Knox Read online

  “Deal,” he agrees. “But there’s still that favor you promised me…”

  “Anything, whatever you want,” I tell him as I lie on my side and pull Knox on top of me. “Fuck me again like before, and then you can have it.”

  Chapter Thirteen

  Knox

  Tonight, I was hit with one helluva unexpected surprise — Jade’s pregnant with my baby.

  Not that she’s given me much time to wrap my head around that newsflash. Instead, we’ve been going at it hot and heavy between the sheets. Who knew I could fuck four times in a row? Certainly not me. But seeing Jade so gorgeous with her swollen breasts and belly that I’m responsible for has me hard as a rock.

  “I had no idea…fighters had…that kind…of stamina. Your endurance…is out of this world,” Jade tells me as we lie sweaty and spent on our backs in bed side by side.

  “One of the few perks,” I admit. Rolling to my side to face her, I say, “I had no idea pregnant women could be so…ferocious during sex. And I’m pretty sure I felt the baby slap my hand away on that last round.”

  “Shut up,” Jade says as she laughs.

  “No, really. When I reached around you, I felt it right here...” I put my hand on her lower belly and feel the thump against my palm again. “That was her, wasn’t it?” I look up at Jade and ask.

  “Yeah,” she answers with a smile. “You said her. You think it’s a girl?”

  “I…I don’t know. It just came out.”

  “If it’s a girl, she’s been pretty active ever since I was fifteen weeks.”

  “How far along are you now? When will I get to meet her?” I ask.

  “Almost twenty weeks, and she’s due on August fourteenth.”

  “Wow. August. I still can’t believe we made her,” I tell her. “I mean, I had no clue that was gonna happen that first day when we met. I sure as fuck wanted it to, but I didn’t think you would ever want me. Guess you were killing two birds with one stone, using me to get information and getting off at the same time.”

  “Contrary to what you may believe, I don’t go around fucking informants for information. You were definitely a first.”

  Glad to hear that, I still can’t help but ask, “And you don’t hook up with other cops?”

  Jade hesitates a moment before she lowers her eyes and says, “God, no. The guys I work with are all pompous, sexist, jerks that take themselves way too seriously because they have a little power and carry a big gun. Most of them believe that women belong at home, barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen.”

  “Well, you’re three for four on that,” I joke.

  “That’s not funny. I didn’t work my ass off for four years in college and then six years on patrol to babysit,” Jade replies defensively.

  “So, what are you gonna do when the baby comes?” I ask.

  “I’ll take her to daycare like most other working moms.”

  “Hmm,” I mutter since I don’t have any alternatives. “It’s not like I could watch a baby on my own. I don’t know how to feed them or change diapers, but I want to be able to see her as much as I can,” I tell Jade. Even if I did know how to do those things, I don’t think I could ever convince her to leave our kid alone with me. “So as long as I don’t fuck up, which I’m not going to, will you let me come over and spend time with her, like, every day? I don’t want her to grow up thinking that I’m not here because I don’t love her.”

  Tilting her head to the side, Jade says, “You think you’ll love her?"

  “Well, yeah. I’ve loved her ever since you told me that she’s definitely mine.”

  Her face softens, before she says, “Wow, Knox.”

  “I should probably buy a car, right? So I can come over faster without waiting for the bus. I mean, what if you go into labor and the bus takes forever,” I ramble. “Which reminds me of why I called you tonight.”

  Clearing her throat, Jade says, “Oh, right. Why did you call?”

  “I need that favor you said you owed me,” I tell her, which of course reminds me of the unfortunate way that things ended the last time I was here.

  “Okay?” she asks.

  “I need to borrow your car –” I start before Jade moves away from me and scrambles out of bed.

  “That’s what you came over for? My car?” she scoffs as she grabs a robe hanging on the back of the bedroom door and puts it on, covering all of her gorgeous, naked skin.

