“It’ll be okay, bunny.” Nate’s reassuring words didn’t make her feel much better.
“There are tests that can tell you if you’re pregnant six to eight days after conception.”
“You want to know already?” Nate asked the question, then laughed. “Of course you do, little Miss Impatient.”
“I do want to know, of course I do. I’m worried, now. But…I’m afraid, too. I almost feel like it’s better to just wait…and see.” She poked at the rice on her plate.
“And that would be when…?” Once again, Nate seemed endearingly uncomfortable talking about Krissa’s female schedule.
“Another week.”
“You can wait that long, Krissa.” Derek cut a piece of chicken.
“Yes. I can.” She lowered her gaze to her plate. Had she been hoping they’d talk her into trying the test, as anxious as she was to find out if she was pregnant?
“We really need to have a talk.” Nate set his cutlery on his plate. “I know the clinic doesn’t exactly have guidelines for this type of thing, but it’s basically the same as a directed donation—we need to have some legal agreements in place.”
Krissa nibbled her bottom lip. “I hate to think that we need to do that…but yeah, you’re right.”
“We’re friends and we trust each other, and we all know why we’re doing this. But things can happen…”
“Like what?” Derek frowned.
“Like what if one day I decided I wanted to claim the child as my own?”
“Why would you do that?”
Nate shrugged, picked up his water glass. “I don’t know why I would. That was just an example. Something like that could really screw things up. I know we all agree right now on how this is going to work, but things change…I just think to protect us all and to protect our friendship, we should maybe have a lawyer draw up an agreement.”
Krissa felt heavy. “I hate that.”
“I know.” Nate’s eyes met hers. “But you agree, don’t you?”
She nodded. “Sure. How about we do that once we know I’m pregnant? If I’m not, it’s moot. Right?”
She had to be pregnant! God. The number of times they’d had sex—more than once in a night, three nights in a row and at the exact right time of the month—it had to happen. Her hands curled into fists in her lap.
Chapter 22
The next morning, Krissa vaguely heard Derek leave for work, and buried her face into her pillow to get her extra hour of sleep. But she didn’t go back to sleep. As she gradually became more and more awake, she grew acutely aware of Nate’s big body next to her, radiating heat, all sleek tanned skin and muscle.
She wanted to touch him.
She touched herself instead.
She slid her hands over her breasts, over soft nipples, brushed her palms over them and felt them harden. An ache between her legs grew stronger and she parted her thighs, trailed her hand down over her tummy. Her fingers played in the curls there briefly, then she slipped her fingers into her throbbing folds. She closed her eyes, bit her lip, pushed a finger into the wetness. Oh, God. She held in a moan.
The thing about sex was, the more you had it, the more you wanted it. She and Derek had planned their sex for so long, timed it carefully around cycles and testing, wanting to preserve sperm, wanting to ensure conception. She’d had more sex in the last week than she and Derek had had alone in the last six months. Well, that might be exaggerating—but not much.
Now she wanted itall the time.Thoughts of sex intruded on her work. Made her warm and wet while she was walking through the grocery store. Made her want to masturbate when Nate was lying right beside her and could wake up at any moment.
She rubbed her finger over her clit, found the spot, moved her hips in the rhythm that always worked for her—and came, in an explosive, tight orgasm that she had to hold inside her. When the spasms subsided she slowly drew her hand away and stretched her legs out, trying not to gasp for breath.
The she turned her head to glance at Nate and found him lying there—watching her.
Heat crawled up her face. “Uh…”
“Krissa.” His voice was thick and strained.
