Thank you so much to everyone who read the first chapter, really honestly appreciate all your comments and kudos. 3 This story has given me life, and I cannot stop writing. This will be the first story that I will actually have finished in my works. (WOOHOO!) Thank you so much Revy679 for betaing my work so quickly, it gives me life knowing that I have come a long way from where I was when I started writing with the help from you! 3

Enjoy!

Just One More Time, For Old Time's Sake

Chapter 2: Time for Seduction

Brussels, Belgium

February 13, AC212

An hour later, a very restless Hilde stood from the bed and stretched her stiff limbs. She decided to check in with her husband, wondering where the hell he was, but before she reached for her phone, she heard Duo barging through the front door, yelling her name as he searched for her through the house. She jumped back into bed, positioning herself seductively, and called to him letting him know where she was.

He stormed his way up to their bedroom, his voice projecting louder as he reached closer. "Babe! Is everything alright? Do you know how much shit I got for leaving? I'm good as fired! What the hell is going..." He stopped mid-stride as he arrived at the doorway, looking at her sprawled across their bed, ending with a curse, "Fuuuuuuck..."

She gave him a flirtatious smile, moving on her hands and knees, flaunting her cleavage as she crawled to the edge of the mattress, whispering, "hi."

He waved his hand, still glued to the entrance, responding with a coy, "hi."

Hilde lifted herself on her knees and summoned him over, pretending to throw an invisible lasso, silently reeling him in. Once they were mere meters apart, she enveloped her arms around his neck as he placed his hands on her hips. She touched her forehead against his and rubbed her nose to his, voicing, "I've missed you."

He pulled slightly back, examining her in his favorite garment, with lustful eyes. However, instead of conveying his usual sentiments of how sexy she looked or how much he wanted her, he raised an eyebrow, "I can see that. But what's the dire emergency I had to come home for?"

She gazed up at him batting her eyelashes in a cute unsubtle pout, "I'm horny."

He raised his other eyebrow, "and that's the emergency?"

She wiggled her butt slowly, grazing his erection with her body as she slid her right arm down his collar, brushing his tie over his shoulder, then trailing her fingers gingerly against the plastic buttons of his white dress shirt. She popped one open, then another, pecking her way down his neck, muttering, "yes," and kept undoing his shirt, exposing part of his chest.

"That's not what that word is for Hil, and you know that. You can't use it willy nilly," he chided.

She frowned and grabbed his callous hand, guiding him to touch her barely concealed chest. "It's been weeks since you properly fucked me. I'd say it's a dire emergency."

He looked down at his hand, cupping her breast, and swallowed. "Hey, it's not that I don't want to. Hell, we've been busy, and you gotta remember, it wasn't until about a week ago, ya didn't want me even touching you."

"Well, that was then, this is now," she argued.

He reluctantly pulled his hand away from her, groaning with disappointment. "Not that I wouldn't love to take you right here and now, but since there is no crisis, I really gotta head back into the office," he emphasized as he worked on clasping the buttons she had undone.

She let go of him in anger, slumping down on her calves, and crossing her arms, accentuating her bust even more than it already was. "Who are you, and what have you done with my husband?"

Duo did a double-take, glancing at her chest, but cleared his throat in an almost abrupt manner and laughed sarcastically, "ha, ha, very funny. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to save the job that keeps us financially afloat." He planted a kiss on her forehead and turned to leave.

She cleared her throat louder, "correction. It used to keep us financially afloat."

He stopped dead in his tracks. "Don't," he demanded.

She crossed her arms, rage coursing through her. "I'm not going to sit here idly by, pretending I'm okay with you working for Preventers."

Duo turned on his heels, confronting her, waving his pointer finger in her direction, "don't do this to me, Hilde. Please don't make me regret the decisions I've made for our family."

She uncrossed her arms and lifted them in the air, "Duo, we've been stable for years! You keep ignoring me on the subject of quitting. I guess I go along pretending I'm okay with it figuring this is what you need, but for you to tell me you work for Preventers for our family? No, you don't. I was not okay with it, and you know it!"

"What the hell, Hilde. I fucking hate it. Do you think I wanna wear this uniform and fucking tie... Who the fuck wears a tie?" He yelled, tugging at the old fashion piece of clothing suffocating him. "Christ, I never thought I'd see the day I would be conforming to shitty office work. Did it help get us through some rough years? Yes, it did. But when we had enough, I couldn't say no to another paycheck. I just want us to be secure."

"Duo, we are secure. We have more than enough..."

He interjected, "It's never enough..."

