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CHAPTER SIX

Days slowly start to pass by faster.

The hours don't seem as long, and the minutes she spends by his side or alone aren't quite as bad as they once were.

Days pass by, and over that time she comes to learn that the incident with his sister had been of a private matter, one he shouldn't have discussed with her. One he had discussed with her anyway.

"She was hurt."

Not hurt, as in bruised or bloody, though the marks on her thighs and the ripped clothing might prove otherwise. No, this was a different kind of hurt, of pain. The emotional kind, the one that does indeed sffect your body yet also rips out your soul and pride and crushes your spirit. The kind you can't move on from. The kind that makes you impure, and unholy, and that considers you a whore for being too easy. The kind where someone strange violates your someone personal, and it's all foreign and unwelcome. The kind April would never wish upon anybody.

"Is she going to be alright?" She had asked, head tucked beneath his chin and her right hand tracing patterns on his skin.

He had pouted for a quick second, lips curling and eyes closing before they flicker back open and she's rewarded with an overbearing sight of green.

"I hope."

"Hope can kill a man."

Her mother had always told her that.

Never have hope, it could fall apart. Your world could crumble within seconds and hoping that things can mend will only make matters worse.

Jackson had nodded, suddenly diverting his gaze down at her and letting his lips turn into a grin, "You could kill a man."

"Because I'm so strong?" She'd joked, sitting up beside him in the bed and folding her legs beneath her like a child. She'd knitted her brows, holding her arms up as though she was carrying heavy weights.

He'd raised a brow at her obvious teasing, hands finding her waist and pulling her back down on top of him all too abruptly.

"Because you're you."

And she had smiled at that, maybe with a small smile and a subtle blush, maybe because she didn't believe him. She, her, quiet April Kepner from up North who had a tendency to eavesdrop would never be able to slay a man with her charms. Because that would require having any charm or desirableness in the first place, things she didn't truly believe she possessed.

But she had let it slide, choosing instead to focus her eyes on his face and her hands on his chest. She was tough, and he was stronger, but when she was above him with all the need and want and power of a wild animal then she could definitely see what he might have been talking about.

Maybe she could kill a man.

"I do hope you enjoy today's arrangement?"

"It's beautiful, Sir Taylor."

She's not sure what kind of man likes to spend time with flowers and trees and leaves all day long, but Matthew Taylor sure seems like he does.

Though he also enjoys tea without milk rather than with it, so she doesn't understand him all that well.

"The roses were carefully selected for you by your Lord Avery. He says that you appreciate roses, is that true?"

It was. She loved them, the red more than the white, and the white more than the pink. Roses were her absolute favourites, aside from orchids. For the smell, and the appearance, and the glow, and the silky texture that makes her fingertips feel like velvet. Roses were one of her favourite simple things in life, but orchids held an entirely different, special, place in her heart

"It is." She nods, holding a hand up to her neck to brush her red hair to the side as she sits down on one of the dining hall chairs.

She had been so tired lately, and it could not be from a lack of sleep. Her feet ached and her back arched, and, every now and then, she would feel shooting pains up her spine and the urge to bring her food back up her stomach would be too overbearing.

She knew what it was before she'd been told.

She was pregnant. With an Avery. With an heir, his heir. She now owned two parts of him, just as much as he owned two parts of her.

"Are you alright, My Lady?"

"I- I am absolutely fine, Sir Taylor. You don't have to worry."

She couldn't tell a virtual nobody that she was carrying before she even told the father.

"But I do, and you look a little pale- Can I get you anything?" Matthew backs away from the table, hands leaving his precious flowers and frowning as she leans back uncomfortable in her seat.

"I don't need anything." April shakes her head.

"Are you nauseous?" He sounds concerned, and much like a child asking their mother if she was ill. "Oh my, is it because of those rumours?"

"Which ones? The ones that say that my husband likes the company of whores, or the ones that say I spread my legs to get him to marry me? Either way, they're false."

