Fearless Bond (Bears of Beauville #1)

Chapter 23

23

CALVIN

Ten weeks pregnant

“Barclay, you’re crushing my hand.”

“Oh, sorry.”

We stared at the fuzzy gray image as it moved and morphed. I couldn’t see anything until Hunter pointed at a small, darker shape in the center.

“There he is.”

“That’s him?” Barclay asked, leaning closer to the screen.

“Yes.”

“Only one baby, right?”

Hunter chuckled. “Yes, there’s only one.”

My mate let out a relieved sigh. “He’s so pretty.”

I almost laughed, but I wasn’t supposed to move. “Barclay, um, you can barely see anything in there.”

He frowned. “Sure I can. Look, that’s his leg.”

“Don’t touch the screen,” Hunter grumbled.

Barclay threw him an icy glare. “Can you at least print the picture?”

“I can.”

Hunter took a few photos from the ultrasound and handed them to Barclay in an envelope. Barclay carefully tucked them into the inner pocket of his jacket.

“Do you want me to email them to you?” Hunter asked me.

“Thank you. That would be great.”

After we left Hunter’s office, Barclay gave me a ride to the daycare. Phil knew I’d be late today and why. It was my second week there, and I was loving it.

I’d been uneasy about starting work and had come equipped with a list of strategies from my therapist: recognize symptoms, challenge negative thoughts, find an anchor, breathe and relax your muscles, repeat your mantra, plus, as a last resort, call Barclay. I’d practiced the exercises and knew them by heart, but I’d written them on a cheat sheet anyway because I’d been sure that once I started freaking out, I’d forget them all. I almost had freaked out at the door to the daycare. But then Phil had ushered me in, and the kids had provided more than enough distractions. Once in the middle of it all, I’d forgotten all my reasons to worry. Now I was looking forward to going to work every day.

Barclay took his helmet off so he could kiss me goodbye.

“I’ll pick you up at half past four.”

“Quarter to five?”

He made an exaggerated sad face, and I giggled. “It’s just fifteen minutes! Today is art class, and I need to help Phil clean up.”

“Okay. What do you want for dinner?”

I mentally flipped through the growing menu of things I craved these days. “Pizza? I haven’t had pizza in ages. With cherry tomatoes and… pepperoni. Lots of cheese.”

Barclay grinned widely. “As long as you’re fine with store-bought dough, you got it.”

“Awesome.”

He gave me one more peck on the cheek and drove off.

My phone buzzed, so I paused in the daycare parking lot and pulled it out. Hunter had emailed me the pictures from the ultrasound.

I flipped through them, smiling. Then I picked one and sent it to my father.

He’d been calling once a week. Our conversations had been stilted at best, but he hadn’t threatened or lectured me, so I considered it major progress.

He replied in a few seconds.

Father: Congratulations. I’m looking forward to meeting my grandson.

Four months pregnant

I draped myself over the edge of the mattress with my feet up. My rounded belly and full pecs looked more pronounced when I rested on my elbows. Listening to the shower, imagining Barclay all wet, I was hard already. I reached between my spread legs, stroked myself, and tickled the underside of my cock. I was so horny it wasn’t funny. Good thing Barclay was just as insatiable as me.

The door to the bedroom opened, and he paused. Leaning on the doorframe, he shook his head.

“If you could see yourself.”

“What? How do I look?” I let go of my cock and brushed my hand over the curve of my stomach before cupping my left pec.

“Like a fucking siren.”

His cock grew and hardened in front of my eyes, and I licked my lips at the breathtaking sight. He charged at me then crouched by the bed, leaning over me.

“You look like you need to get fisted and fucked and fisted again.”

I groaned, my head falling back, when he sucked my cock into his mouth. He circled my rim with his fingers and began burrowing inside. The pregnancy made me so flexible that I could take whatever he gave me and be grateful for it.

I loved the moment when my rim was stretched impossibly wide around his knuckles, but I was still hollow inside. Then my body gave up its resistance, letting him in, and his bulky hand surged into me. My inner muscles squeezed around it with relief.

“Oh fuck yes!”

