“Buenas—um,noches?” Siobhan had lost track of time. There was still a glimmer of fading dusk beyond the windows, but she felt as though a week had passed since she’d fainted at work.
“Welcome,” Marta said in warm Spanish. “May I take your coats? I’ve prepared a light meal if you’d like me to serve it?”
“I texted her that you missed lunch.” Joaquin seated her at the dining table where freshly baked buns gave off a heavenly aroma. Candles wreathed in holly sat on the table, lending a gentle festive atmosphere.
“That’s not why I fainted,” Siobhan said when Marta was in the kitchen. “The doctor said it’s not uncommon for blood pressure to fall in—” she had to clear her throat, still wrapping her head around it. “—in early pregnancy. He said he’d test my iron levels when I go back for bloodwork, to be sure I’m not anemic.”
Marta brought out bowls ofpescado en blanco. It was a light soup that Siobhan already knew would sit gently in her unsettled stomach.
“I’ve kept you late enough,” Joaquin said when Marta asked if she could bring them anything else. “We’ll manage. Enjoy your evening.”
“Gracias, señor. I’ll clean the dishes in the morning.” Marta wished them good-night and left.
“I feel like all you do is feed me,” Siobhan said as she tucked into her soup.
“If you would feed yourself, I wouldn’t have to, would I?”
She was so on edge, she flinched.
They ate in subdued silence.
“So, um…” Siobhan couldn’t stand the suspense any longer. “Still a skeptic about fate?”
It was a terrible joke. He didn’t reveal one glimmer of amusement.
“We both have free will here. Your choices will affect mine so, ladies first.”
Her veins stung with heightened emotion. This was sooner than she had planned to start her family and she had always imagined she would be in a loving, committed relationship when she did, but “I’m having the baby.”
Chapter Nine
Her voice was quiet, the words simple, but they hit Joaquin with the force of a hurricane wind, nearly knocking him from his chair.
She was having the baby.Theywere having a baby.
The world titled on its axis. He resisted the urge to grip the table as he felt himself falling into empty space.
Conflicting responses warred within him. A desire to backtrack. If he could return to that elevator in San Francisco, he would go to his room alone— But no. A resistance rose in him even as he considered giving up that memory. It was too good.
Let the doctor be mistaken and I’ll… What? What could he do to atone for getting a woman pregnant?
“You’re not happy.” She pushed aside her empty bowl and walked to the fireplace where she stood with her back to him, hunched, hugging herself. “It’s okay. I’m making this decision for me. I want to be a mother. I’m not doing it lightly, either.” She turned her head to speak over her shoulder, offering him the curve of a cheek carved from ivory. “I’ve been around a lot of pregnant women and their children. I know what I’m in for more than most first-time mothers. I have a ton of support and resources. You don’t have to be involved.”
“Stop.” He left his own chair and walked around the sofa toward her. “I’ve never wanted to be a parent, that’s true. It doesn’t mean I intend to ignore the fact I’m about to become one.”I am one. The fist around his lungs clenched tighter.
“But no one needs to know that. Most couples don’t tell anyone about their pregnancy in the first trimester anyway, in case something goes wrong. We can keep pretending we’re merely acquainted—”
“No.” He didn’t let her finish, offended on a very primal level that she would even suggest he turn his back on both of them.
Something very visceral was springing to life in him that he didn’t want to examine too closely. It was greedy and atavistic and protective and it wouldn’t be pushed to the margins where his actions would be ineffective.
“Why have you never wanted children?” She pleated her brow in anxious incomprehension.
He winced and reached for the most obvious explanation.
“I travel too much. They’re a level of responsibility that always seemed inconvenient.” He loosened his tie, feeling constricted by it. “One of the reasons my brother and I struggled to reconnect was the fact he had young children. His family was his priority. Which was as it should be, but I saw how much of his time they monopolized.”
He pushed his hands into his pockets, still trying to wrap his head around this news while that belief, that personalstandardof his brother’s, settled into him as his own. His priorities had been shuffled. New ones had arrived at the top in the form of Siobhan and their child.
