Clearwater’s Redemption by Tiffany Casper

Chapter 15

Knox

I was brushing my teeth when something occurred to me. Over the past few weeks we had forgone a condom all together.

Since we had the birth control conversation we had decided to allow nature to take its course. Thankfully, because I had tossed every single condom in our bedroom in the trash. Those fuckers were torture compared to what it felt like ungloved in Fiona.

And I know that she hadn’t had a period since we had gotten our tattoos.

Walking out of the bathroom with my toothbrush still in my mouth, I headed to the front porch. “Fi, have you had your period?”

She sat there with a raised brow, “Yeah, I had it…” Then when she trailed off her eyes grew wide.

“Get ready.” I turned on my feet, finished brushing my teeth, and dressed.

Fiona was fidgeting with her hands. Seeing worry in her brow I walked over to her, placed my fingers under her chin and lifted until her eyes met mine. “I love you.”

She smiled, “I know, I love you too.”

Hand in hand we walked out to the truck, opening the back door so Kida could jump in.

Then we headed to the pharmacy. The entire drive over, Fiona kept looking out the window, moving her rings around on her finger.

“Sweetheart.” I called softly to her. She turned her head to look at me, “Everything will be okay.”

Tears formed in her eyes; I was wondering if this wasn’t news that she wanted. “What?”

“It’s just, I don’t want you to feel trapped.”

I looked in her eyes, “If I didn’t want to be trapped, I wouldn’t have your ink on me, I wouldn’t have put my ring on your finger. And I damn sure wouldn’t have made you my ole’ lady.

The moment we walked down the aisle we stopped, “Which one?” She asked as she looked up at all of the options.

I reached out, grabbed one, handed it to her, then grabbed another one. Looked at the back of it to see how accurate it was.

The moment we made it back home, I walked with her to the bathroom as I carried the bag.

Opening the boxes we pulled everything out and read the instructions, “Oh I gotta pee.”

She grabbed three tests, pulled up her skirt, and then she did what she had to do, handing me each test that I grabbed with a paper towel, I loved my woman, but not that fucking much.

Laying them on the counter while she finished I said, “Test takes three minutes.”

However the moment she washed her hands I looked down and sure enough all three windows already had a plus sign in them.

She froze as she grabbed the box with her still wet hands, “One line is negative, and two lines is…”

Looking up at me with her eyes wide she said in a whisper, “Positive.”

A breath-taking smile formed on her face, I bent over and wrapped my arms around her waist, lifted, and spun her around.

She placed her face on the side of my neck and giggled.

Sitting her on her feet, I placed my hands on her face, then I kissed her.

Dropping to my knees I wrapped my hands around her hips and placed a kiss on her belly, “Get ready little one. I hope you look just like your momma.”

Placing another kiss on her belly, I stood, wrapped her in my arms carefully and carried her to the bed.

After making love to her and paying special attention to her belly, I started to make mental notes on things that needed to be done to the house. Baby gates. Locks for the cabinets, and doors. Alarms for all of the windows.

Shaking me out of my list was when Fiona leaned up on an elbow, “You ready for my question of the day?”

Fake sighing I said, “Lay it on me.”

“How old are you? We are married and I don’t even know that.” She chuckled.

“Thirty-five.”

Her eyes got a wicked look in them as she snickered, “Damn, your old.”

Growling, I rolled atop her then tickled her. “No… Knox.” Her laughter caused Kida to jump up on the bed and start licking the both of us.

Laughing at Kida, “You?”

“Twenty-three.”

I looked over at her. “Not too shabby to have landed a hot young piece.”

Her eyes narrowed, “Take that back.”

Shaking my head, “Negative.”

Angrily she bit out, “You’ll take it back.”

“What you gonna do about it?” I taunted her.

And when she winked, climbed off the bed and started to do a sultry dance, needless to say after her torturing me, and not letting me touch her while she danced. I ended up taking it back.