A few pumps, his fingers prodding the mouth to my womb, and I was coming. Barclay milked my gland from the inside and sucked my cum out of my cock as if it were a straw.

Then he scowled down at me, his face nearly feral.

“We’re going to play a game.”

I panted. The orgasm was still making me tingle. His entire fist was up my gut. What game?

“You’re going to push my hand out. Like a good little papa when he gives birth.”

He rotated his hand when he said that, spreading his fingers a little, and I cried out. I was so fucking full.

“Now push, sweetheart. Show me.”

Why was that so hot?

On a moan and a grunt, I bore down, trying to expel his hand with my inner muscles. But he pressed back. The sensation was indescribable. I bowed on the bed, yelling.

“Again. C’mon. Push.”

I did, and he pulled to help me but paused where I was stretched the widest, my rim holding on to his knuckles.

“Fuck, Calvin. Your ass right now.”

I whimpered.

He thrust back in, and a small orgasm ricocheted through my insides. My rim clamped around his wrist, and his fingers brushed my womb.

“Yes!” I yelled, getting hoarse.

“You want to come some more, love?”

“Uh-huh.”

“There you go. Anything you want.”

He pumped with his hand, fucking the mouth to my womb with his fingers, and I lost it. I mewled and whined, pinching my sensitive nipples, coming in waves.

He stilled his hand and ordered me to push again. This time, he pulled all the way out. He admired my stretched hole, then he placed a soft kiss on my yawning opening.

“Do you still want your big hole fucked, or do you need a break?”

“Fuck me. Always.”

“Damn. I’m so lucky. You never say no to me. My omega always wants my dick.”

He flipped me easily, bending me over the edge of the mattress.

Then he sank fluidly into me, to the root on the first thrust.

“I love your dick,” I managed before he thrust hard, and I lost the capacity to speak.

Lifting my upper body, Barclay cupped my belly with one hand and put the other over my nipples.

“You’re gorgeous, Calvin. Your sweet tits, that belly, the way your ass has filled out. You take my breath away.”

He sped up his thrusts, and I grappled the covers to hold myself in place. His cock stroked my insides at the best possible angle, and I moaned louder and louder.

“So beautiful,” he rasped. “All knocked up.”

His hips stuttered, and he plunged into me, setting me off just as his cock jerked against the mouth to my womb.

I slumped over the bed, my nerve endings buzzing. Barclay pulled his cock out and sat on the floor next to me. Then he slowly but insistently pushed his entire hand back inside me. He stroked the stretched walls of my ass, pumping steadily.

My hole made the most filthy, slurping sounds in the quiet room.

“Tell me when you want me to stop,” he whispered. He rained soft kisses on my hips and ass cheek. Such a contrast to the invasion in my hole.

“A little longer.”

“You’ll be so well prepared. The baby will just slide out of you.”

“Can’t help it. Love the fullness so much.”

“Good. Because I love doing it for you. Makes me so hot to see my hand disappear up your ass.”

Slowly, the tingles abated, and I felt mellow all over.

“I’m good now,” I told Barclay, and he carefully eased his hand out. Then he carried me to the shower.

He soaped me up, lingering on my belly as always.

“I got the right piece,” he said. “It’s walnut, dry and ready. The texture is great. The delivery is coming on Thursday.”

Barclay was determined to build a crib himself, and he’d been searching for the right material for weeks.

“That’s great news. Are you spending the weekend in the shed, then?”

“No. I want to spend quality time with my mate.”

“But maybe I could be with you in the shed for a bit? I like watching you work.”

Barclay hugged me to his wet body and squeezed my ass cheeks. “You like it when I bend you over the bench.”

I smiled. “That too.”

He grazed my ear with his teeth and rasped, “You’re so horny.”

“Mm-hmm. For you, always.”

Eight months pregnant

Twelve to two was nap time at the daycare, but Toby was almost four now. He was the oldest in his group and woke up from his nap early. Sometimes, he didn’t sleep at all. He was a calm and thoughtful kid, though, easily entertained with building or coloring. Today, he climbed into my lap and put both hands on my stomach.

“Why are you fat?” he asked with a serious frown.

