War Bride - Chapter 21 – A Stimulating Discovery

A/N: See…just a couple of days I needed. I can be trusted sometimes. ;-)

In the heated moments that followed Tom couldn't even recall who had made the first move to take their reunion to the next level, he thought the desire put into action might have been instinctive and exactly mutual in its timing. What he did know was that her mouth was now happily dueling with his, the heat and ardor in both their bodies joyfully taking the lead from their mouths…and their hands followed, he felt hers caress his covered chest and realized his hands had already made their way beneath the thin material of her singlet and were now trailing the skin of her hips…and upwards, in delight.

Ok, so maybe he was getting a little further ahead of her, but he had fewer barriers in his way that she had. He was fully uniformed, whereas she was standing there, being held there, in an extremely flimsy example of sleep attire…

One he highly approved of. As their mouths continued to fulfill their yearning and their hands continued to hungrily traverse one another…he remembered the look of her standing before him so lowly clothed just moments ago.

It had been a stunning picture even mired in the fugue of sleep, shock and anger.

And he realized he had never seen her thusly. Never so casual, never so lowly attired…except the one instance that he had been the one to disrobe her of her every small piece of attire.

But this was different. In some ways, at least for him, the presence of the right strategic coverings of the female form was more awakening and sensuous than the immediate gratification of the completely disrobed form.

Of course, in that moment, his mind helpfully provided him with a full color image of his gorgeous wife's completely disrobed form…laid bare and willingly open to his hungry gaze in that hotel room all those long months ago. He groaned into her mouth and thrust himself into her as the effect of the mental image sizzled through his veins.

But as the erotic image of many months past faded and the one of mere moments ago reemerged in its wake….a slower but no less powerful sizzle awakened in his veins. His mind studied her every detail as his hands confirmed his every theorem.

He happily established what he had already deuced. Her clothing was indeed thin and loose and absolutely no barrier at all to his strong mission-oriented hands. And as he now trailed both his hands down the luscious skin of her back, he lustily confirmed what his front view of her in the tiny scrap of fabric had already made clear…she wasn't wearing a bra.

He had never seen her breasts such, technically clothed though so very unconfined…it made them look much different somehow, bigger…plumper… In that moment he couldn't believe what she had been so successfully hiding beneath all loose shirts all those months on the ship and even off it.

Though he remembered that she hadn't exactly been at her healthiest all that time. He swore he had negligently seen her loose many pounds on his ship. And to his shame it was not something he had attempted to remedy. First because he barely knew the beautiful scientist living on his ship, and later it was because he simply couldn't ask her to do what she actually needed…take a break.

She presented a vastly different picture now. Her face showed the stress and sleep deprivation she had mentioned, but her otherwise her body showed signs of a return to health. Far from being skinnier than he remembered, something he had feared given how well he knew her penchant for overworking and irregular eating, she was actually fuller than he had ever seen or felt her…maybe that was it, especially in regards to her previously hidden voluptuous breasts…it was all certainly changes he liked…especially her breasts.

She was simply breathtaking, was still taking his breath away, though she was doing it far more literally now…her mere untouching visage had been enough to do it before…

Of course he was 'reacting', how could he not? He had dreamed of being welcomed back into her arms every night since the single night she had welcomed him back on the night of their marriage. A night he held as if sacred in the most cherished corner of his memory.

A night that seemed so very long ago now…

Too long ago, he longed to make up for lost time and from her current reaction, it seemed she was more than amenable to his fervent desire, and he thanked the heavens for that. Because as much as he and his people had traversed the last ten months, he feared that after so long apart, being near her again yet unable to have her would have been the real challenge that could well have tested his capabilities to their limits.

Again he remembered the visage that was now pressed into him as if she was painted onto him. She had molded herself to him in her ardor…particularly her lower body…and it was doubtless she was aware of his sizeable reaction to her action…

Unable to resist any longer, an urge that in his lust filled fog he couldn't fathom why he had been resisting at all, he allowed his hands to travel up the front of her upper body, and to the glorious twin objects of his reawakened fantasy.

Her hands had not been idle either, far from it, they had maneuvered past the greater barriers created by his clothing and were now greedily trailing his abs, even as her mouth continued to explore his, though breaking frequently to expel hedonistic moans of pleasure.

The first touch of his eager hands to her free full breasts was wondrous for him, and seemingly very pleasurable for her as the loud shocked moan that immediately escaped her was discernibly headier than the already extremely stirring ones that came before it.

He repeated the action, palming both her full breasts in his large balms. She practically screamed her cry of pleasure when he lightly squeezed the objects of his passion. Though thankfully she did not break from him and her cry was muffled by his mouth on hers.

Encouraged by her very favorable reaction he went further and caressed her seemingly very sensitive nipples…even more encouraged, he squeezed them. He had expected a reaction but not the one he got…she shrieked into his mouth and jumped backwards out of his arms.

He just looked at her in shock, confusion as to what had just happened clearly evident in his features…that confusion grew exponentially as he noticed twin dark patches of wetness that were expanding from two central points on her top…emanating precisely from two very telling areas…the twin objects of his ardent attentions of only moments ago…

It was like his brain was suddenly frozen…and yet as he watched the wetness expand further he managed to make his mouth form two words.

"What's that?" His utterance was made in evident shock...and shallow dawning realization. It was like a bucket of cold water had been dumped on him as his mind started feverishly putting together all the clues he had noticed but missed all at the same time.

