27: Dropping the Gloves Read online

  “I said shitty things to you.”

  I nodded. “Yeah. You did. But Jordan…” I took a deep breath and puffed out my cheeks before letting it out. “Everyone deals with miscarriages and infertility different. We were obviously on two very different sides of the coin.”

  “And if it happens again?”

  There was a kick in my heart at the thought of more babies. I shrugged a shoulder. “Well, we both know how we acted before. I’d have to try to not be such a scheduled nympho,” I tried joking, smiling a little when it earned me a slight kick up in his lips.

  I brushed my thumb over his cheekbone, my eyes watching the movement. “We can’t just jump back into things, though, Jordan. And if babies come up five, ten years down the road, we deal with it then.”

  “We had ten really good years. You think we can get another ten?”

  I shifted my eyes to his and whispered, “I raise your ten, and give you twenty. Thirty.” I bit on my bottom lip. What I would give to erase our mistakes and just have the happy times. He’d always been the one I saw my future with.

  “No more five-year breaks,” he added.

  I shook my head. “If it happens again, it’s the last time. No more five-year breaks.”

  I heard as he shut the album, but I kept my eyes on his. He reached for my hand on his face, moving it so my palm was in front of his mouth.

  I felt as his lips brushed the sensitive skin there, followed by a swipe of his tongue and a gentle nibble.

  “I love you,” he said, pulling my hand to his lap. “I never stopped. I thought it faded, but it didn’t. I just let jealous desires cloud it.”

  I pulled my lips in, giving him a small smile but unable to form the words back.

  Once bitten, twice shy.

  My love for him never went away. There was a saying I heard, that to hold such anger and contempt for someone, there had to be some degree of love and hurt in there.

  And wasn’t that the truth?

  We’d had the type of love that was the forever kind. We just had to do some growing up.

  Instead of admitting that I loved him, that I’d always loved him, I put my hands back to his face and brought his face near, whispering, “Stay.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Jordan

  The last few weeks were a whirlwind of emotional flurry, but I’d take the anger, the hurt, the breakdowns…to get to this part.

  I carried Marlo to her bed, her legs wrapped around my hips as her hands framed my face, her lips playing gently over mine.

  Slowly, I kneeled on the bed, lowering her to her back as I kept one arm banded behind her and the other braced against the mattress. When her back hit the mattress, rather than unwind her legs from me, she pulled me close until my weight was pressing into her.

  My eyes were open and hooded, and I watched as she lifted her own eyelids, kissing me with her eyes open.

  There was still an intense connection between us.

  It never left.

  Like I told her, I just allowed it to be clouded for some time.

  I reversed us so I was on the bottom, slow enough so she could unwrap her legs. With her knees on either side of my hips and her hands still on my face, Marlo had me completely within her web and there was nowhere else I’d rather be.

  Ever.

  Never again.

  Sex with Marlo was coming home.

  It didn’t matter if it was hurried or slow, there was too much emotion there to be labeled as anything other than making love to her.

  Reading my thoughts, or maybe it was my hardening cock under her spread thighs, Marlo left me with one last peck, pushing up to sit. I watched, mesmerized as she crossed her arms in front of her, pulling her shirt up and off. She tossed it to the ground and as she reached behind her back, thrusting her chest out, I reached up to stop her hands.

  I sat up and pressed my lips to her shoulder, trailing kisses up her neck and to her earlobe, where I sucked. “Let me.”

  She obeyed, dropping her hands to the hem of my shirt. I could feel her playing with it as I unlatched her bra.

  Leaving her ear, I brought my kisses back to her shoulder, down the slope as I followed the dropping of her bra strap.

  Marlo leaned back and I pulled the garment completely off.

  She was so goddamned beautiful. I kicked myself for thinking life without her would be worth living.

  Marlo was my beauty.

  I didn’t want to share her with anyone else.

  For as long as she allowed.

  I pressed my hand into the middle of her back and with the gentlest of pressures, she arched back. With my head dropped, I suckled the top of her breast, sweeping my tongue down until it brushed over her tightly peaked nipple.

  Her moan was accentuated by a further arching of her back, and I took the opportunity to suck her breast into my mouth.

  Her boobs weren’t the same as when we were kids. Nor were her hips, her stomach. But the proof of why slept soundly in the next room over, and I was absolutely okay, thrilled even, with the changes in her body.

  She was still beautifully mine.

  A ‘mine’ I lost, yet somehow was given back.

  I lowered her to her back once again, still sucking and nibbling on the tight bud. Her left nipple was more sensitive than the other, I remembered. I could have her flying in just a few more moments.

  I slipped my hand into the top of her pants, my fingers at once encountering the wet pool of heat there. I flicked my tongue quickly at the very underside of her tight nipple just as my finger pressed into her clit.

  Marlo’s knees lifted, trying to draw her legs into her chest, as she breathlessly moaned above me. Her fingers dug into the back of my head as I gentled my ministrations on her tit. I pulled back with a gentle pop, my hand below gently rubbing up and down over her clit, dragging her orgasm out.

