Page 147 of Daddy By Design

What if he’d actually bled out? He would’ve become one of those stories in a magazine about an artist who’d died before his time.

I slid my hand over my stomach. And there wouldn’t be this baby.

Definitely not in my plans, but I was already attached to the idea of it. But what if I was like Harriette?

What if I lost this baby even before we began?

“Why are you thinking so loud, so early?”

I jumped.

He opened one eye, his face smashed in his pillow. “You have a very noisy brain.”

“I was just thinking about Harriette.”

He rolled onto his side and his scar was on display. It snaked down his clavicle and along his ribs to disappear under the sheet. “What about her?”

“What if I’m like her?” I gripped my fingers in the soft undershirt I’d found in his mini closet. “What if this is just a tease?”

He brushed my hand away and pushed the shirt up to show off my still flat belly. Well, mostly flat. I had enjoyed fries quite a bit in the last few weeks. He inched down to kiss my stomach. Then he rubbed his bearded chin along the skin above my panties. “Listen here, Little Bean, you stay exactly where you’re supposed to. You have much cooking to do.”

My eyes burned as I pushed his hair out of his eyes. “Think that’s all it takes?”

“Can’t hurt, right?” He shifted back up to lay next to me. “Reading those diaries would worry anyone.”

“Yeah,” I whispered.

“Pretty sure between the two of us, that baby will be even more stubborn. It’s not going anywhere.”

“But it could?—”

He lowered his mouth to mine, kissing the words away. “It could be fine.”

“Okay.” I tried to push the fears back. Was Harriette warning me of trouble? Or just letting me know the baby was here?

He rolled onto his back and draped me over him. “Touch me, Hellcat.”

I gripped his shoulders. “All of you?”

He licked his lips and tucked one arm behind his neck. His hand fisted and I could feel the tension radiating off of him, but he nodded. “Anything you want.”

Gizmo opened one green eye then he leaped off the bed.

“Guess he knows you’re going to debauch me too.” Nolan grinned and some of the tension slipped out of him.

I pushed the sheet out of the way and slid my leg over to straddle him. I felt his cock grow behind me, lengthen with interest, but I ignored that for now. Instead, I spread my fingers over his shoulders and down his free arm. I grasped his hand in mine, lacing our fingers as I pushed his arm up to follow the other one. “Stay there.”

Like he’d done to me that first time.

He dragged in a slow breath, and those watchful midnight eyes made me burn. Was it just chemistry? Or was it more?

Even when he’d hidden himself from me, he’d been overwhelmingly generous. Holding me down while he’d made me insane. No part of me had been safe from his mouth or the delicious cock that was being very insistent against my ass. I ground down on him lightly as I trailed my fingertips over his pecs. I scraped lightly through the heavier hair there and beside the puckered skin of his longest scar.

Little horizontal scars showed where he’d been stapled back together. Just how much damage had been done to him?

I lowered my mouth to trace the lightning bolt fissure. He hissed out a breath but stayed still. A few spots on the scar were raised with a pink color. Where his body had resisted the healing and left an extra bit of flesh. I took extra care there and as I explored the grafts that covered his left side.

“Does it hurt?”

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