Fuller breasts…

Fuller figure…

Sleep deprivation…

And he added this final irrefutable one.

Her breasts were leaking.

He had caused that…and had seen and experienced the reaction before. Though he had missed an appalling amount of his first wife's pregnancies, births and his children's very young lives…

Oh God…all signs were pointing to the fact that that was exactly what had happened…again.

Though this time he had missed everything.

There was no other explanation.

Rachel…his wife.

…had had a baby in his absence

…his baby.

It had to be his baby…right?

They had only had that one night together…but still…

Tom tried to stamp down on the self-punishing self-destructive thought. But too his peril, both were well travelled and familiar thought processes by now.

For too long his emotional solitude had tortured him with his many worries that he had not sufficiently or honestly inspired her to truly wait for him. For too long he had felt the dread that her lack of true fidelity would be exactly what he deserved as he had not promised her his.

Not the fidelity of his heart that was.

He had felt it, he had in fact given it…but he had not told her that she had it. And he was still clueless as to whether or not it was a promise she had even wanted to receive…or possibly give him in return?

He held himself back from voicing any of his highly inflammatory thoughts. Revelations…whatever they might be, would soon unfold…they would have to now.

And hastily forthcoming, he silently pleaded to the ether.

Tom tried desperately to control his impatience as he stared at his wife now several feet in front of him, her arms having belatedly risen to cover her leaking breasts. The action was futile both in its tardiness and because the expanding wetness of her thin singlet was still clearly visible behind her thin crossed limbs.

"Rachel?" He prompted, his voice more than slightly desperate. She was doing everything but meeting his eyes, or answering his unvoiced, because it didn't need to be voiced, question.

"Yes?" She answered completely lamely, and also quite desperately, though she was finally actually looking at him. Unfortunately that look reminded him somewhat of a dear caught in headlights, and it wasn't particularly comforting that in that scenario he was the oncoming truck about ready to mow her down.

She seemed near as shocked as he was by what had happened…of what her body had betrayed as truth, and was now hanging in the air between them regardless of its unvoiced state. Though he wasn't sure how that could be…he was the one being thrown in the deep end here. Yet here she was, looking at him very nervously...or even scared?

Of him?

Of his reaction?

Of revealing the full truth to him…?

Was it possible his should be unfounded fears did have foundation here?

A deeply buried part of himself screamed at him. Warned that he was at risk of doing it again, every mistake he had made way back when…

And yet he could not ignore the thought. It crept up and was fed by the increasing silence, just as every doubt and his own mistakes had been fed by the many months of forcible lack of resolution.

He knew he should not speak his doubt, it was his and the product of own prolonged emotional trauma…he should not speak it and inflict it on her…and yet the silence was killing him with its every prolonged second. Someone had to speak and she was not.

Still she was bearing a startling resemblance to the dear caught in oncoming danger that he was apparently the one to bring upon her…or so she seemed to fear.

Instead of speaking his doubt, with massive deployed restraint he managed to settle on speaking the far less inflammatory virtual certainty.

"You had a baby, Rachel?" He was staring at the evidence and yet his own question was like a revelation to his own ears.

Rachelhad a baby.

It could be his…it really could.

God, he hoped!

There was a long silence, too long for a question he already knew the answer too. Her prolonged hesitation seemed very odd, but eventually she did speak.

"…Yes." She said with a strange lack of definitiveness in her tone. He really wouldn't have thought that question had any other options for answers except the very basic yes of no… He couldn't fathom where her seeming desire for qualification could possibly have come from…except…oh god…last night…

"The baby? It's safe? After last night? Rachel, please tell me it's safe." He pleaded hurriedly as soon as the terrible thought had occurred to him. He had been resting easier upon seeing all his children safe upstairs, but upon learning of another child's existence he also immediately realized he had not confirmed its welfare also. Had seen no sign…but then he had not looked, single minded in his focus to find all the much older residents of the house.

Again her answer, what really should again have been a very simple yes or no, took an entirely confusing too long in coming.

"Yes, Tom…Safe. All the children are safe." She answered eventually in a placating, but somehow still withholding, manner.

Something was wrong, the fact that she was withholding something and was fearful of his reaction was basically plain now…and it made it very difficult for him to ignore the doubt that he depressingly knew would explain her strange reaction…he couldn't think of another reason…

Rachel knew he now knew she had had a baby in his absence…if all was plain and it was his baby, if it was her husband's child that she had birthed, shouldn't she now be acting like the biggest revelation was past? Why was she still looking like the biggest revelation was yet to come, and why did she seem so fearful of his reaction to it?

Unless…

No, desperately he tried to stamp down on the doubt…and yet he could unearth no other theory for her reaction. Part of him knew he was once again allowing himself to be controlled, to his own detriment, but his doubts and insecurities…and yet again he could not seem to stop himself.

With his wife being so very unforthcoming and sending such worrying signals…he was forced to speak and try to find a way to exorcise this doubt that he desperately needed rid of…it was simply painful at this stage.

So, his self control apparently departed, and a big but buried part of him already knowing his question was damaging and hurtful, he heard himself speak the ill advised words anyway.

"Is it mine?"

TBC

A/N: Yeah, I know. You have to understand, Rachel was not the only one left being tortured by unresolved doubts for months on end. Only Tom actually had an added heaping of guilt to stew in because of his awareness of his own failure to handle things well back then. You have all been asking for Tom's POV, well that is what is happening here. (Shock horror! He's not perfect either! ;-P). Stay strong people, there is light at the end of the tunnel. :-)