“What’s the nonpractical reason?”
His face twisted like he was trying to mentally translate Latin. “What?”
“You said that the simple practicality was enough. But is there more?”
Let
it
be
love. Please let it be love.
“Oh.” He sighed and stared at his feet. “Can we just say that the thought of my kid growing up without me there every night makes me really uncomfortable? That kidney bean’s mine too, and the idea that I would have to schedule days to see him… it doesn’t taste right. I don’t like the thought of leaving either of you behind.”
She closed her eyes and refused to let him see her fight back tears. No, not love for her. For the baby. Which was more than many other women could say. With that mental slap she swallowed what tears were close to the surface and opened them. And she nodded.
He blew out a breath and gently wrapped his arms around her in a sort of semihug while lowering her to the pavement. “Thank you,” he whispered in her hair. There was no kiss, no sweet caress. Just a man, thankful for the opportunity. And a woman who already wondered if she’d made a mistake.
She couldn’t have said no. Never intended to. But oh, it hurt to say yes.
Dwayne entered his apartment and looked around. He wanted to go back with Veronica. Wanted to be there with her constantly. But she’d made it clear with her body language that, although she’d said she would marry him, she wasn’t in the mood for spending time with him.
She agreed to start looking into packing and moving in with him as soon as possible. He just hoped she wouldn’t actually start the packing itself. He would handle all that. As much as he wanted things to go fast, he refused to have her lifting heavy boxes.
Hm. Should she still be working at the restaurant? All those heavy platters of food, the long shifts on her feet… would it be out of line to call her doctor and ask for himself?
And why did he need to call a doctor when he had an expert within his own family calling plan? He pulled out his cell and hit speed dial three. She picked up on the second ring, and for once there were no toddlerlike sounds greeting him before his sister said, “Hello?”
“Congratulate me.” Dwayne sank onto the couch. His head hit the back of the couch with a thud, and he winced a little.
“Congratulations,” Natalie said on cue. “For what?”
“I’m going to be a daddy.”
Dead silence met his declaration. Not even a squeal from his niece. It dragged out so long he pulled the phone away from his ear to see if he’d been disconnected. “Nat?”
“I think I heard that wrong. Did you say…”
“Yeah. I did.”
“Oh my God,” she breathed. “Veronica?”
“Well, yeah,” he said, annoyed. “Who else?”
“I don’t know. You dropped a bomb on me. Sorry for being confused for a second. You’ve always been Mr. Careful, even before Blair. Wait.” She breathed hard. “I hate asking this but—”
“Yes, she really is pregnant. I went to the doctor with her, saw the ultrasound as the doctor did it. No faking that.”
“Oh. Well, she didn’t sound like the type to fake it anyway. So things happen. At least it’s with someone you love.”
Love? He hadn’t gotten around to figuring that part out when he got hit with the bomb. “It shouldn’t have happened at all.”
“I know, but sometimes these things do happen. Protection fails. Mistakes are made. And then you get to nine months later, and you forget you thought it was a mistake.” He could hear the smile in her voice. “I can’t ever look at my little girl and think she was a mistake.”
“Of course she isn’t. Speaking of, where’s the little rugrat? It’s too quiet over there.”
“On my way to pick her up from day care.”
“Should you be driving while on the phone?”
“Easy with the big brother routine. Even my crappy cell has speakerphone. As we speak, you’re sitting in the cup holder.”
“Comfortable. Should she be working?”
“By she, I assume you mean Veronica. And working where?”
“At all.”
Natalie laughed. “Well, does she work on a construction site? Is she often exposed to hazardous chemicals?”
“Natalie.”
“Oh, come on, Dwayne. Pregnant women aren’t disabled. She sounds like a smart person. I doubt you would have fallen for a moron. If she needs a break, she’ll ask for one. If she is struggling, she’ll take time off. If she keeps up with her doctor and listens to her body, she will be fine. I worked up until the day Suzanna got here.”
The pause stretched out ten seconds before his sister spoke again. “Dwayne? Are you happy?”
Happy, scared shitless… same thing, right?
“I don’t know what I am.”
“If you love her, you’re allowed to be happy. I know I haven’t met her, but she sounds like a great person. And I know her chats with you helped so much while you were deployed. She brought the calm to you. Isn’t it just possible this was all a big coincidence, and she’s just as scared as you are? Not every woman thinks the way Blair does. Not everyone sees gain from someone else’s misery.”
