Page 65 of Expensive

The mountain of stuffies isn’t that bad. I can deal with it. Maybe it will give me good practice for the eggs.

“I wish it wasn’t so hot,” Andrew says.

He’s always hot these days. It’s probably the pregnancy.

I resist the urge to tell him that the bed would probably be a lot cooler without the mountain of stuffies on top of us. He’s the one carrying our eggs. If he wants to be covered in a mountain of stuffies, he can be covered in a mountain of stuffies.

He sits up and pulls off his shirt. That’s not entirely surprising. He hasn’t worn pajamas at all the last week. But the amount of sweat on his skin is definitely more than usual.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to move the stuffies?”

“The floor is lava, Daddy.”

He starts taking off his pajama pants too, and I look away. Andrew’s been clear that sexual advances while he’s in his little space are unwelcome.

The problem is that Andrew’s erection is obvious when he takes off his pants.

“Baby boy, are you…”

“I… need you.” His voice is lower, and he’s completely naked now.

That was a fast transition.

He starts rocking back and forth, the sheen of sweat on his skin thick now. The doctor said that this was a sign the eggs were descending, but she also said it would take time. So far, Andrew’s pregnancy has been different than most omegas from both of our shifter species. The doctor said that mixed couples had to play things by ear—that most of the time the babies were perfectly healthy as long as the parents let the pregnancies run their natural course.

I reach out for Andrew without thinking. The cool metal of my right hand rests on his back. Usually he flinches at the temperature of my magic hand, but this time he arches into it like a cat.

“Oh, that’s good, Daddy.”

The magical hand responds so readily to me now, I sometimes forget it’s not real. The sensation has gotten better over the last few weeks too. It almost feels like the hand I gave up at The Flickering Candle. The biggest difference is how versatile the new hand is. I can manipulate it to flatten and lengthen when something gets trapped behind the fridge. And it has a strength that my old hand didn’t. Opening a pickle jar is nothing.

I run my palm along Andrew’s back. “Tell me what’s happening, baby boy. Are our eggs coming?”

He shakes his head. “I don’t know. I… I just can’t…” He keeps rocking back and forth.

“It’s okay. You said you need me. Do you mean here?” I slide my fingers between his ass cheeks and rub along his opening.

“Fuck yes.”

I can’t help but chuckle. Little Andrew is definitely gone for the time being. I get up on my knees and crawl around the bed so I can prep him with my other hand. In the process, I knock the panda bear stuffie off the bed.

“Pick it up, Daddy. Hurry.”

Okay. There’s the eccentric behavior the doctor promised. I guess we’re doing this egg birth with an army of stuffies. I bend down and grab the panda bear, tossing it onto the bed.

“Okay, here we go. I’m here for you, baby boy. We’ll do this together,” I whisper in his ear as I run the fingers of my left hand along his entrance. The amount of slick alone is a good sign that the eggs are coming.

“No,” he says. “That hand is too hot. I need the cool one.”

I’ve wanted to finger him with my metal hand ever since the sensation settled in. I’ve been curious about the kind of pleasure I could give him by manipulating it into different shapes. But this probably isn’t the right time for experimentation.

“Alright.” I crawl back to the left side of the bed, careful to avoid knocking off any stuffies.

He’s so beautiful right now, with the sweat coating his body and his belly swollen with the eggs we made together. When I was growing up on the compound, I wanted a family more than anything. For the longest time, I thought the pits had taken that chance away from me. But here we are, about to see our eggs for the first time.

I run my hand along the curve of his ass. “You’re everything to me, baby boy. You know that, right?”

He looks back at me with an intensity that makes me feel understood. Andrew has suffered as deeply as I have, which means he can appreciate the joy of this moment as much as I do.

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