"I don't know about-"

She likes Sir Taylor. She appreciates his company when he talks about daisies and daffodils and roses and tulips. She doesn't mind when he's around to talk to when her husband is off doing something important with his father, the man who happens to own this part of the world's land.

"What are you saying?"

Because no matter what, she won't believe him. Not when she knows that his lies aren't the truth, aren't real.

"I am only... suggesting that maybe you do not know everything there is to know about Lord Avery."

"And you do?"

She's not a horrible person,

"Please. Tell me something, one thing, that you know about my husband that I do not, hm? Go on. Are you going to tell me how he used to make his way through the Whorehouse? Or just how he wasn't very fond of the way his father sent a woman into his room when he was fifteen and told him to 'be a man, a future king'? I know everything there is to possibly know about him."

"But he doesn't love you!"

She's not clueless.

"But you do. Don't you?"

She has him cornered. She's just confused what kind of man would shamelessly admit to loving another man's expecting wife?

"Yes."

"Well, I am sorry. Truly, I am. I'm sorry that I can't return the sentiment, I'm sorry that you apparently fell for me even though we've barely spoken and you know nothing about me-"

"I know more about you than he does!" He sighs then, hand running through his light brown hair as he paces back and forth. "He doesn't even know your favourite flower. He doesn't- He doesn't deserve you! He doesn't understand you the way I do-"

"Sir Taylor-"

"Matthew. My name, it's Matthew. And you know that. And you hate to call people Sir and Lady and Lord. You hate being privileged. You miss the North. You miss your parents. You love roses more than anything, your favourite meal is the roasted chicken that Jo cooks up on Sundays."

"Are you finished?"

"I just- I do not understand how you could settle for being his-"

"His what?" She raises a brow, daring him to continue.

"His whore."

"I would rather be his whore than your anything."

She's not a horrible person.

She just has respect, for herself and for Jackson's name, and she won't let some nobody waltz in and claim to know her better than she knows herself.

"I think you should leave now." She stands up, palm pressed against her abdomen. "For future reference, roses are not my favourites."

"Is your father getting any better?"

Days pass, hours fly, and sometime a couple of days ago, the King had fallen ill and was on bed-rest until he was feeling up to the challenge of reporting back to his land.

In the meantime however, it was Jackson that had to take charge and rule, but luckily the man was born a leader and ownership was in his genes.

He glances back at her from his seat on the edge of their bed, hands on his knees and head dropped. He's tired, worn, aching.

"He's... progressing."

April nods, unpinning the few strands of hair that were held up by clips around the back of her neck.

He stops when she feels a pair of hands on her shoulders, fingertips tapping her collarbone as she tilts her head sideways to look at him.

"Are you alright?"

"Best I can be."

She licks her lips, dropping her hair clips onto the small metal tray on her dresser. Turning back around against him, April lets her hands wander down his chest before they stop along the bottom of his shirt.

"Are you sleepy?" He almost laughs at her use of the word, like a child, like a toddler who craves sleep and a good cushion.

"Am I sleepy?" He smirks, watching as she slowly nods with a faint blush. "I think I might need a nap, Mother."

She swats his arm at the joke, then unable to move her arm away when he grasps her wrist and holds it against him.

"I don't, really." He lies.

She can see the faint purple colour beneath his eyes, the way he holds back a yawn when he glances down to mess with the ties of her robe, slipping them open and letting the gown hang from her shoulders.

Maybe she shouldn't have bathed before he came in

"Has it already been emptied?"

She shakes her head, watching as Jackson runs his hands up her still damp arms.

"No."

"Wonderful."

Pretty soon, she finds herself back in the same place she'd occupied earlier. In warm water, only this time there was someone else with her and she wasn't washing.

She adjusts into his lap, letting her hands move to the sides of his neck. Resting her knees on either side of his thighs, she pushes closer, arching her back into him when he slips a hand down her front and the other down her back.

"Have you ever pleasured yourself?"

She'd been comfortable there, close to him and heated against his warmth. Until he'd asked that question, that was.

