He refrained from answering that. Probably because we had agreed on a strict policy of one hundred percent honesty with each other, and answering that question truthfully would probably make me cry. He pulled me into his chest. A faint hint of his cologne lingered in the warm and comforting space there, and I drew it in deep as he pressed a kiss to the top of my head. I felt his lips stretch with a smile as he sniffed my hair. “Grilled cheese?”
“Lucky guess.”
“Is there any left?”
“I’ll make one for you, if you’re feeling brave enough to try it.” I stepped out of his arms and started toward the kitchen.
“Not so fast,” he said, catching me by the shoulders. He turned me gently toward the table and deposited me in a chair. His cop voice brooked no room for argument as he lifted my feet and propped them on the empty chair beside me. “You’ve done enough today.”
His shoulders flexed between the straps of his leather holster as he stripped off his jacket and loosened his tie. He moved through my kitchen with an easy familiarity, retrieving a bottle of cheap red wine from the pantry and twisting open the metal cap. He poured me a glass and set it in front of me. I drew it to my lips and paused. I’d been so busy, I’d forgotten all about the pregnancy test I’d hidden in the cabinet. I set the wine down. “Actually, I think I’ll just have a ginger ale.” Nick raised an eyebrow. “Just a bit of an upset stomach,” I said.
“Have you eaten anything today?” he asked. I opened my mouth to tell him I was fine, but he held up a finger. “Picking at Zach’s leftovers doesn’t count.”
I had to think about that. The day had been a blur. “I could eat,” I admitted.
He poured me a glass of soda and began assembling grilled cheeses. When he set a steaming sandwich in front of me, my stomach actually growled. I hadn’t had much of an appetite since Vero was arrested. I had been telling myself I was too busy to eat, but the fact of the matter was that nothing had tasted quite the same since she left. Not because she was a better cook, but because I missed her. Every bit as much as the kids did.
I moved my feet to the floor to make room for Nick. He sat down and eagerly tucked into his meal. I could feel his cop-brain working overtime, analyzing my body language—the way my elbows rested beside my plate, the long sips of ginger ale I took after every slow bite. He refilled my glass. “Any word from Vero?”
“Not since last weekend. I thought maybe she was just busy, but Javi says he hasn’t heard from her either. I’m starting to worry.”
“Her trial’s coming up. She probably has a lot going on. Her mother and her aunt are with her, and Ramón’s been checking in,” he reminded me.
It was the same reassurance I had offered Javi, but the longer I sat with it, the more doubtful I felt. “What if something’s gone haywire with her case?”
“She’s been assigned a lawyer. I’m sure he’s doing everything he can. We just have to trust the legal system to make the right call.”
“And what if they don’t?” I didn’t want to think about what would happen if Vero wasn’t acquitted.
He set down his sandwich, watching me with a look of concern as he wiped his hands. “Want me to make a few calls? Sam has some contacts in Maryland. She probably knows someone in PG County. Maybe she can get an update.” Detective Samara Becker was my sister’s girlfriend. Sam worked in cybercrimes, and she seemed to have contacts everywhere. Apparently, being gorgeous and ruthlessly good at her job didn’t make it hard to find friends. She looked more like Hollywood’s version of a lady cop than any actual female detectives I’d ever known, and if she weren’t so head over heels for my fashion-challenged and socially awkward big sister, I would think Sam and her Louboutins were too perfect to be real. If anyone could get information quickly and discreetly, I didn’t doubt it was Sam. But maybe Nick was right and I was stressing over things I couldn’t control and probably didn’t need to.
“If she doesn’t call me back tomorrow, I’ll reach out to her mom.” I had met Vero’s mother for the first time the day Vero was released on bail. I had driven up to Norma’s house with a suitcase full of Vero’s clothes, her toiletries, and her laptop, along with some art my children had made for her. Norma had been understandably distraught, Vero had been depressed and distracted, and my visit to their home had been far too short.
Nick reached over and took the napkin I was shredding from my hands. He turned my chair sideways, pulling it and me a few inches closer to him. “Why don’t you go see her?”
“I don’t have anyone to watch the kids.” My mom and dad had been sick with the flu, and Steven was visiting his family in Pennsylvania.
“I’ll do it.”
My head snapped up, but Nick’s expression was serious. “I would never ask you to do that. It’s more than just watching them, Nick.” How did you explain the impossibly broad scope of child-rearing to someone who’d never done it? It was feeding them and bathing them and keeping Zach on track with his potty training. It was giving Delia her allergy meds and shuttling her to and from preschool. I could hardly manage it all myself now that Vero was gone. We had been a team for so long now, I had almost forgotten what it felt like to be a single parent. Her absence was eating away at me, but my relationship with Nick was too new to test.
I stood and gathered my unfinished plate. Just because we had exchanged bodily fluids andI love yous didn’t mean he was volunteering to become a dad. Expecting him to care for my kids—even for a night—felt like too much to ask of him.
Nick got up and followed me to the sink. He reached around me, taking the dirty plate from my hand. “I can handle it, Finn. And I can wash the dishes, too.” He set them in the sink basin and turned me around to face him, bracing his hands against the counter on either side of my hips. He ducked his head, bringing his face close to mine until he was all I could see. Not the stacks of unopened mail on the counter or the pile of clothes waiting to be folded on the couch in the next room.
“I’ll think about it,” I said.
He kissed me. When he didn’t stop kissing me, I reached my arms around his neck, letting him hoist me onto the counter. “What do you say we leave the dishes for the morning and go upstairs?” he murmured.
I cringed inwardly, remembering the large swaths of leg hair I’d missed during my hurried sponge bath over the sink that morning. As much as I wanted to let Nick make me forget all about the day, I didn’t think I had it in me to stay awake once my head hit the pillow. “I’m a mess,” I said with a hand to his chest. “I didn’t even have time to shower before my doctor’s appointment, and—”
He put a finger to my lips. “First, if I wanted to have sex with you—and let the record show Ialwayswant to have sex with you—then there is nothing you could say about the state of your body that would dissuade me from wanting to see it naked. Second, as much as Idowant to get you naked and have sex with you tonight, I’m not going to.”
“You’re not?”
“No, I’m not.” His mouth quirked into a smile at my obvious disappointment. “You’re exhausted,” he said, brushing the hair back from my eyes. “So you’re going upstairs to take a long, hot bath, and then you’re going to sleep.”
“I can’t,” I said. “I have too much to do.”