Fiona

A few hours later we headed to the department store, Knox was like a kid at Christmas and I found myself giggling every single time when he smiled and held something up.

He was going to make a great father, this thought had anger surging through my veins all because of his mother.

Knox had told me that he had no clue who his father was, he said that when he was younger and would stupidly ask, she told him that she didn’t know.

I had plans to buy him one of those ancestry kits for Christmas so maybe if he had any relatives that had submitted their DNA we could find them. I still can’t believe that he had agreed to it as long as I wanted him to.

As we were walking to check out with some basic essentials, he asked, “When do you want to tell everyone?”

“Let’s wait until we see a doctor. I’ll call when we get out to the truck and make an appointment with my OB.”

And apparently that night, instead of getting morning sickness, I had nighttime sickness.

The entire time, Knox wiped the back of my neck with a cool cloth while he made sure none of my hair fell into the toilet bowl.

Seeing that I was sick, Kida nudged his nose in my knee and whimpered. Scratching his ears I had been about to tell him that I was okay, until more stuff came up that I didn’t want to notice.

After I was sure that nothing else was going to come up, I flushed the toilet, then grabbed the mouthwash that Knox held out for me.

Soon as I was finished with that, he bent at the waist, wrapped me up in his arms and carried me to our bed.

“What have you got there?” I asked him as he grabbed something he picked up at the store earlier.

“Says it’s for stretch marks and shit. Doesn’t bother me, those are tiger marks, but I figured you would like to keep them to a minimum.” Placing my hand on his cheek I grinned and nodded.

Sheepishly he ducked his head as he squirted some shea butter on my stomach and rubbed it in.

“Hey Knox, I don’t want to know the gender, I want it to be a surprise.” I looked at him to see him smiling.

“Fine with me. But I want to go over names.” Laughing, I laid there as he massaged the lotion on my belly.

That night while I fell asleep, it was to the sounds of Knox talking to our baby.

That morning while we were eating breakfast before the appointment I said, “I’m going to try to find another job where I won't be on my feet.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know how much you make and you haven’t let me help pay any bills since I moved in with you.”

“Money isn’t an issue. You don’t have to work.”

“Knox… seriously? I have to work. The baby will need things.”

He pulled his phone out and two debit cards. “Was going to give these to you later today.”

I grabbed the debit cards and saw my name on them, then I looked at his screen and gasped. “Knox.. what on earth?”

“Like I said. Money isn’t an issue.”

And that was when he told me about a boy he had met in juvie and how much he gets from Jacob every six months. He told me that Jacob had given him twenty percent of his company.

Just as we were about to head out, there was a knock on the door. No one ever came up here, Kida’s hackles started and a low menacing growl emitted deep from his chest.

I watched as Knox walked to the door, checked it, then he opened it, “Yeah?”

“Hi, My name is Robert Caswell, I work with Peters, Rodgers, and Stein. I am here to discuss a great opportunity with you, may I come in?” I had to smother a laugh when the man actually tried to step up to Knox, thinking that he would move.

It wasn’t Knox that responded, no it was Kida, he lunged and snarled at the man, watching the man’s face turn white was pretty comical.

“No.”

“It's extremely chilly up here.” The man tried again.

“Not for sale.” Knox said darkly.

“Well sir, it's more of an opportunity, you see…”

“No. Leave.” Knox growled.

At Knox’s growl when the man started to say, “But sir I…” Kida wasn’t having it, he lunged for the man as he started barking, warning him.

The man fell backward off the front steps. Walking over to them I placed my hand on Kida’s head, he calmed instantly, “We are not interested in selling, not now, not ever. Best you can do is to leave us alone. If you don’t we will be contacting our lawyer for harassment.” I didn’t know if we even had a lawyer but I knew that was the only way to get them to leave us alone.

The man bolted to his car, he didn’t even leave us a card, that would have been a good fire starter.