"I'm sorry?"

Jackson grins, eyelashes flickering as though he's going to reel her in, "Have you?"

"Before you did?"

"Ever?"

April gulps, feeling a light red colour rise to her cheeks.

"No."

"Never?"

"Not once."

"Do you want to?" He knows that he's doing, and he proud. She can tell by the way his lips curl upward and his green eyes darken.

"Now? With you- here?" She swallows a breath then, closing her eyes and raising her hands. Is there anyway of getting out of it?

He reaches down beneath the water, placing the palms of his hands flat against her thighs. "Yes."

"Oh."

She chews on her bottom lip for a moment, letting her eyes drift below, admiring his flesh against hers.

"I wouldn't know how." April flutters her lashes, peeking up at him with a small yet wicked smile. She leans closer into his body, bare breasts pushing against his bare chest and wrapping her arms around his neck. She towers over him this way, and she presses her head into the side of his neck, "I guess you might have to teach me."

Jackson smirks, hands quickly reaching out for her own and bringing them down to her legs. The water blurs her view of what he does, but she gets the gist when she feels her own fingertips pressed against herself.

He moves her hand back and forth, causing friction and tension and she's honestly a little confused by the feeling. It's not him, though he is technically the one controlling her and leading her and showing her what to do. It's her. And it might be a little stranger than she had originally thought.

Because, pretty soon, her fingers part, and her body awakens and she's reminded that she's not a little girl anymore.

Little girls don't do this. Little girls don't let big boys do this. She doesn't do this, only now she is and she finds it weird yet incredible.

Without realising it, his hand is no longer working at grasping her own, and he's cupping the aides of her face, pulling her lips down onto his as she continues to rub a hand against herself below the water.

And pretty soon, the tree that is her hand branches out and she learns just how amazing her velvety fingertips truly are.

And she has him to thank for that. She has him to thank when she feels her legs part further, feels her body implode and convulse. She has him to thank for showing her her own talents.

Jackson watches on as she thrives, eyes drifting up and down her body as she spasms, as she lifts her hands to his shoulders and collapses against him after a second.

"You like that?"

She nods like a good girl, like a little girl wanting candy. And she kisses him, like the wicked woman that her mother warned her about turning into.

I would rather be his whore than your anything.

And she would is, maybe she is.

But she isn't that little girl anymore. She doesn't still braid pony's hair and laugh with her sisters.

She's a woman now, and she has him to thank for that.

"You changed the flowers, I noticed."

It's a little strange as a conversation starter, but she just frowns and goes along with it, lets him talk and grasp her hips to pull her down onto his length.

She shifts comfortably, nails digging into his shoulder-blades and biting her bottom lip, "Yes?"

"I didn't know you liked roses."

Maybe she knew everything about him, but he knew nothing about her. Maybe he liked sharing about himself, but didn't like it when she did the same. Maybe he didn't know her.

"You didn't?"

"I thought you liked orchids." He tells her honestly, eyes shutting as he lets his head drop back, hands clutching her waist as she runs her wet hands over his face and neck, pouring the water down him and letting her soaked skin stick to his own.

And then she's confused. Because not many people of her love for orchids, and she fails to see how he could know about it.

"At our wedding, you kept... staring at them, and... smelling them. It was a little bit strange, really." He goes to laugh, but it turns into a groan when she pushes deeper onto him, surprised and kind of shocked.

"You saw me?"

"I was watching you."

Maybe he does know her. Maybe she wants him to.

"Jackson?" Her voice hitches, breath catching and lips parting as she continues to ride him, hands clawing at his bones and teeth drawing blood. She responds when he kisses her, eager to taste the blood of her lips and the bruises of his previous embrace.

"Hmm?" She's not sure he's entirely respondent, or even in the right state of mind for what she's about to tell him.

"I'm carrying."

Maybe she is his whore, but she's also his wife, and the mother of his child.

Maybe she is the reason for his existence.

She is his life.

She is his.