“You want something more recent?How about when you came back to town and found out that Loud Louie had died?”
“What the— He had cancer.He’d been suffering.”
Her jaw set.“It’s also what you said when we found out I wasn’t pregnant.”
Heaviness settled over the room, the kind that made it hard to breathe.
Billy’s fingers curled, straining the sheet.
“You were happy about that,” she whispered.
While she’d been devastated.
“I hate those words,” she said, swallowing hard.“They’re what you say whenever you turn on me.”
“Turn on you?”he growled.
This time when she pushed at him, he backed away.Their bodies, still warm and lax from shared pleasure, stiffened and disconnected.Roxie pulled the sheet over herself and moved until her back was pressed against the headboard.Watching him defiantly, she wrapped her arms around her bent knees.
Billy’s hands fisted.“I’ve had your back since Day One.You’re the one who gave up on us.You’re the one who walked away from what we had.”
What they’d had…
Life had been crazy back then.They’d been trying to figure out how to live in the real world.They hadn’t had much, but they’d had the building blocks.They’d had each other, an apartment, and an old Ford that Billy had fixed up.He’d had his job at The Ruckus.A baby hadn’t been in the plans, but once the idea had set in, Roxie had gotten excited about it.The possibility that she’d finally have a real family, someone to belong to, had been a dream come true.
Until it hadn’t.
“You didn’t want a baby then; I’m just making sure we don’t have any ‘accidents’ now.”
“Bullshit.”
The curse cracked across the room like a rifle shot.Roxie’s head snapped back, but Billy’s gaze was fierce.
“This has nothing to do with biology.I know you’re on the Pill.I saw it in your medicine cabinet.You just don’t want to let me close.”
Her eyes narrowed.“Tomato, to-mah-to.”
“Because you’re scared.”
The blunt words were like a jab, and she forced herself not to flinch.
“You don’t think I’d make a good mother,” she accused.
And that burned.She remembered her mom, faint as the memory was.She remembered her long, dark hair and her lavender perfume.Most importantly, she remembered the feelings associated with that memory.
She’d make a great mother.
“God damn it, Roxie.I’ve never said that.”Climbing off the bed, Billy found his jeans.He pulled them on and planted his hands on his hips.“I think you’d make a kick-ass mom, a real mama bear.”
“Then why was it ‘for the best’?”
“We’ve been through this.Because we couldn’t care for a baby.The two of us, Roxie, not just you.”The words exploded from his lips, and he raked both hands through his hair.His abs were cinched up tight, and his eyes had gone dark green.He paced the room one time and then turned back to her.“We were teenagers fresh out of the system.We were barely getting by.”
“We’d been out for two years.”
“You were just graduating from high school.”
“Billy, we weren’t some big-eyed, wet-behind-the-ears kids.We had to grow up faster than that.”