  “Yeah,” I answer with a cringe as I sit up in bed before plowing forward, remembering that Ivan is counting on me and I’m out of options. “I also need some forty-caliber rounds and, if it’s not too much to ask, an extra handgun if you have one around.”

  Jade huffs and then goes over to her dresser. The next thing I know I’m getting beamed with a set of metal keys to the center of my chest.

  “Ow,” I mutter as I rub the place where some of the pointy ends hit.

  “You better not get a single scratch on it!” Jade warns me before mumbling something about ulterior motives.

  “I won’t,” I promise.

  Crossing her arms over her chest, she asks, “And what the fuck do you need a gun and bullets for?”

  “Ah, p-personal protection. Same as you, right?” I lie.

  “I’ve spent hours at the shooting range, training to use guns safely. I’m guessing you have not, so no, I’m not giving you a gun or bullets!”

  Tossing the keys down beside me, I pat the empty spot on the bed that she just vacated and say, “Come lie back down.”

  “What? Why?” Jade asks with her forehead creased in confusion. Confusion is better than anger.

  “Because I’m gonna make you come until you cave,” I inform her.

  “I’m not that horny,” she replies.

  Drastic times call for drastic measures.

  Spotting her handcuffs on the dresser next to where she had her keys, I climb out of bed with my Johnson swinging heavy and low from all the exertion to retrieve them. Jade hasn’t moved from her stubborn position, so I dangle the cuffs in front of her face and say, “I’ve missed these. You want to do the honors?”

  When she doesn’t respond, I snap them on my own wrists one at a time and hear the catch of her breath with each click. Jade has a serious weakness for me in handcuffs. Now that I know that, I plan to exploit the hell out of it.

  “Where do you want me, ma’am?” I ask as I lower my wrists and tuck them under my cock to lift it up. “What can I do to avoid an arrest?”

  Grabbing my shoulders, Jade pushes me to my knees. “Stay there and don’t move. I’m gonna go wash all of your cum off of me in the shower, and then you’re gonna go down on me until I say stop.”

  “Yes, ma’am,” I reply with a grin, looking forward to it.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Knox

  My dick gets hard again as I listen to the shower running, which I thought would be impossible after all the previous rounds of sex. Still, I don’t mind waiting if it means making Jade feel good. She said she hasn’t been with anyone else since me, which I fucking love, but I would bet my balls that she’s been abusing the hell out of her vibrator based on how hot and needy she’s been tonight.

  I’d like to think it was all me getting her wound up, but it was just a matter of being at the right place at the right time to get jumped by her. Still, I consider myself lucky as fuck and plan to take care of her so good that she can’t resist coming back for more. Or at least calling me up to stop by to give her a few orgasms since I can’t have her showing up at the apartment and risk Cain or Ivan finding out I was fucking her during Cain’s case. Sex may be the only thing Jade wants from me right now, but that’s fine. I’ll take it because it means spending time with her and getting a chance to soften her up to me being in the baby’s life.

  From now on, you can bet your ass that my feet will be cemented on the straight and narrow path. Well, after this situation with Ivan blows over. He’s like a brother to me, and I know how much it means to finally get justice
for his mom’s murder. There’s no way I can abandon him now. I’ll just have to hope that whatever happens with him doesn’t bring any heat down on me. I want to help him get through this as soon as fucking possible so that I can start proving to Jade that I deserve to be in the baby’s life. I don’t have the first idea what that looks like, but there’s no doubt I want it. No, need it. I need to be a father to my son or daughter because I know all to well how much it fucks up a kid not to have one.

  All these years later and I still would like to think that my father doesn’t know I exist. Maybe my bitch of a mother never told the one-night-stand chump that she got knocked up and he’s gone through his life never knowing that he made me. I like to even throw in the lie that if he knew about me he would have wanted me…

  “Hands behind your head.”

  Jade’s command when she returns from the shower naked, her skin slick with water droplets and hair off her neck is a welcome reprieve from those depressing fantasies.