She was right, and he knew it. He’d reacted like a jerk, without even giving her the chance to explain. Maybe there was an easy explanation.
“Give it a chance. If things had been different, I’d want two parents for Suzanna. I know you would have given anything for a dad. I would have. Don’t push her away because of assumptions and hurt feelings from the past.”
“When did you get to be so smart?”
“I’ve been growing up while you were out there saving the country. Parenting is its own crash course in life.”
“Love you, Nat.”
“Love you too, D.”
***
With the truck loaded with boxes, Dwayne drove Veronica home. Their quick dinner at the restaurant, set up by Skye so they could make the formal announcement, was a quiet affair. Everyone put on smiles, but behind the façade, there was the underlying knowledge that this wasn’t the typical pregnancy announcement. And after a quick trip to Madison’s place, they were on the way home.
Home. Their home now. She’d officially agreed to move in with him before the wedding. Though the date for that little detail hadn’t been decided. When he’d broached the subject, she’d said she wanted to check with her aunt and uncle, and didn’t he want to ask his family their plans?
No. He wanted to drag her down to the courthouse and get the thing done now. He hated loose ends, and their lack of wedding was a loose end that itched in all the wrong places. But he had to remind himself, just getting her to agree to move in was a big step. There was no way things would progress positively if they couldn’t at least be together to figure them out.
Which reminded him. Time to start looking for houses to rent. It didn’t make sense to buy at this point, when he’d likely be PCSing in another year or two. But there were always houses to lease around a military base. And he couldn’t see bringing home his baby to his bachelor-style apartment.
It all came crashing down on him. A baby and—hopefully—a wife. In six months. Busy year.
“The dinner was nice,” Veronica said, staring out the window. He couldn’t tell if she wanted him to respond or if it was just something to fill the void. So he took a chance.
“Yeah. Skye’s a sweetheart to set that all up.” He thought back for a minute. “You didn’t eat much though. You feeling okay?”
She stared at him with big eyes, and he realized it was the first time he’d directly asked about her pregnancy since the doctor’s office.
Covering her stomach with one hand, she gave him a smile that looked a little more like a grimace. “Still sensitive, but overall, getting better. Or at least, that’s what I think. Then out of nowhere, a bad day will hit me.”
She could have been describing his assimilation problem word for word. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that, with his relationship with Veronica up in the air and the new changes in his life all coming to a head at once, he was struggling a little to keep up with everything. And his mind was playing tricks again.
It was the exact wrong time for a freak-out. Not with a new baby on the way.
They pulled up to the apartment and she reached behind the seat for her bag. After he lifted her down from the truck, he almost grabbed her hand on instinct. But that wasn’t a good idea. She was upset with him, and he was upset at… what? Her? The world? Himself? He still hadn’t worked that through in his mind yet. But when he opened the door to his apartment, he couldn’t deny a big urge to sweep her off her feet and play the old-fashioned knight carrying his bride over the altar.
He resisted the knightly urge. With her stomach unsettled, the gesture likely would have resulted in her getting sick, anyway. Nice way to spend the first night of cohabitating.
She walked around the living room slowly, pivoting in her little silver flats. Brushing a hand over the top of his sofa, touching the corner of a picture, eyes soaking in every inch of his apartment, as if she hadn’t been there before. As if she hadn’t spent night after night with him. Then her shoulders tensed up, like she took a deep breath, and she turned to look at him with a resolute face.
“I need to ask you something.”
“That sounds ominous. But go ahead.” He took off his suit jacket and draped it over the back of the armchair, then shoved his hands in his pants pocket like what she was about to ask had zero bearing on his mind. What a lie.
“Where do I sleep?”
Okay, that was definitely not what he was thinking. “In bed?”
“Is that a question?”
“I don’t know, is it?”
She blew out an exasperated breath, one he could relate to. “Stop that. I just don’t…”
She lifted her hands and let them fall again. “I don’t know what we’re doing here. There. I said it. I don’t know what’s going on. I don’t know where you are, I don’t know if you only asked me to marry you because you felt like you had to, if you’re upset with me, if I’ve ruined everything. I just… don’t… know.”
The uncertainty in her eyes came close to breaking his heart. But he held firm. Blair had played the same game, and he just couldn’t go through that with Veronica. Putting in the extra effort to appear nonchalant, he said, “You can sleep wherever you want, darlin’. I wouldn’t mind company in bed, but if that’s not what you want, then there’s a guest room. Or the couch. Whatever you want.”
