Lightening lit up the bedroom as we sat on the bed next to each other. Less than a second later came a crack of thunder that shook the house. I was tucked tight into Knox’s arm. He loved storms like this. I didn’t understand it. We already lost power, which I hated. But Knox was happy. He was such a weirdo sometimes, but I loved him.
“I hate this stuff,” I said.
“Darlin’, you’re shaking.”
“I don’t do storms.”
“What do you want to talk about?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Tell me about your day.”
“You really want that?” Knox asked. He grinned, knowing half the time I didn’t want to know and the other half he couldn’t tell me.
“Fine.”
Knox took my hand and opened it. He started to trace lines down my fingers and circles at my palm. It sent a tingling feeling through my entire body. It made my toes curl and made my panties soaked. Seriously. It was almost aggravating how attracted to Knox I was.
He traced my hand a couple times before I pulled away.
Another crack of thunder rolled through the sky.
“Hey, it’s okay,” he said. “A storm is good. It cleans things up. The rain. The air gets cooler. It keeps us off the streets. I have a night off.”
“That’s one way to look at it.”
Knox laughed. “What are you going to do, Ana, find a town that never gets thunderstorms?”
“Exactly,” I said. “With a white house. Two stories. A point at the top with one attic window. A wrap around porch. A red door. Red shutters. A white fence. And a black mailbox at the end of the driveway.”
“Nice,” Knox said. “Two car garage with a basketball hoop attached to it?”
“Of course,” I said. “I thought that was implied.”
“So a house that big means you’d have some kids running around, right?”
“Sure,” I said.
Another flash of lightening. Another crack of thunder.
I swallowed hard. I was going into some touchy waters here with Knox.
“Where do you think this town is?” he asked.
“I don’t know, Knox. I’m just playing…”
He touched my face. “Darlin’, I fucking love and hate hearing that shit. You know why?”
“Why, Knox?”
“I love hearing it because of the way your eyes light up. The way you smile. I know it’s completely genuine. But I hate it because I can’t give you that life, darlin’. I’m here. I have to be in this town and I have to stay with the Reap.”
I knew that already. It pained me to think about. Would I leave this town? Would I never end up with Knox for the rest of my life? Those were questions that I tried to avoid facing. It wasn’t easy to do though.
They were storms in my mind that wouldn’t go away.
Maybe that’s why I hated real thunderstorms so much.
We were in silence for a few minutes.
More lightning. Another wicked crack of thunder.
It made me cringe.
“Ana…”
“Knox, it’s fine,” I said. “We’re still young.”
“What does that mean?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” I looked at him. “I thought it was the right thing to say.”
“We’re not young,” he said. “Young was when we first met. We are who we are right now, darlin’. If you ever find that house with two car garage and basketball hoop and all that shit… and you find a man that’ll put you in that house…”
I touched Knox’s lips. “He’d never be my outlaw, Knox. You are. I can sit in this room, in the dark, in a thunderstorm, for the rest of my life, and I’d be happy.”
“That’s a complete lie,” Knox said. “But I appreciate you saying that. I’ll always work hard for you, for us. That’s the truth of what I can offer.”
Thunder boomed again and I jumped.
Knox’s hands touched my back and he leaned into me.
We quickly started to kiss and even quicker, we started to strip each other down.
He thrust deep inside me and I arched my back. Lightning flashed outside the window as my nails dug into his muscular back. For some reason I had a sudden vision of Knox coming inside me and leaving a piece of him for me. Something that we’d create, I’d carry, and then we’d have a family.
I cried out his name as he fucked me harder, chasing that image away.
From that night on… I loved thunderstorms.
twenty-seven
(ana)
NOW
I paced. I bit my nails down to nothing, to the point where they hurt bad. My bottom lip kept quivering. My eyes tried to fill with tears but I fought them off. I wasn’t sure how it would all play out. This was a really big deal. Not just for me, even though it was my body and the rest of my life that would forever change. But it was a big deal for Knox, the Reap, and even Porter and the family.
I managed to mutter the words to Knox over the phone.
“I’m pregnant.”
It didn’t make sense. No, it did make sense. It made a lot of sense. I was super late. I had been getting fucked by Knox two, three times a day, every single day, unprotected for weeks now.
No shock there.