38 Weeks: The Thirty-Third Week

A/N: Burn Notice romantic fluff with a side of angst. Want to start at the beginning? Click here.

Week thirty-three:

Michael came home from the grocery store and found Fi rocking against the exercise ball.

"Hurting again?"

"Yeah. This helps some, but what I really need is about three extra vertabrae. I just need some more room for this kid to spread out."

"Well, how about you hop into your bathing suit and we hit the hot tub?"

"Michael, it's 110 degrees out there. The last thing I want to do is take my overheated body, go outside into the blazing heat, and then soak in water that's even hotter than that on top of it. I've got the AC set at 55, a frozen drink next to me, and I'm still sweating."

"I thought you might say that, so I got you a surprise."

"What?"

Michael lifted a bag of ice out of one of the grocery bags. "I've got four bags of ice here. Get in your suit, give me about ten minutes, and I should have a nice, cool hot tub for you."

Fi smiled. Full body immersion ice water sounded really good. "That's perfect."

Five minutes later, Michael had dumped the ice into the tub, put a few candles around it, lit them, and was waiting for Fi.

Five more minutes later, and she still wasn't out.

Five minutes after that, and he decided to go in and see what was going on.

"Fi?" He headed toward their bedroom. "You okay?"

She was sitting on the side of the bed, in her bathrobe, glaring at her bathing suit.

"It doesn't fit."

"The wall is high. I'll kill the lights, and you can go in naked. No one will see."

"You'll see."

"I've seen you naked, Fi." He shucks off his bathing suit. "I'll go in naked, too."

"What if I don't want you to see?"

"Why wouldn't you want me to see you?" Michael looks honestly perplexed by this, which seems to lift Fi's spirits, a little.

But not enough. "Because I'm fat and puffy and saggy."

Michael stands in front of her, taking her hands in his. "Stop that." He tugs gently until she's standing, and then turns them around so he's sitting on the bed, and she's standing between his legs.

"Do you know what I see when I look at you?" he asks as he skims his hands over her shoulders, under the robe, slipping it off of her.

Fi looks down at herself. "Flab, grotesque ankles, and ugly blue veins?"

"No. I see my woman," he touches her wedding ring, "and my child," and his fingers caress her stomach, "and I see how you got this way. And, since I don't know exactly which time did it, I remember a week of the best sex of my life. I see you on top of me, your head back, hair wild, breasts jiggling with each thrust. And I see you right after that, when you dropped to your hands, so your hair fell around us and all I could see was your face, and your eyes staring into mine. I see you under me, legs around my waist, and I hear the incredibly sexy things you were saying to me while we rocked together. I remember us on our sides, facing each other, and your back to me. I remember you on your hands and knees in front of me. I certainly remember you handcuffing me to the bedpost for the longest forty minutes of my life, while you blew my mind—"

She's smiling now. "Michael, that wasn't your mind I was blowing, and of all the things we did that week, that's one of the few I'm certain didn't get me pregnant."

He shrugs, grinning. "Still a good memory. And I do see it when I look at your mouth." His fingers ghost along her lips.  "I remember putting you on the tiny counter in the kitchenette and returning the favor. And, yes, I know that didn't get you pregnant, either. But all of those memories are still in my head, every time I see you.

"So, I don't see flab. I see luscious, soft," he traces over her tummy and hips, "curves. And I couldn't care less about blue veins," he leans forward to softly kiss each breast, "because I love the way these jiggle each time you move, and how sensitive they are now, and how I can drive you crazy by petting them," his hands cup her bottom, "and if your ankles are less than perfect, I'd have no idea, because I haven't looked below your ass in a very long time. It's round and soft and fits perfectly in my hands and snugs against me when we're spooning, so that when you lift your leg over mine, and we find that angle where I can just slide in and set both of us off, I get to slip through a warm and soft embrace and that feels ridiculously good. So, it attracts my attention." He takes her face in both hands, and kisses her deeply. "How about we go get into our now nice and cold hot tub and make some more memories?"