Page 86 of Vasily the Hammer

For an errant second, I wonder how much this feels like the amnesia Ana has suffered through. Not nearly so extreme, and none of the fear, but I’m sure she’s grieved the loss of milestones she doesn’t know if she’ll ever get back.

It’s selfish, I know. This is the sort of thing that gets men ridiculed by their women when we’re wounded by our own poor decisions, but I feel the need to sit down, even though I’m honestly wishing I bought shower shoes at TJMaxx, too. My arms fall to my side as my knees take over the space between Ana’s feet and my ass lands on my heels. There isn’t nearly enough space here, but I don’t need space.

God, if they had to do emergency surgery so drastic, I must have almost lost her then. My son was almost an orphan. I don’t know if Tony would have taken him in or shipped him to me or just threw him into foster care. I might have lost them both.

It’s as good as a sucker punch.

Ana shakes and clutches her stomach, holding in the emptiness inside her. “I’m so sorry.”

Her words bob around in my brain, wrong in a way I can’t immediately identify. She didn’t do anything. It’s not like she performed the hysterectomy herself. The doctors did that. And I’ve heard enough bitching from Kseniya about reproductive rights that I know they didn’t do it on a whim. She doesn’t have anything to apologize for.

She doesn’t have anything to apologize to me for.

She shouldneverapologize to me.

My arms go around her legs to pull her in. She doesn’t have a choice except to put her hands on my head as I invade the space they were just in.“I’msorry. Fuck, I am so goddamn sorry I made you feel like you couldn’t tell me about Artom. I’m sorry you had to go through that alone. I’m sorry about how much pain you must have been in. I’m sorry... I’m sorry I was a coward. I’m sorry I didn’t give you a choice.” As much as it hurts me to say, I blurt out, “You shouldn’t take me back. I don’t deserve you.”

The sweet, devastated, beautiful woman that she is, she swipes tears from her cheeks even though she’s standing under running water. “You’re not upset that I can’t have any more kids?”

“That’swhat you think I’d be upset about? Ana, I didn’t even know I was a father a week ago. And it kills me, everything I missed, but I just want you. Anything else is a bonus. I haven’t been with you for the last six years, but I don’t want to miss a single other minute.”

Her lips pinch like she’s unsure of my words. “You’re sure? You seemedreallyinto the idea of me being pregnant.”

I nod. Yeah, I can see where that might have her a little concerned. “Yeah, I was, but we can always pretend, right?”

“Pretend?”

“Right, like—” I spread my knees, forcing her to walk her feet out a step and giving my shins some much-needed space. I slide a hand up her inner thighs and part her lips, slipping through the slickness that’s far too thick to be water and pushing two fingers into her, curling them into the front wall. “Like, what if I just made sure that I came in this little hole every time?”

She stumbles when I straighten my fingers and curl them again. She has to grab onto my shoulder to steady herself. I massage her at a slow pace, keeping my fingers rigid, going as deep as I can to make sure she really feels it, even though everything about her wobble assures me of that already.

I lean in and flick my tongue over her clit, making one of her knees dip.

“What if every single time I came deep inside you, coating your cunt with my seed, I forced you onto your back with your legs up to keep it inside you as long as possible, and pretended it had somewhere to go?”

Her fingers dig into my shoulders, and she makes sharp, panting sounds when I lash her clit some more, doing my best to time everything so I get her close to the edge before I lift my head up.

“Would you like that?”

“Vasya,” she croons, rocking herself on my fingers.

I spread my other hand across her belly, noting the stripes of stretch marks she wears proudly, feeling the ripple of them under my fingertips. With just a bit of pressure, I say, “What if we pretended that my seed took and your belly grew and grew and grew? If we pretended your belly would get so big with my baby that you had to waddle around with a hand on your back, and the only thing that made you feel better was taking my cock over and over and overagain? Would you like that,zvyozdochka?”I lean forward to kiss her belly, and then I pump my fingers into her to punctuate my words. “Would you beg me to give you my cock every single day, just to make the burn go away?”

Her head tosses back as she gives up her bid for balance, instead leaning against the wall, moaning my name and attempting to get her own hand between her legs to help herself along.

I’m crowding her too much, though. No room for her hand. And when I lift myself up onto my knees, I can rest my chin on her sternum and lean my head one way, then the other, and say, “What about these? Can we pretend that they’re so filled with milk they ache? Can we pretend the flesh is pulled taut and glistening? That our baby’s already full and sound asleep so there’s nothing to be done except make Daddy suck every drop of sweet milk out of your tits as he fucks your sweet cunt?”

Her eyes fly open, and she gasps out, “No!”

But I’ve already got one in my mouth, and I’m already pulling hard on it, like if I just suckle it enough, I’ll find milk somewhere.

I know that was a bit too far for her— the words, I mean— that if she’d actually just had a baby and was nursing, she wouldn’t want me anywhere near her breasts, but this is all pretend. And her orgasm? That’s real. And her trying to silence it, only to make a sound like a tea kettle ready to explode? The whole house probably heard that.

She’s so wobbly it’s nothing to fold her legs and drop her down onto my cock. She rides me there in the mildew-speckled tub under the abysmal shower in the decrepit, formerly-pink bathroom of the shittiest Airbnb an hour north of Denver, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. It doesn’t matter where we are or what the world isaround us, it’s just us in this moment, and she is so fucking incredible I will die before I let anyone separate us.

The water runs cold before we finish; by the time we have finished, we’ve turned it off and melted into jelly in the tub. I’m gonna be broken all over with the way I’m curled up, but Ana is hugging me and kissing me, and I’d rather be broken than interrupt this moment— so of course we’re interrupted by a knock on the door.

Not a knock, a bang, and Kseniya shouting, “Get dressed and get out here now!”

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