Page 84 of Stags

His eyes opened. “I don’t think I am, though, that’s the thing, but I don’t know if I should say why.”

She raised her eyebrows, expectantly.

He visibly blushed, breaking their gaze. “Lay back down.”

“Now you have to say it,” she said.

His gaze flitted up, caught hers, and then went to the ceiling. “It’s because of you.”

Her heart went out of rhythm. She lay her head back down on his chest. “No, it’s not. It’s just that I’m probably the first woman you’ve been with since, right?”

“Yeah.”

“So, you’re just working through that, because you didn’t want the divorce,” she said. “You know, in any break-up, the person who does the breaking has an easier time of it. It’s always hard being the rejected party.”

His fingers trailed over her hair, over her bare back. “I don’t know,” he said in a scratchy voice. “I feel like I was missing out all this time, on this, on sex with a doe. It feels right in this way that it never felt right with her? I mean, if that makes you feel better, that it’s some kind of savage species-on-species thing, maybe that’s it.”

“I’ve only been with a buck once before this,” she said. “And there’s something about it, you’re right, something…”

“What?”

“I have an antler fetish, what can I say?” she smirked, drawing a little heart on his chest, right around his nipple.

He laughed, a deep reverberating laugh that shook them both. “It’s also… this is kind of fucked-up, too, I think, but I really, really like the idea of getting you pregnant.”

“I gathered that,” she said, amused. Then, softening, “I like it, too.”

“So, uh, if it doesn’t take, you should… we should… I mean, would you be at all interested in…?”

She lifted her head to look down at him again.

“Can I see you again?” he said, grinning at her.

She grinned back. “Yeah. Yeah, I’d like that.” She was realizing this man was kind of deeply insecure, and that he threw around all of his cocky bravado to try to hide it. On paper, that sounded utterly unappealing, and maybe… maybe it was. Maybe she was cock struck, just liking him in spite of all his flaws because of the haze of chemicals in her body that had been wrought from all the orgasms and his touch and the way it felt to be wrapped up in him.

Well, she could get out of it at any time, she decided. Seeing him again didn’t mean anything.

Of course, if she did have his fawn growing inside her—and that thought made something flip over in her chest, a tight and good feeling that also frightened her—that could make things complicated.

Custody battles in the deerkin community were few and far between, but when they did make it to the courts, the law tended to side with allowing fathers rights to their children, even if it violated deerkin cultural norms.

There was an understanding with the rite, of course, that participating in this way, the traditional way, meant that you would do things the traditional way.

“You know, it, um, it could have taken,” she said. “You’ve come inside me what? Four times?”

His expression changed into something both hungry and fond at the same time. “True.” He reached up and put his palm against her cheek. “That’d be awesome, though.”

She melted, her grin getting too wide for her face. Moon and sun, how much she’d wanted a man to be like this about making a baby with her, how much she’d wanted it to be a dual effort, both of them excited by it, both of them actively wanting it.No, no, no, Tawny, try to rein yourself in here. Be rational.“We could get out there and realize we actually really do hate each other, though.”

His hand slid away from her face and his expression went wistful. “Yeah.”

She lay her head back down on his chest, wishing she hadn’t said it, feeling like she’d just burst a bubble.

“If, uh, you don’t want me around, even if… you call all the shots, you know? I’ll bow out of it, whenever. Say the word.”

She nodded, reassured, saddened, though. “Maybe, even if it doesn’t work out, but if I am, you know, pregnant, there could be, um, like, I could send you pictures or updates or something?”

“You’d do that?” He tightened his arms around her.

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