"Well, then, when will it be enough for you?" She roared in question but then continued to berate him. "Do you think we'll ever be rich like Quatre, Dorothy, or Relena? Hello, Earth to Duo; part-time Preventer work will NEVER put us into the one percent. We're fucking middle-class business owners, and I wouldn't want our life to be any other way."

He dropped his head to his chest and balled his fists, muttering through gritted teeth, "what I do will never be enough, Hil. When we decided to bring kids into this world, I swore they would know no hunger, no pain, no grief, no sorrow or worries. Everything that I went through, everything that you went through, fucked us up, and I will make sure nothing will ever fuck up our children." He gazed back up at her, tears streaming down his cheeks. "So, you see, whatever I do will never be enough…."

She jumped out of bed, approaching him quickly, hands now planted on both sides of his face, forcing him to look at her. She stared intensely at his reddened eyes, crying, "you cut that shit out, Duo Maxwell. You and I are not as fucked up as you think. Yeah, we may have our shit, but who doesn't? For me, what you do is more than enough for our growing family. I know you're gonna be the greatest father to our children because, hell, Duo, the orphans you hire off the street, you treat those kids like a father." She placed her forehead with his, whispering, "please, don't overthink things, you are such a wonderful man, so kind, so brave, so loving natured..."

He wrapped his arms around her waist and buried his face in the crook of her neck, weeping from exhaustion, rage, and empathy. She placed her cheek on top of his head and stroked his back in comfort while she shed melancholy tears of her own.

She hadn't seen him cry a single tear since that fateful day when their world turned upside down...

The TV was broadcasting live about a hostage and bomb threat situation from the ESUN tower, and Duo and Hilde's attention was nervously glued to the screen. Their friend Relena, along with other prominent political figures of the ESUN, were captured in the facility. Hundreds of local law enforcement, bomb squads, and Preventers actively worked together to secure the area and negotiate with the terrorist. The maniac yelled through a microphone on the fifty-seventh floor, flaunting the bombs he had placed in the building wanting nothing in return. She was terrified for her friend. She was nervous about the sanctity of peace and prayed that Duo wouldn't have to get involved.

She didn't know she was holding her breath and death gripping her husband's hand until Duo's work line began to ring. She jumped out of her seat, startled by the loud ringing that carried her back to her living room.

She eyed Duo with a questioning look and shook her head in a dreadful panic.

He frowned, "I gotta take it," he said in a solemn tone as he picked up the device from the coffee table and answered the anticipated call. Duo stood up from the couch and stepped into the office, leaving her all alone with the TV and growing fear.

She kept monitoring the screen, but instead of listening to the newscaster, she held a trained ear to her husband's conversation. She could hear him accepting a contract for active duty, and she lifted her legs to her chest and hugged them tightly as she rocked herself back and forth, reciting to herself that things would be okay.

After he got off the phone, she heard him stomp to their bedroom and rummage through their closet. Then came the unmistakable sound from his duffle bag as he quickly unzipped it. She couldn't believe what was happening, but she didn't have time to process it as a section of the building exploded on TV. "BABE!" She screamed, jumping to her feet in horrifying shock.

He dashed back into the room in a panic, asking, "what?" She pointed to the screen, and his jaw dropped. "Oh, shhhiiit."

The newscasters reported that Preventers could not contact the terrorist, and they were going in as the firefighters started to douse the building with water.

Duo embraced Hilde tightly, stroking her back, calming her while they still kept a watchful eye on the screen. The news transmitted a live picture to picture feed of Firefighter one's body camera conducting a search and rescue. The brave individual started finding people in the building and helped escort them to safety.

What seemed like an eternity later, her husband's work line rang again as breaking news announced the safety of the Foreign Minister.

"Maxwell," he answered sternly. He said a few uh-huh's and okays, but then his eyes widened, a look of terror replaced his somber expression, and his phone slipped from his hand.

She questioned him in distress, "Duo, what is it?" Before he could say anything, despite her efforts, his knees buckled from under him, and he began to slump to the ground. She caught him in her arms just in time, slowing his fall, enveloping him in her arms, and cradling him against her chest. She brushed a few locks of his bangs away from his forehead, "Duo..." She shook him slightly when he didn't respond to her and pressed further, "Duo, what's wrong?"

"Trow..." he choked, and tears started to stream down his cheeks as he stuttered the rest, "Tro...Trowa… was the one disabling the bombs."

"What?!" She gasped in disbelief.

"He's dead, Hil, he's dead." He cried out in despair.

She stared at her husband, crying uncontrollably in her chest, but where were her tears? Feeling numb to the whole situation, she couldn't believe it. No, in fact, this isn't true. This didn't seem right. What was Trowa doing at the ESUN tower? She remembered him telling her he'd been on a trip for them. Somewhere else, not in Brussels. Questions kept popping in her head as she caressed her husband, trying to soothe his pain because, at the moment, she had none.