“It’s not just me. There’s a baby in there.”

“Uncle Phil said that the baby is in your tummy.”

“Yes.”

“How did it get there?”

“He grows from a tiny little peanut until he’s big, strong, and ready to be born.”

“When?”

“In a month or so. Soon.”

He eyed my stomach again. “Are you making fun of me?”

Poor little Toby. Growing up with three older brothers hadn’t been easy.

“I promise you I’m not lying. We have a book about how babies are born. Let me find it, and I’ll show you.”

He sat on my lap and rubbed his palm on my stomach absentmindedly as I showed him the pictures in the children’s book. It was simplified but accurate, with drawings of the growing fetus in an omega’s womb.

Toby inspected the picture of a baby in the third trimester. “But how does he eat?”

“Good question. He doesn’t eat with his mouth yet. He gets all he needs from his papa’s body. Through this tube here, see?”

“And he pees and poos in there?”

I bit back a chuckle. “He does. But it’s a different kind of pee and poo.”

“Not smelly?”

“No. Not smelly.”

He gave my stomach a suspicious look. “I don’t want a baby to poo in me.”

“It’s not as bad as it sounds.”

Toby looked unconvinced. “Uncle Phil says you’ll be away.”

“Only for a short while, after the baby is born. Then I’ll come back and bring him with me.”

The promise of live proof seemed to satisfy Toby, and he returned to his coloring.

In the afternoon, I took a walk home. Barclay still offered to drive me daily, but I liked the narrow winding path that led through the forest to our house. June had been dry and sunny, and the blueberries would soon be ripe.

The sun warmed my back, and I took off my jacket and tied it around my hips under my huge belly. Of course it kept slipping, so I gave up and threw it over my shoulder.

After a few minutes, I heard stomps behind me. I knew who that was.

“I told you I didn’t need a ride,” I said when the bear caught up with me, trampling the grass along the trail.

He gave me puppy-dog eyes and sniffed at my belly.

“I’m not tired. I want to walk. It’s a beautiful day.”

The bear gave a low growl and poked my arm with his nose.

I paused. “What?”

He waddled in front of me and lay on the ground, stretching his front paws in front of him.

“I’m getting too heavy for this, Barclay.”

The huge animal stared beseechingly at me.

I shook my head but relented. I climbed onto his back and held on to the long fur on his neck as he carefully rose and began walking. Except he didn’t follow the path home. Instead, he carried me through the blueberry bushes into the thickening forest. I could hear the bubbling creek in front of us.

“What are you up to?”

Of course, he didn’t reply.

He brought me to the creek where the trees opened. Large boulders lay strewn along the sunny bank, the water creating small waterfalls as it rushed toward the valley below, where the birches, with their bright green canopy, created almost a tunnel around it. It was a lovely place, away from any trails, with no hint of civilization anywhere near us. Barclay lowered himself so I could climb off. Looking at the stunning scenery, I stretched my back.

“Are we having a picnic?”

A low purring and hissing announced Barclay’s transformation. Two human arms wrapped around my belly from behind.

“I didn’t bring any food,” my mate said.

I leaned back against his naked body with a sigh. “That’s okay. I’m not hungry yet.”

Leaving a trail of kisses down the side of my throat, he burrowed his hands under my oversized T-shirt.

“I just thought I could make love to my mate here in the sun.”

“Excellent idea.”

He tugged my pants down my legs, and I sat astride his hips, leaning with my back against his chest. He helped me move, supporting my thighs, and I rocked on his cock, stroking my stomach. Two orgasms later, I got too mellow to ride him anymore.

On my hands and knees, my pregnant stomach weighing me down, I could come the hardest, and Barclay knew that. He thrust into me relentlessly, telling me how much he loved my body, how he couldn’t wait to taste my milk, and how he’d fuck me hard until he made me go into labor. It felt a little dirty and absolutely marvelous.

Nine months pregnant

Hunter had assured me that a home birth was perfectly safe for a shifter mate. He would be on call, ten minutes away if needed, and Barclay knew what to do.