  I pushed up so I could take her mouth with mine, although hers had grown slack under mine. I swept my tongue into the moist depths of her mouth, reacquainting myself with every aspect of this woman.

  As her body relaxed under me, I removed my hands from her pants, just as she let go of my head to start working on the button of my jeans.

  Everything became hurried then.

  My clothes were off, a condom packet pulled from my pocket and tossed on the bed.

  Her pants were next.

  I crawled over her and as I brought my lips down, her legs came up, and my cock was brushing over her wet folds, begging to be let in.

  I reached for the condom packet, but Marlo intercepted my hand.

  She folded her fingers against mine, whispering against my lips, “No.”

  My body stilled and I lifted my head. “As in, stop?”

  Her lips kicked to the side and she shook her head, reaching with her free hand to bring me back to her. “Just make love to me, Jordan.”

  I needed no other permission.

  I squeezed her hand, reaching between our bodies to angle my cock, and slid home, entering her tight heat slowly.

  Her drawn-in breath was deep and full, followed by her biting on her lower lip.

  I watched her face as I pulled out, thrust back in three slow times. It was total fucking torture.

  Her walls squeezing me.

  Her eyes hooded, that lip between her teeth.

  I pulled out nearly all the way, then slammed back home.

  Then, unable to stop it, I rutted against her like a fucking animal, my hips pounding into her as her breathy little moans edged me on, further and further, closer to my edge.

  Short, quick thrusts, and her tiny little squeezes, were doing me in. Her nails scratched down my back until she dug in at the top of my ass. I wasn’t going to last much longer.

  In the past, fast sex didn’t get Marlo off, but damned if I was restarting our relationship on that note. She was coming with me.

  I let go of her hand so I could roll us to our sides, my hand between us, playing with her clit. Then my mouth was on h
er breast and I sucked once. Hard.

  And she flew.

  I was right behind her.

  My groan was loud and even in the throes of her own passion, Marlo could find it in her to laugh and put her hand over my mouth. Her leg pressed into my side, holding me to her as her hips bucked.

  She was still smiling when she lifted her hand, leaning in to seal her mouth over mine.

  I fought to breathe through my nose as she kissed me sweetly.

  “I love you, too,” Marlo whispered against my mouth.

  I pulled back slightly, just enough to take in her face. She was still smiling, even if her lips themselves were tipped just a little. Her face showed she was happy, and that look—the full, raw look of open happiness—was one I forgot I loved on her.

  It had been a long time since she looked this happy.

  Maybe even as far ago as our wedding.

  I would do anything to keep this look on her face.

  “I might disappoint you over the years, Marlo,” I started quietly as I fought to catch my breath. I watched as her brows lowered and continued, “But never again will I question what I feel for you. What I want with you. What I’ll have with you. I’m going to love you until the day I die. But until then… Just a day at a time.”

  She nodded, pushing up to kiss me again. “Yes, Jordan. One day at a time.”

  Epilogue

  Jordan

  I was pacing.

  I’d been kicked out of the birthing room nearly two hours before, and I was antsy as fuck. Now, I was banned to the mom-and-baby room, waiting for news.

  Waiting for Marlo.

  “Dad.”

  I stopped moving and turned toward Rori. She was sitting on the blue pull-out couch, her legs drawn up and acting as a rest for her iPad. Against her side was her five-year-old brother, Jackson. His eyes remained on the iPad screen and he looked tired. He was a firm believer in the no-nap-regime, but he still needed them.

  Rori doted on Jack. She was such a little mom; had been since the day Mar and I told her we were expecting.

  Tomorrow was Rori’s fifteenth birthday. It made me feel really fucking old.

  I was too old to have a newborn.

  Too late for that.

  “Everything’s going to be fine,” Rori, my voice of reason, said. “Mom would let you know.”

  “I know, Rore.” I looked around the empty room, then plopped down at the end of the unoccupied bed. I took the moment to appreciate the last few minutes with just two kiddos—even if one was well into her first year of high school.

  Marlo and I re-married eight years ago. Two years after that, I was a restricted free agent and was picked up by Toronto. An international move with an eight-month pregnant wife wasn’t exactly on my list of fun times, but we survived.

  Like with Rori, getting pregnant with Jack was difficult. Marlo only suffered from one miscarriage, but we went through a lot of negative pregnancy tests. It was when we took a three-month break of actively trying, that Jack came to be.

  We were essentially told that Marlo’s body wasn’t meant to have babies, words from an ill-mannered doctor; words that tore my wife apart. On more than one occasion, she expressed her fears of me leaving because of those fucking words.

  Those were fears I wouldn’t be able to take away from her, but I certainly tried to ease them.

  I wasn’t going anywhere.

  I was happy. I loved Marlo more today than I did ten years ago; more than twenty years ago.

  Marlo was my person, and our kids? They were my purpose.

  We’d been happy with our family of four, and after three seasons in Toronto, I chose to retire. Rather than heading home to Iowa, Marlo and I headed back to San Diego. San Diego was our home.

  It was there, back with the group of people that made up our extended family, that Marlo expressed her desire for another baby.