"Babe...?" Duo uttered, through his now controlled breathing, pulling her back to the present. They were slumped on the ground, now mimicking her memories.

She lifted her head from his and looked down at him. "Hmm?"

"I'm…. sorry," he muttered between sniffles.

"Duo..." She whispered.

He released her from his grip, still sniffling and wiping the trail of salty liquid away from his cheeks with his hands. She could feel her collar drenched from his breakdown. He sat up as she mirrored his actions, but it wasn't good enough, so she crawled over to the bedside table and seized the box of kleenex. Using a few for herself before crawling back over to him, with the box in hand. His legs crisscrossed as she returned, and she offered the tissues to him. He muttered a thank you while taking a few out of the container. He blew his nose, batted his eyes, and when he was all done, he balled them up together and tricked shot it into the wastebasket.

She set the tissue box aside and placed her hand gingerly on his knee, circling it around his joint, and his focus landed back on her, "I don't know what is going on with me..." He looked down at her small protruding belly and placed a hand on top, caressing her stomach with tender care. "I've been feeling so erratic recently. I'm just a big ball of nerves." His eyes locked with hers again, confessing, "I think….I think I'm fucking terrified for what's gonna come."

Hilde covered her hand with his, not breaking eye contact, "I know what you mean. I am too. But, it's only natural to feel this way, Duo."

"I hate it. I hate that we are here and not at home."

"So, what's stopping us? Let's go home!"

He squinched up his face, "Um, one crucial matter comes to mind. They pay for all our medical care."

She frowned, "Oh, right." That was the only perk she would miss. Well, that and business class to Earth, which she could live without.

Duo sighed, "yeah, so I have to uphold my contract for the next few months, then I swear I'm done. I'll tell them I'm retiring."

She immediately gave her husband a big bear hug, crying in delight, "Oh, thank God, those have been the words I've wanted you to say for years! I'll have to tell Trowa not to threaten to knock some sense into you when he sees you."

"Wait, what? Trowa?" He said with a bemused glance.

She hit her palm against the side of her temple, forgetting he didn't know. "Oh my God, yes, I ran into Trowa today!" She exclaimed.

"You really saw Trowa!?" She nodded her head. "How is he? What is he up to?" He questioned eagerly.

"He looks terrific!"

"Is he in town for business or pleasure?"

"Business, the circus will be here for a few months, and he invited us to tonight's opening show."

He frowned in disappointment, "I don't know if I'll be able to…."

She interrupted him to ease his worries, "I already told him that."

"Okay, good. I don't want him thinking I'm trying to dodge him."

"No, he really understands, Duo. There are no hard feelings at all. He doesn't want to lose touch again. In fact, hanging out with him felt like old times."

"So, he really does seem well?" He asked again with concern.

She nodded her head, "yes. I think the circus did wonders for his recovery."

"That's good to hear."

"Matter of fact…" she trailed off, thinking of her last conversation with Trowa. "If you get out of work at a decent hour, you could join us and then maybe…. Maybe our little reunion can be more than just catching up?" She eyed him in question.

"Oh," Duo said in shock. "Um, hmm."

"What? What is it?"

"Well, it's just, aren't we too old for that?"

"Old?!" She said, flabbergasted, "how old do you think we are, Duo?"

He brushed a few strains of loose hair behind her ear and clarified, "when I say old, I don't mean literally, but we're about to be parents... We're not in our twenties anymore."

She smiled. Her husband was far from any grown-up she'd known, "hun, if we grew up at thirty, do you think we would have been capable of doing what we did when you knocked me up?"

Duo plastered a goofy grin at the mention of their fantastic baby-making vacation. "Yeah, that was fun... But Babe, our little one is more than halfway done cookin', shouldn't we..."

She silenced him with a manicured finger to his lips. "Duo, we're thirty-two years old. Who gives a fuck if we are expecting. If we invite Trowa into our bed, the baby will not get screwed up. That will be purely left up to us when we are hard asses and parent the fuck out of our kids. The fact that I am pregnant is probably the most reasonable justification for resuming our little pact, even if it's just one more time, for old time's sake."

Duo muttered through her finger, "Oh?"

"Yeah, think about it. It's a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to have a threesome right now because that means you and Trowa will be fucking me, a pregnant woman. We can check that off our bucket list."

He chuckled, "Babe, I don't think we even have that on our list."

"Well, let's add it, and THEN we can check that fucker off," she giggled.

"It does sound intriguing..." He said, trailing off in thought.

Persuading him further, she added, "I bet you anything; Trowa's never been with someone pregnant. We can check that off the list too."

