“Sleep with me tonight,” I whisper. I’m sick of being alone. Sick of knowing he’s so close and feeling like he’s so far out of my reach. “No expectations, no confusion. Just…stay in my bed.”

Then his hands are under my arms and he’s kissing me and drawing me from the tub. He takes his time drying me off before leading me into the bedroom. I climb into bed, but he doesn’t follow. He stands beside it and trails his eyes over me again and again, finally letting them rest on my stomach.

I settle both of my hands on my slightly rounded belly. “Imagine how big I’ll be by the end.”

He laces his fingers through mine and moves my hands before he lowers his mouth to my navel. “So. Beautiful.”

Goose bumps run across my skin under the ceiling fan. He explores me with his mouth—his hot, open, miraculously talented mouth—and trails kisses from my collarbone down my arms. By the time his mouth finds my br**sts, my skin is warm and I’m impatient for more.

He cups my br**sts in his hands, his lips parted, his nostrils flaring. When he places his open mouth over my nipple, it’s with the same tenderness he used on the rest of my body, and it’s good—so good—and still I want more. My hands go to his hair and I arch into the sensation. While he draws one nipple into his mouth, he caresses the other, brushing the rough pad of his thumb against the taut peak, and that swirl of warmth in my belly becomes larger, hotter, and more intense as it finds its way between my legs.

“Am I too big?” I ask.

He lifts his head. “Too big for what, angel?”

“I want you to make love to me,” I whisper. Then, with a hand to my belly, I laugh. “I’m wondering if I waited too long.”

He sighs dramatically and rolls over onto his back. “I guess I’ll just have to be on the bottom, but you should know this is terribly inconvenient.”

Giggling, I follow him and straddle his hips. “I’m not sure if it’s inconvenient or impossible.”

He lifts his hips off the bed at the same moment he grabs mine, and in the next moment, he’s sliding into me, and I gasp. “Nothing’s impossible.”

Pleasure knifes through me as I sink onto him, but I force my eyes to stay open. He’s grinning, and that smile makes me feel like the most precious thing in the world.

“Inconvenient,” he whispers, lifting his hands from my br**sts, “but damn if the view isn’t spectacular.”

SHE’S CURLED into me, eyes closed, her hair fanned across my arm, and I want to hold on to her forever. I’m afraid that, if I leave her bed, she’ll forget how good we are together, and God knows how long it’ll be before I get to touch her again.

“I don’t forget to use condoms.”

She lifts her head and frowns at me. “I think it will be okay. Unless you’re afraid you’re going to get me pregnant?”

I chuckle and smooth her hair out of her face. “I’m saying I’ve never forgotten to use a condom before. Vivian and I didn’t, but she was on the pill and I was young and stupid and didn’t realize how unreliable the pill is if the person taking it is flighty and forgetful.”

“I don’t blame you,” she whispers. “I forgot too. And now that I have them”—she takes my hand and places it on her belly—“I wouldn’t want it any other way.” She giggles. “They always get so still when you touch my stomach.”

I swallow. I haven’t felt them kick yet, though Liz and Maggie have. “I don’t forget,” I repeat. “And I think some subconscious part of me was very aware of what I was doing the day I took you in the shower. Part of me knew I was risking you being tied to me forever. And that part of me would do anything to make that tie.”

Her breath catches and she lifts her eyes to meet mine.

“I’m sorry how I handled everything that day. The truth is, I still don’t know what our future together looks like, and that scares me. I’m afraid that, if I don’t know exactly what’s coming and how we’ll handle it, I’ll lose everything that matters the most. I panicked, and I almost lost you because of it. And, angel, you’re one of those things that matters most to me.”

“I panicked too,” she admits, “because I was scared I wasn’t good enough for you to give everything I wanted.”

“I should never have gone to London.” I wrap my arms around her and pull her against my chest. “I should have tracked you down here and insisted you talk to me. Insisted we work it out. But I thought I’d already lost you.”

“You haven’t lost me,” she says, yawning against my chest. “I’m right here.”

I focus on her breath against my skin, the heat of her body curled into mine. I try to live in this moment, to let the here and now be enough. But as the minutes tick by, contentment remains just beyond my grasp, hiding behind a question I only have the courage to speak into the darkness. “Why did you choose him?”

Her only answer is the steady rise and fall of her chest in sleep.

17

I PAD down the hall and up the stairs to his bedroom and find the door cracked. I knock softly before stepping inside. I pick up a shirt from the folded stacks in his closet and press it to my nose, inhaling deeply, taking a hit of his scent. There’s a picture of Collin on the dresser, his big grin eating up his face as he points to his Captain America T-shirt.

I’m not sure what I expected to find in here. Pictures of Vivian? A journal confessing that he wishes I’d never gotten pregnant? Some evidence that I’ve made him feel trapped? I am so terrified of trapping him. But there are no answers here. Only his scent and reminders of what a good father he is that make my heart tug.