“Oh. Okay.” She grabbed her bag from the sofa and headed down the hall. A door closed, though he had no clue which one. Probably the guest bedroom, since he was basically an asshole and even he didn’t want to spend time with himself.
You’ve got to get over it. Veronica isn’t Blair.
But
she
could
be. And if Blair got the drop on you, anyone could.
It was cynical, it was harsh. But it was true. Could he seriously risk going through that again? With Veronica, a woman he was half in love with already?
If the entire thing turned out to be a scene, it might kill him.
***
Veronica dropped the bag on the mattress and sat next to it, crossing her legs. What a picture she must look. In her nice dress, sitting on a twin bed in a guest room by herself while her, what, fiancé? Whoever he was, while he did who knew what all by himself.
Fiancé. She tasted the word and didn’t care for it much. Though the flavor might have more to do with the situation than the person. Or maybe the person’s actions…
So what did she do now? Unpack, apparently. She started taking things out of her bag, setting them down on the desk. It was a pathetic assortment of stuff she’d shoved in there last minute before heading to dinner. The rest of her things were in boxes Dwayne had unloaded in the dining alcove for the moment. Where should she unpack them? His room? Had he made space for her in the closet, in the dressers?
Questions sucked.
She slammed the shampoo down harder than necessary. No. That was just bull. Things hadn’t started off in the most conventional manner, true. But they were engaged… sort of. And she loved him. And he… well. He something. He cared enough about the baby at least to want to marry her. And that said something. She wasn’t going to just sit in the guest room like some child being punished. If their relationship—the family they had started—stood a chance, someone had to fight for it. And he wasn’t ready to go to battle for them yet. So she would.
With more anger than conviction, she flung the door open and went to find him, prepared to give him a piece of her mind. But the anger burned out quickly when she found him passed out, facedown, on his bed. Still in his pants, shirt, and shoes from dinner. Her heart gave up the irritation and made way for compassion.
With quiet, smooth movements, she untied one shoe, then the other, placing them silently on the carpet at the end of the bed. There was nothing she could do about his pants and shirt, not the way he was lying facedown. But she could turn off the bedside lamp and leave him to rest for a while.
But the click of the lamp was like waving a red cape in front of a bull. So fast, she didn’t see him move until it was too late, as he grabbed her wrist and pulled her down to the bed next to him. Her mind flashed to that day, months earlier, when he’d pinned her to the couch in an unconscious haze of fury. The blank look in his eyes, the awareness that just wasn’t there.
But this was different. Even in the dim light from the moon, she knew he was wide awake, fully aware. His eyes weren’t blank, but full of something very real. Something that looked like hunger. Desire.
Something she could easily relate to. Cupping his face in her hands, she smiled in welcome. And he took it. Took her mouth in a kiss that was almost as fierce and possessive as he used to be before…
No. She couldn’t do that.
“Dwayne.” She breathed it, didn’t mean for it to escape. But if he heard, he didn’t respond, merely working his way down her neck to her collarbone, the hot trail left behind on her skin cooling in the air and making her nipples pucker under her dress. One large hand moved her until she was on her side, then unzipped her dress until it gaped in the front and he could pull it down. But he didn’t pull it off.
Instead he reached under her bra and fondled one breast, lifting until it pulled out over the cup. Then repeated the process with the other. His knee dragged up, forcing her legs to widen, until he rubbed against her center.
She felt unbelievably decadent, lying there so exposed while still in her dress. Somehow, the parts still covered made it seem even more naughty. She wanted him—God, she wanted him—but he was determined to take his time. Make her suffer. For the pleasure, or for punishment, she wasn’t quite sure yet.
Slipping his hand down, he fumbled and worked until he caught the elastic of her panties with his fingers and tugged down, lifting his knee only a moment to pull them completely from her body.
“Bend your knees.” He spoke into the soft skin of her breast, and she automatically shifted to do what he commanded. Anything he gave, she would grab at.
With his left hand he hooked under her right knee and brought it up as far as it would go. “Hold this.”
And when she would have asked why, he answered without words. Not that he could have spoken while his mouth was
there
. It felt so wrong and so good all at once, and she almost exploded with the combined pleasure and embarrassment. But pleasure won out, slowly edging any self-consciousness to the side as he worked her with expert knowledge until she was sobbing his name. Crying out to whoever would listen that she couldn’t take more.