Ten days before the due date, I said goodbye to the kids at the daycare. Barclay would be with me twenty-four-seven until our baby was born. We had nothing adventurous planned except for short walks in the forest near our home and car trips for groceries. And we would make love. A lot.

I was fascinated by how much sex my pregnant body craved. I loved sucking Barclay off, eating his cum, then taking his fist into my hole. We did that almost every day. Riding him was nearly impossible for me—with how big I was, I could merely sit on his cock and rock back and forth, but the pressure on the mouth to my womb was heavenly.

Six days before the due date, Barclay fucked me on my knees before the fireplace. It had been raining all day, so we’d lit it even though it was the middle of the summer.

Bending over me and supporting my stomach, he thrust deep, and a searing pleasure spread from the sealed gate to my womb. The climax made it throb. It felt incredibly satisfying in a strange, new way, and I strained to keep him there. The pleasure came in waves, tightening my core. When he pulled out only halfway, I keened with frustration.

“Stay deep! I need you… Deep!”

“I got you, love.”

He gave me small thrusts, nestled in me to the hilt, and I shivered with climax after climax. Tension chased relief, crested, only to dissolve into pleasure again.

And then… the mouth to my womb gave way.

A wave of sheer ecstasy crashed over me, and I shouted so loud, I must have scared Barclay.

“Calvin? Calvin!”

He pulled out on a gush of liquid.

“I think my water broke,” I managed before a contraction stole my breath.

Then it went fast. Really fast. I’d heard all these stories about omegas going through labor for twenty-four hours or even longer.

Not me.

My contractions must have started while we were having sex; I just hadn’t realized because the tensing only made me come harder.

Barclay wanted to carry me to the bedroom where everything was prepared—supplies, towels, and blankets neatly folded in the closet—but I couldn’t move. The second contraction came right after the first.

I remained on all fours, my need to push too strong already.

“He’s coming, Barclay.”

“But…”

“He’s coming now!” I wailed on the next contraction. I had to push. Had to.

Barclay swore. I felt his hands on my ass.

“You’re… you’re… giving birth.”

“Yes!” I shrieked. “Bring the stuff!”

His stomps echoed through the house. I clawed at the carpet and went through two more contractions before he returned.

He spread out the blankets and towels under me. When the next cramp hit, he hugged me from behind and lifted my torso. I bore down, my pain suffused with pleasure.

“It should help to elevate your upper body,” Barclay said.

“I know. I remember.”

Then I had to push again.

“It wasn’t supposed to be so fast,” I complained.

“You’re doing great. We’re ready.”

“Fuck!”

He had to let go of me to look at how dilated I was, and I swore at him some more. Luckily, he had the brilliant idea to bring the chaise and set it in front of me so I could hold on to it and lean on it with my upper chest.

The contractions came faster, but the pushing brought me relief.

“I can see him!” Barclay’s voice broke.

Ray Mason Black was born at four in the afternoon and weighed six pounds.

He looked at us with his strangely alert eyes, his expression a little judgmental. He seemed unsure if this new situation was better or worse.

Barclay wrapped him in a fluffy towel, and I settled with him on the sofa before I offered him my nipple. He latched on after a few tries. Frowning, he kept staring at me as I nursed him.

“He’s so clever,” Barclay said. “Look at him. He knows exactly what’s going on.”

“It’s instinct, Barclay. He’s twenty minutes old.”

He cupped Ray’s little head in his big paw. “See that crease between his eyebrows? You have the same when you’re thinking hard about something.”

“Maybe.”

Soon, Ray closed his eyes, and the crease smoothed out.

Barclay didn’t move, staring at our baby with what looked like consternation.

“Barclay,” I said after a few minutes.

“Hm?”

“I’m hungry.”

“Oh! I’m so sorry.” He pressed a kiss to my temple. “Are you comfortable? Do you need another blanket?”

“I’m good.”

“Okay, I’ll go bring you something to eat. Stay put.”

“Not going anywhere.”

He stood, looked at us, blinked rapidly, then crouched in front of us. With one hand on my cheek and the other on our baby’s back, he kissed my nose.

“You’re amazing, Calvin. I’m in absolute awe of you.”

I grinned. I was proud of myself too.

THE END