  I’d been fucking terrified.

  There we were, in our mid-thirties, with a new teenager and a three-year-old boy that made terrible-twos look good, and Marlo wanted to revisit the words she didn’t believe in.

  We tried for a year. Found a reproductive endocrinologist. Marlo’s inability to carry was confirmed.

  This doctor, though, was ready to present to us options we could look at, rather than just give Mar the news and say, “Oh, well. Good luck.”

  And a year later, nine months ago, we found out we were expecting.

  I swallowed hard and looked up at the clock for the sixtieth time that hour.

  “What do you think the baby will be?” Rori asked. I looked back at my daughter. She’d put the iPad down and Jack was laying on the couch, his head in her lap, sleeping. Her hand was lightly playing over his buzzed hair.

  Where Rori had Marlo’s hair and facial features, but my eyes, Jack was the opposite, with my hair—if I didn’t shave it off—and features, and Marlo’s darker eyes.

  “I don’t know, sport.” I leaned forward. “As long as it’s healthy, I’m good.”

  Rori grinned crookedly, shaking her head. “That’s such a generic answer.”

  “It’s true though.”

  “I think Mom wants another boy.”

  I shrugged. “She’d be happy with either. Boy or girl.”

  “Ten fingers and ten toes,” Rori mocked, still grinning.

  “Where’d you get your sass from?” I joked.

  “Mom. Obviously.”

  I chuckled, shaking my head. It was then I caught movement from the corner of my eye.

  Immediately, I stood.

  My beautiful wife walked into the room, a bundle cradled in her arms. With a wide smile on her face, she looked over our kiddos before holding my gaze with hers.

  “It’s a girl.”

  Marlo

  It had been difficult to wrap my head around the fact I wouldn’t carry my last baby.

  But choosing a surrogate didn’t turn out to be too difficult, and the woman we chose was one-hundred percent open with communication. The moment we chose her, knowing that we were on our way to a third baby, Jordan and I both went in to the clinic.

  This baby was completely us; I just didn’t carry her.

  I’d missed not feeling the baby moving around in my tummy but the most important part of having a baby was holding that baby in your arms and watching her grow.

  “A girl?” Jordan had stood the moment I walked into the room, and the nervous energy was all around him. Now, there was a look of disbelieving joy.

  I nodded. “A girl.”

  “Bring her here, Mom,” my oldest said and I walked further into the room.

  The baby slept against my chest and I moved to sit at the end of the bed, at the spot Jordan just vacated. “Wake up your brother, Rore.”

  While Rori did that, Jordan moved to sit next to me. I rearranged the baby so she was cradled in my arms, angling her so she faced Jordan. He reached out and ran a finger down her tiny button nose before hooking his finger gently at the top of her bundled blanket.

  “She has my jawline.”

  I smiled and nodded. “Yeah, she does.”

  “Poor girl.”

  “Lucky girl,” I whispered, watching him as he watched her.

  Jordan was such a good dad with Rori and Jack, and I could only imagine how he would be with this little one. Even with the missed years, Rori had been a daddy’s girl. When she turned thirteen, though, and decided friends and boys were more important than her dad…

  It was comical, some of the conversations he and I had. I had to talk him off a few ledges.

  There’d been some rough times over the last ten years, but Jordan more than proved he would stand by my side. Through the trials of conceiving Jackson, and then the year of truly understanding I would never carry another baby, not once did Jordan allow me to drop too far into depression. We were better at communication now, than we ever had been before.

  The bed dipped on my other side, and Rori sat with Jack on her lap. “Jackie, say hi to baby Tallulah.”<
br />
  I once again rearranged the baby, this time so I cradled her outward, her sleeping form facing all four of us. Facing her family.

  “Hi, Lulu,” Jack said sleepily, reaching out and placing his hand on her covered stomach. Immediately, she opened her eyes.

  It was too early to tell, but I really hoped she’d have her daddy’s eyes, too.

  “I think she likes you, bud,” Jordan said, reaching behind me so he could ruffle Jack’s hair. Then, with his arm over my shoulders, Jordan pulled me closer.

  With his lips to my temple, he pressed two small kisses before saying, “I love you.”

  I turned my head, smiling when he dropped his lips to mine in an innocent kiss. “I love you, too. Forever.”

  Thank you for reading this second-chance romance, featuring Jordan and Marlo Byrd.

  If you haven’t yet, you can pick up Caleb and Sydney’s story, Interference.

  The next Enforcer scheduled to fall will be none other than Trevor Winski.

  Look for Refuse to Lose late summer.

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  About Mignon Mykel

  Mignon Mykel is the author of the Love In All Places series. When not sitting at Starbucks writing whatever her characters tell her to, you can find her hiking in the mountains of Arizona. Mignon writes in one world, so while every series can be read as a standalone, her stories will be more enjoyable if you read them in publication order.

  Love In All Places series

  full series reading order

  Interference (Prescott Family)

  O’Gallagher Nights: The Complete Series

  Troublemaker (Prescott Family)

  Saving Grace (Loving Meadows)