He nodded in agreement, "so, how do you think we should go about asking him?" He questioned, accepting her proposal.

She squealed with delight, "oh, no need to worry about that; we've already got that part covered. He's definitely willing."

He gaped at her, puzzled, "what do you mean, you've already got it covered? Hil, what did you do?"

Her cheeks heated from embarrassment, confessing to accidentally texting Trowa earlier that day. She gave him her phone, telling him to read it for himself.

He scrolled down, skimming through the conversation, but once he arrived at the flirty part, he cleared his throat, theatrically reciting the first passage out loud pretending to be Trowa, "for exposing too much, I'll be forced to call a Preventer agent on you." He looked up at her and laughed, pointing to himself. "Is this supposed to be me?"

She nodded. "Yeah."

"Okay, just checking." He looked back at the screen, clearing his voice again but this time continuing in a higher pitch tone, impersonating what was supposed to be her. "There used to be two. What happened to the second?" He snickered, "that's a good come back, Hil."

She giggled, "thank you." He was so ridiculous sometimes, and she loved it.

Back in his masculine inflection of Trowa, he carried on, "he retired, but I guess I could call him for backup if you were too much for the one agent…." Duo smacked his leg with his free hand, laughing at the top of his lungs. "Damn, Trowa is gooood." He commented, locking the phone and handing it back to her. "Well, that indeed clears up whether or not he's interested…." He trailed off, and his face frowned, scratching the back of his chocolate mane in thought, "but wait… you wanna do this tonight? Babe, I don't know if I can get off work in time for tonight. I'd have to leave now and grovel for forgiveness."

She grabbed hold of his thick braid and twirled the end in her hand, "for starters, you are not fired; I guarantee they wouldn't do that, especially to you. Secondly, you know how to charm your way out of things. Use your bubbly personality to get you off the hook for tonight. I have faith in you."

"Okay, I'll see what I can do." He said, getting ready to lift himself off the floor, but before he could, she tugged him by his braid to sit back down.

"LAST, but not least, you gotta take care of mama. I'm dying here. I'm so fucking horny; my walls are aching. I'm in so much pain. Please, I need you, Babe." She pleaded in distress.

Duo sighed, "fine. How can I say no to that? But I have a job to get back to. I'm in, and then I'm out."

She squealed in delight, "oooh, I love it when you talk dirty to me," she giggled as she yanked his braid towards her, bringing them closer together, kissing him with a fevered passion.

He simultaneously unbuckled his belt as they kissed, unclasping and unzipping his pants, revealing his already hard erection. She gripped her hand around him, and he broke free from their liplock, "What did I say? I'm in, and then I'm out."

"Okay, fine, stop talking dirty to me and just fuck me already."

"What does it look like I'm trying to do?" He sarcastically said, whipping his penis like a sword in the air towards her.

"Stop showing off and come here already," she whined, playfully. She laid herself flat on the carpet, opening her legs, inviting him in. He scooted his way over while he pumped his cock a few times. He slid the string of her thong to one side, and she wiggled in excitement as he slid inside her dripping pussy.

When he entered, it hurt like hell; even though his pace was loving, slow, and gentle, it had been far too long since the last time they made love. He continued his rhythm, penetrating her inner walls with a little more aggressiveness, and finally, the pain subsided. She moaned his name loudly now that she could enjoy his cock ramming into her like a piston.

Duo picked up his pace, balls smacking her with every thrust he made, and after a while, each one became more critical than the next in reaching her climax. She swore he knew how close she was, like it was his sixth sense, because the next second, his hand was down on her clit, massaging it in quick circles while his weeping dick hit the spot that brought her over the edge. She drowned out his grunt with her own as they both exploded to their peak.

He hovered over her, trying to catch his breath, sweat dripping from his brow and his braid hanging over his shoulder tickling her stomach. He muttered through gasps, "that was just a little snack. Prepare yourself for tonight's main course."

She lifted her head, kissing him tenderly, "Thank you, this will definitely tide me over till then."

He slid out of her and got up, then waddled over to the bathroom with his pants still around his ankles. She could hear the water running, and a minute later, he was all zipped up and ready to go back to the office as if he hadn't just pulled a quickie with his wife. He walked over to her and extended his empty hand to help her to her feet. He also offered her a warm wet washcloth and a dry one. She thanked him and took the towels, but before she could clean herself, he kissed her on the lips, cheeks, and forehead, whispering, "I love you. See you tonight."

He practically strutted across the room without saying another word, and once her gaze no longer fixated on her husband bouncing out of the room, she glanced at the clock. It was already way later than she thought, and she quickly cleaned herself. She had a bit of shopping to do before tonight: first stop, the lingerie boutique.