Both of them look at each other on a roll of their eyes and mimic throwing up with their fingers in their mouths. I laugh, as does Ava. ‘What else did you remember?’ Jacob presses on, done with the sloppy stuff.
‘I remember some things your dad has said to me in the past. But enough of that. How is everything there?’ Ava settles back on the couch and gets comfortable, chatting happily with our kids for a good ten minutes. And I remain where I am, content to watch her. I could leave the room and she wouldn’t notice, and for the first time in my life, it doesn’t hurt to know she wouldn’t miss me if I were not here.
When she’s done, she blows them both a kiss on a promise to call tomorrow, and sighs when she’s hung up, looking down at the phone on a mild smile. It’s a good few minutes before she snaps from her daydream and seeks me out.
‘I didn’t want to say goodbye, anyway,’ I tease quietly.
She laughs lightly and settles her head on my chest. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘Never apologise for loving our children more than me.’ I realise my error the second it’s fallen from my big gob. Love me. Does she? Can she? Will she?
‘I love you all the same,’ she argues quietly, pulling my stare down to the back of her head. There’s unmistakable uncertainty in her tone.
‘I don’t expect you to wake up from a coma with no recollection of me and instantly be in love with me, Ava.’ Never has it hurt so bad to say something.
Turning onto her back slowly, her head on my lap, she looks up at me. ‘I love our children,’ she tells me, her hand on her heart. ‘I can feel it in here.’
I place my hand over hers and squeeze, trying not to allow myself to be disappointed. A mother’s instinct is stronger than anything else in existence. It might hurt, but it also injects me with more fortitude. If the next few days are anything like today, Sarah aside, then she’ll be head over heels with me in no time.
I hope.
I pray.
There’s no doubt the lust is there. I take comfort from the fact that this is how it started for us. That lust. That desire. The need to be all over each other. I see it in her now – the restraint it’s taking to hold back, the overwhelming urge to ravish me. I have to let her go at her own pace, and that pace has accelerated satisfyingly today. But I know she’s holding back, too, and I have a feeling deep inside me that it’s because she’s scared. She’s scared of how she feels for me without even really knowing me. Just like she was scared all those years ago.
Ava tries to suppress a yawn, and makes a terrible job of it.
‘Time for bed.’ I get to my feet and help her up. ‘You must be exhausted.’
She lets me lead her by her shoulders upstairs. I smile privately, but feel a little guilt creep up on me. She’s overdoing things, and it’s my fault.
The usual flurry of nerves descends the closer we get to our bedroom. Today has been a huge step forward. Would it be too much to ask . . .?
‘Goodnight.’ She turns at the door and takes the handle, biting her lip as she moves back.
I die. Over and over inside, I die. ‘Goodnight.’ I turn quickly and make my way to the spare room before she can see the devastation on my face. Clearly it is too much to ask.
Closing the door softly behind me, I strip down to nothing and crawl into the unfamiliar bed. It’s cold and lonely.
I toss and turn for hours, sleep nowhere to be found, not that it’s much of a surprise. I’m about to give up and go and put myself on the couch, when I hear a stirring on the landing. Worried, I make to get up and go to check on Ava, but the sound of the door handle stills me. Light creeps into the room through the small gap, and the silhouette of a body I’d recognise anywhere appears. I slowly ease down to my back. It’s fucking ridiculous that my heart starts hammering. It’s fucking ridiculous that I dare not move. It’s fucking ridiculous that I’m nervous.
She pads on light feet across the room and gently pulls back the covers a little before crawling in beside me. I’m like a fucking statue, letting her lift my arm so she can burrow into my side. She settles, palm on my pec, cheek on my chest. It’s one of the most beautiful moments of my life. So simple. But so significant. She can’t sleep without me. I don’t care that there’s a barrier of lace between us. I don’t care that she’s technically in the wrong position. And then she sighs and she’s on the move again, crawling onto my chest and spreading her body all over me, face in my neck. I smile, discreetly inhaling her into me, bringing my arm around her back and holding her to me.
Within minutes, I hear her soft breathing, and only minutes after that, my own eyes become heavy. The fact that the bed isn’t ours and is lumpy is inconsequential. I could be lying on a bed of nails and be content. Because she’s here. With her man.
Chapter 23
My sleepy brain is telling me not to move, though I’m not sure why. I’m aware that I’m curled around Ava’s body, my front to her back, snug and tight. And I’m aware that I slept the best I have in over a week. I’m also aware of something growing between my groin and her arse. That’s why I shouldn’t move. But Ava doesn’t get the warning. Her body starts to stretch, and she groans. Oh, shit. My muscles lock, my body freezes, and I hold my breath as she grinds her arse into me, causing all kinds of chaos in my cock and my head. Good God, what kind of torture is this?
Then she suddenly stills, my erection wedged between her thighs, my teeth grinding as I fight my way through the torturous sensitivity. ‘Oh . . .’ she breathes, shimmying a little, as if I’m not in enough fucking pain.
‘Don’t move, Ava,’ I warn. I’m so fucking hard, it could break off. ‘Please.’
‘Sorry.’
‘So you should be.’ I need to get out of this bed before the radar on my cock wins and finds its target. Half of me wants it to. Actually, the best part of me wants it to. I could fuck her memory back. I mentally slap myself for my unreasonable thought. But, then again, my lack of reason is one of the things Ava loves about me . . . right? Jesus, Jesse, sort your shit out.
Quiet falls, and she waits patiently while I focus on talking down my wayward dick. Five minutes later, I’m still iron. ‘It’s no good,’ I finally admit. My cock has and always will have a mind of its own where my wife is concerned. ‘It won’t go down.’ I relax and squeeze Ava closer, hoping that restricting the rampant little fucker might help.
‘It’s okay,’ Ava says, surprising me a little.
It is? What, my dick hard, or my dick where it is? Just a little nudge to the left and I’ll be inside her. Would that be okay? Shit, change the subject quickly. ‘Couldn’t you sleep?’
‘No. Something wasn’t . . .’ She fades off, stilling. ‘Right.’
‘This. You didn’t have this.’ I squeeze her tight, and she nods, sighing and settling again.
‘This is nice.’
‘It would be better if you were naked,’ I say without thought, wondering just how much I want to physically hurt myself.
‘Really?’ She sounds truly surprised by that, and I frown at the back of her head. ‘Because I had a very good look at my body in the mirror last night, and, frankly, it isn’t pretty.’
My hard-on shrivels to nothing in a second as I stare incredulously at her hair.
‘Stretch marks,’ she grumbles on. ‘Saggy boobs, and what the hell happened to my waistline?’
Is she playing some kind of cruel game? ‘Take that back,’ I all but growl in her hair. I won’t have her speaking such bullshit. ‘Turn over.’ I bully her body over until she’s facing me, a little alarmed. ‘Let’s get one thing straight, lady.’ I wave an accusing finger up and down her reclined body. ‘All this here is mine, and I love it. Your boobs are perfect.’ I allow myself a brief glimpse at the mounds beneath her lace negligee, my mouth watering for a taste. ‘Your waistline is perfect, and the stretch marks you speak of make me smile every day. They’re part of you, a part of us. I love them, almost as much as I love your boobs, and I love your boobs a lot. A real lot. And, for the record, so do you.’
‘I do?’