  “Like this?” I ask as I move my cuffed hands up and grasp the back of my hair to flex my biceps for her.

  “Just like that,” she agrees as she strolls closer and eyes every inch of me like I’m a gourmet meal she can’t wait to dig her fork into. “Keep your hands off me. You can only use your mouth,” she warns.

  “I think I can make do with those conditions if you’ll spread your legs wide enough for me to devour every inch of your pussy,” I reply as I look up the length of her stunning body.

  In response, she lifts her right leg and places her foot on the bed next to my head, putting herself on display right in front of my face.

  “Yeah, that’ll work,” I tell her, my voice raspy as I lean forward and stick my tongue out to lick her from her ass all the way up to her clit.

  Jade lets out a long, needy moan as she grabs onto my left bicep for balance. When my lips close around her clit and suck, her fingers move around to the back of my neck. Threading them through my hair, she presses my face into her pussy, desperately wanting more. So, I give it to her.

  My nose is buried in Jade’s sweetness as I lick and suck and fuck her with my tongue until her legs start to shake against my ears and her moans turn to screams. I feast on her until she comes at least three times. The only reason I stop is because she sinks down to her knees on the carpet in front of me, her entire body trembling as she gasps for air and throws her arms around my neck, pressing her chest and stomach to mine. I know that the only reason she’s clinging to me is to hold herself up, but I enjoy the feeling of her needing me while it lasts, keeping my aching arms behind my head since the handcuffs would come between us and separate us if I bring them down now.

  “Nothing’s ever felt so good,” Jade says with her damp lips moving against my neck. And at first, I think she’s referring to the cuddling because it’s so much better than fucking. No one’s ever hugged me for more than a few seconds, and never skin to skin like this.

  When I don’t say anything, Jade’s palm slides down the front of my stomach and fists my dick that’s so hard it’s pointing toward the ceiling. And yeah, it feels great when she strokes it, but I don’t want this moment to be about sex.

  “Do you…do you want my mouth?” she asks hesitantly.

  “No, Jade,” I reply on an exhale. “I didn’t go down on you just so that you would reciprocate.”

  “And I didn’t offer just because you went down on me,” she explains while she keeps working me over.

  “Maybe some other time,” I say, causing her hand to stop moving abruptly.

  “Are you leaving?” she asks, releasing my cock and pulling back to look at me with some expression on her face that I can’t determine, maybe hurt or confusion because I turned down a blowjob. That was never my intention.

  “Do you want me to leave?”

  “Have I taken the handcuffs off yet?” she responds with a half-grin.

  “So that’s how I know when you’re tired of me? When you free me?” I tease.

  Reaching up to my wrists, she smooths both of her hands over my biceps, down to my underarms and keeps going until she comes to a stop at my hips.

  “Being this tempting when naked has to be some sort of criminal offense, so you should probably get used to the cuffs.”

  “Leave them on me then until you get your fill,” I joke.

  “If I take them off, will you stay?” she asks softly like she’s afraid I’ll say no. Doesn’t she realize that I would stay here forever if she let me?

  “I don’t have anywhere to be until the morning,” I assure her, rather than say I would gladly stay until she hauled my ass out the door and into the street.

  “And in the morning, you need to leave with my car, a gun, and ammunition?” she asks as she gets to her feet, still a little unsteady and stretches to reach the keyring with her car keys still lying on the mattress.

  “Yes,” I answer while she unlocks each cuff with one of the keys on the chain and I get to my feet.

  “Fine, you can have all three. As long as you promise me that you won’t hurt anyone.”

  “I won’t hurt anyone,” I assure her since that’s the truth. I just can’t speak for Ivan. “It’s just in case someone tries to hurt me or my boys.”

  Placing her fingertip to my lips, she says, “Don’t tell me anything else. The orgasms were so good that I’m agreeing to this, but too many details and I may sober up and refuse.”

  “Thanks,” I tell her as my now free hands stroke her backside. “And anytime you need them, my tongue and cock are yours.”

