind me, I hear thumps as Knox toes his shoes off, but I don’t take the time to fully remove his pants, too impatient to straddle him and rub my aching pussy up and down his length until he’s fully hard and ready to go. I grab his cock and position it…

  “Condom?” Knox asks, making me pause.

  “Do you fuck those skanky strippers without them?” I ask.

  “No. And for the record, I haven’t ever fucked the strippers,” he says, but I don’t believe it for a second.

  Rolling my eyes, I tell him, “Knox, you don’t have to lie…”

  “I’m not!” he exclaims as he grabs my hips. “I don’t fuck them. They just, you know, occasionally suck my dick.”

  “Eww,” I reply. “Just stop talking. You been checked for herpes or whatever else?”

  “Yes! Now, no more talking, only moaning and, if I do it right, screaming,” he says, making the ache between my legs even worse.

  “Right, and can we skip the condom? You can’t knock me up twice in nine months.”

  “Okay. I was just tested a few weeks ago for a fight, and I’m clean,” Knox agrees with a nod before I feed his length inside of me. “Oh fuck! God, that’s good, even better than before,” he groans, reaching up to cup both of my breasts as I brace my hands on his chest and start to ride him.

  “The pregnancy hormones…have me wanting it…all the time,” I tell him as my eyes close in the ecstasy that comes with getting filled by a long, thick, and unlike my vibrator, very real cock.

  “I’m not…I’m not gonna last,” Knox says. “Been too long.”

  Reaching around behind me, I grab his balls and give them a squeeze to hold off his release, making him groan.

  “Just a little longer. I need this so much,” I tell him as I work my hips faster to try and catch up. On each down motion, I grind my clit against Knox’s pelvis, and it feels so good that I stay there and rock back and forth until the pressure inside me bursts.

  “Oh, thank God,” Knox says as his hips buck underneath me and his hot seed fills me while the tremors continue to wrack through my body.

  As soon as the last shudder leaves me, my arms go weak, and I fall forward onto Knox’s chest. He wraps one strong arm around my back and the other around my waist, holding me to him as we both catch our breath and recover.

  Eventually, he asks, “Have you picked out names yet?”

  “No,” I answer with my head still lying on his chest, listening to his racing heart as it settles back down.

  “Don’t take this the wrong way, but are you really sure it’s mine?” Knox asks. And I don’t get the impression that he’s calling me a liar, just that he needs reassurances before he thinks of the baby as his.

  “Yes, I discussed dates of conception with my doctor, which was easy to do with the arrest reports on the second occasion,” I start to explain since the same question went through my mind when I realized that my period was late. “The doctor is one-hundred percent certain it was either the first time or second we were together since it was just a few days apart.” I hesitate a moment before I admit to him, “The last person I was with was four weeks or so before. Not only did I have a period afterward, but the baby’s measurements on the ultrasound don’t line up with that time at all. So, yes, it has to be yours.”

  “Do you think…should we do a paternity test to be sure?” Knox asks as I feel his fingers playing with strands of my hair.

  “Sure, we can if you want,” I tell him. “But you don’t have to do any of this if you don’t want to. It was my fault for seducing you…”

  “Seducing me?” he repeats. “It wasn’t like you tied me down or anything…”

  “Yeah, I just handcuffed you and took what I wanted.”

  “I don
’t remember it that way,” he says. “I wanted every second of what we did the first time, and the second was all on me.”

  “After I invited you over, then answered the door wearing nothing but a robe,” I remind him.

  “I came over thinking it was just a booty call, not that you were going to admit to me that you went behind my back and used my grief-stricken, heartbroken friend to catch a bad guy.”

  “Now that just makes me sound like a cunty whore,” I admit to his warm, sturdy chest.

  “I shouldn’t have said the whore thing earlier,” Knox tells me. “It’s just…you don’t really know me after fucking me twice.”

  “You’re right, I don’t,” I agree.

  “Are you gonna give me a chance?” he asks.

  I don’t respond right away but instead chew it over. Doesn’t Knox at least deserve for me to give him the benefit of the doubt that I was wrong about him? This is his son or daughter too. So, if he can prove to me that he would be good for the baby, then there’s no reason he shouldn’t be involved in his or her life.

  Pushing myself off of him so that I can look at his face, I tell him, “I think I can give you a chance.”

  “You will?” he asks with his dark eyebrows raised in surprise.

  “Prove to me that I was wrong about you, and you can be as big a part of their life as you want.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes.”

  “Thank you,” he says on an exhale. “And what about us?”

  “What about us?” I ask.

  “Are we going to keep doing this? You said the pregnancy makes you horny and you haven’t been with anyone else. I could take care of you whenever you need, like, as part of the getting to know me process…”

  Thinking that proposition over, the sex is too good to say no to.

  “Okay, but on one condition,” I tell him with a grin.

  “What’s that?”

  “You have to fuck me like before, right now, and don’t hold back. Trust me, you’re not gonna hurt the baby. I don’t want anyone, especially you in the bedroom, treating me like I’m fragile just because I’m pregnant.”