“Not exactly a shocker,” Kade rasped. “Bastard!” In a gentler tone, as he placed a hand on her belly gently, he continued, “I want this baby, too. I know what I said, and I could have easily adopted. But now that I know you’re having our child, I’m ecstatic. I know she’ll be as beautiful as her mother. I guess I’m a little in awe of the fact that we made a baby. Our baby.”
Asha swiped at her tears. “Don’t you want a boy?”
“Nope.” He grinned at her, a smile that went all the way to his eyes, making them twinkle happily. “But I’d take a boy if that’s what you give me. I’d be happy either way, sweetheart. He or she will be our child, and that’s what will make the baby special, no matter what sex it turns out to be.”
Asha digested that information and smiled back at Kade. “I’m used to men who want only boys.” It was Indian culture to want a male child. Knowing Kade would love and nurture either one equally was still a bit of a culture shock. Then again, it shouldn’t have been surprising. He was…Kade. “It will change our life a lot,” she warned him.
“Plans are made to be changed. I want to get married right away. I wanted it soon, anyway. This seems like a convincing reason to do it tomorrow.” He grinned at her wickedly.
Kade had been trying to talk her into a quick wedding since he’d proposed, and she’d wanted to wait awhile because Maddie would be due soon, and she wanted her sister at her wedding. “Maddie—”
“Maddie can come if we do just a few people at her and Sam’s place. We’ll put her feet up and she can be there,” Kade said convincingly. “I already talked to her because I told her I couldn’t wait. She offered.”
Asha raised a brow at him. “She didn’t tell me.”
“I asked her not to tell. I was planning on convincing you tonight,” Kade answered with a seductively evil grin.
“Are you tying me to the bed again?” Asha asked eagerly, blushing slightly. “You could always try to f**k me into submission again.” She’d go for that.
“I’m not tying my pregnant fiancée to a bed,” Kade answered in an adamant but awed voice.
“I can’t believe I’m actually pregnant,” Asha whispered, putting her hand over Kade’s on her belly. “All those years when I thought I wasn’t capable. This seems so surreal.”
“What did the doctor say? Is everything okay? You should have called me. I would have gone with you.” Kade sounded both irritated and worried.
“I didn’t think about it. I thought it was all a mistake. I think I must have conceived in Travis’s office at the racetrack. The doctor said everything is fine.” She hesitated for a minute before she commented, “I suppose that means I won’t be taking the riding course to get my motorcycle license right now.”
“Hell, no!” Kade boomed. “You aren’t even getting close to a bicycle right now.”
Asha sighed. “I suppose this is going to make you into a tyrant.” His protective nature was probably going to be nearly unbearable, but it was done with love. This was all new for both of them. “You’ll get used to it,” she told him casually. “We both will.”
Kade tightened his arms around her body. “No I won’t. Sam never has. The closer Maddie gets to her due date, the more frazzled he looks. I feel like I’m about to have a heart attack already, and the egg is barely fertilized, right? Damn. I need to borrow some of the books on childbirth from Sam. And we need to get stuff for a nursery. And a baby needs clothes and lots of other stuff. This house definitely isn’t childproof. I need to work on that.”
Asha took his head between her hands and kissed him, shutting down his frenzied words, and hopefully his overactive mind. She loved the way he cared enough to brood over her well-being and now the baby’s, but when he got obsessive, she needed to find a way to calm him down. And kissing him seemed to be the only way to do it.
Kade took over the embrace almost immediately, kissing her with a passionate intensity that left her breathless. Both of them ended up panting, Asha resting her head on his shoulder. “You have time to do everything,” Asha gasped. “And the last thing you need right now is to talk to Sam. He’s a wreck. Maddie’s having twins, so he’ll probably tell you a bunch of horror stories about what could go wrong. Women have babies every day.”
“It’s different. My woman doesn’t have our baby every day,” Kade muttered.
“I love you. Take me to bed,” she urged in her f**k-me voice that Kade had never been able to resist. “We can talk about everything later. Right now I just want to be close to you.”
Her relief at the fact that Kade really wanted this baby as much as she did had her dizzy with happiness, and all she wanted was to be joined to the man she loved in the most elemental of ways.
“Food,” Kade argued.
“You,” Asha countered, sliding her hand down to the front of his jeans and gently grasping his hard c**k through the denim. “I’m hungry for you.”
Kade groaned. “I love you, too, and you’re pushing me, woman.”
“I know. I plan to push you right over the edge with pleasure,” she answered naughtily. “All I need is you inside me right now.”
Kade’s big body shuddered, all of his defenses coming down as he looked into her eyes. “I want to give you anything and everything that will make you happy. That’s all I want.”
“Then you don’t need to give me anything but your love,” Asha told him honestly, her heart in her eyes as she stared back at him.
“Baby, you’ll always have that,” Kade told her confidently, standing up with her in his arms.
“Then I’ll always be happy.” Asha sighed as Kade strode toward the bedroom.
Kade didn’t forget to feed her. But they ate later. Much later.
Epilogue
Two Months Later
“That looks good. Exactly what I would do,” Kade told Asha encouragingly over her shoulder as she sat looking at her financial portfolio on her computer, the portfolio she was now building for their child.
She explained her rationale to him as she did her investing. Kade encouraged, and he pointed out pros and cons, but he let her figure things out on her own once she got the hang of thinking like an investor.
He’d calmed down considerably about the baby, but he never stopped worrying. Instead of his alpha male behavior irritating her, it actually comforted her. She was learning, especially from the women in her life, exactly how to handle Kade’s occasional over-the-top behavior. Mostly, Asha felt loved, and that was a feeling she wouldn’t trade for anything. Kade coddled her, cherished her, and downright spoiled her. In return, she tried to do the same for him. She supposed there was nothing she could really do to prove how much she loved him, but it didn’t stop her from trying.