  “No more trips to Escapades,” she says.

  “No more trips to Escapades,” I easily agree. “And just so you know, you were my first. I haven’t been with anyone since…”

  Jade’s jaw drops when she looks up at my face. “Are you saying that I took your virginity?” she asks.

  “Um, yeah. Just don’t tell anyone. I would hate to ruin my street cred,” I tell her with my face flaming with embarrassment.

  “I thought you had been with tons of women!” she exclaims. “And all the strippers…”

  “Nope.”

  “I…I shouldn’t have teased you like that. If I had known, I wouldn’t have jumped you…”

  “I wanted to be with you,” I assure her. “And I’m glad I waited. It’s just ironic that the reason I waited was because I didn’t want to knock anyone up.” I lower my hand to Jade’s belly where I swear the miracle inside radiates extra warmth.

  “You were afraid a woman would give the baby up without you knowing?” she asks.

  “Yeah, and that’s a horrible life that I wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy,” I admit to her. “Not the facility itself so much as the emptiness you grow up with inside of you.”

  “No matter what happens, our baby will be cared for and loved,” Jade tells me. She stands on her toes to kiss my cheek before she turns off the overhead light and climbs up on the bed.

  While her words were meant to be reassuring, I can’t help but take them as a premonition that Jade’s promising to take care of our son or daughter even if I’m not around.

  “Are you coming?” she asks when I continue standing at the foot of the bed.

  “Yeah, fuck yeah,” I agree before I join her under the covers.

  …

  Jade

  “So you grew up in an orphanage?” I ask Knox in the darkness, unable to stop thinking about it. Not being able to see his face, only feeling his heart beating against my ear, makes it easier to ask the tough questions about his childhood that I was so clueless about. I want to know more about him, so that I can understand him better.

  “In an all-boys home, yeah, until I was six. That’s when Vito Scarfone recruited me to be a fighter.”

  “Six! Jeez.”

  “I didn’t start training until I was thirteen,” he says, like that makes it any better. At thirteen he was still just a kid and they were already teaching him how to hurt other people.

  “Have you never tried to fi
nd your parents?” I ask hesitantly.

  “Why would I?” he replies. “They made it pretty clear they didn’t want anything to do with me when they gave me up. They didn’t even bother naming me. Everyone called me John until I was eight fucking years old and finally realized ‘John Doe’ was what they assigned to all unknowns. That’s when I asked Mrs. Engle, the woman who ran Scarfone’s foster home or whatever, to help me change it…”

  “You picked Knox?” I ask, my heart breaking upon hearing that he had to name himself.

  “Yeah, and she suggested her last name since I couldn’t decide on one. At the time, anything seemed better than John fucking Doe.”

  “I’m sorry,” I tell him sincerely, unable to comprehend how a mother could give up her baby so easily. Maybe she had her own reasons or thought he would be better off. It couldn’t have been easy for Knox to deal with the abandonment. I’m sure that’s something that he still struggles with, knowing he wasn’t wanted by his parents. Just so he doesn’t worry about our baby, I tell him, “My mom will take care of the baby if anything happens. Not that my family even knows I’m pregnant yet…”

  “Why haven’t you told them?”

  “I don’t know,” I answer. “They’re all back home at the coast, so I didn’t want to do it over the phone and haven’t had a chance to visit.”

  “You’re ashamed.”

  “No, I’m not,” I argue. “It’s just, I don’t want to deal with all of their questions.”

  “Like who knocked you up?” he asks.

  “That’s a big one, yeah.”

  “So you’re not ashamed of being pregnant, but you’re ashamed you’re having the baby with me?”

  “No. Things are just…complicated with us. I always thought I would be married before I had kids with a man…”

  “Jade, I get that I’m not the man you would’ve chosen to start a family with, or the man you want to spend the rest of your life with. But if you let me, I’ll try to be the man you need me to be, so that you don’t have to do this all alone.”