Her bra was right there on the floor next to her left foot. She snatched it up.
“Let me help you with that.” He swung his feet to the floor and stood.
She laughed, an awkward, too-loud burst of sound. Feeling foolish, she accused, “You are so transparent.”
“Hey.” He put up both hands. “All I want to do is help.”
Dear Lord, he was a fine-looking man, tall and lean, broad-shouldered with that irresistible smile. Sometimeswhen she looked at him she wondered how the skinny smart aleck she’d grown up with had miraculously become the guy she most wanted to climb like a tree.
Life was full of mysteries, no doubt about it—and hedidn’tknow. She was sure of it now. He wouldn’t be kidding around with her if he knew.
Would he?
“Fine.” She put her arms through the bra straps and turned her back to him. “Hook me up.”
He stepped close. The backs of his fingers brushed the sensitive skin between her shoulder blades as he slipped the hooks into the eyes. “See?” His warm lips brushed the side of her neck. “I can be good.”
“Thank you,” she replied as she actively resisted the desire to lean back against him. Stepping away, she reached for her jeans, shook them out and pulled them on, glancing up with a grin to find him watching her. He wasn’t smiling. His serious stare made her throat feel dry and sent an odd little shiver racing down the backs of her thighs. “What?” she demanded.
He just stood there, buck naked, his eyes unreadable. The moment stretched out.
She gulped. “Josh. What’s the matter?”
He came toward her then, stopping when he was only a few inches away. A muscle twitched in his jaw. “Got something to tell me?”
It took all the will she possessed not to burst into tears. “I, uh…”
“Hey…” He whispered the word. Gently. Tenderly. And then he touched her. Sliding his fingers under her hair, he clasped the nape of her neck and pulled her in.
With a tiny moan, she let her head drop to his shoulder.“It’s just that…” She lifted her head and made herself look him straight in the eye. “I’m pregnant, Josh. About thirteen weeks along.”
Chapter Four
There was absolute silence. They stared at each other. She had no idea what might be going through his mind, no clue what she ought to say next.
He stroked her hair. She was so grateful for that. Whatever he was feeling right now, he behaved tenderly toward her. “Come on.” He took her hand and led her back to the bed. “Sit down.”
She sat.
He bent, grabbed his Wranglers, put them on and sat down beside her. When he took her hand again, the ache in her chest eased a little.
“Talk to me,” he said, weaving their fingers together.
What to say? Where to go from here? “It must have been that night on the first of January. We were together. After you left I started feeling sick…”
“I remember,” he said. “You had a bad stomach bug. It lasted a week or so, didn’t it?”
She nodded. “I kept throwing up. It didn’t occur to me at the time that my birth control pills were coming back up, too…”
He squeezed her hand.
She took that as encouragement to go on. “I’ve known for several weeks now. I took a home test. Positive. To besure, I went to my doctor. He confirmed that I’m having a baby in the first week of October.”
“Is everything…okay?”
She turned to him. “You mean the baby?”
“The baby and you, too.”
