Dread swims in my stomach now as I climb into the passenger seat. A moment later, Barry gets into the driver’s side, cutting me a sidelong look. His heart is right there in his eyes, his lids and jaw heavy with emotion. Aren’t they? Am I only imagining the way he held me so tightly this morning upon waking? Can I be the only one who is in distress at the imminence of parting ways? Oh, I know he’ll help support me if I end up pregnant, but how long will it take for me to know? Weeks? Months?
Will we be strangers who share a child someday? Or…more?
Barry starts the truck and we pull away from the valet station, waving to wedding guests who are still waiting for their cars to be brought around. I stare straight ahead, trying to dissect the weekend and figure out where things went wrong. Maybe they went wrong from the start. I forced Barry to bring anineteen-year-old as his date. I seduced him. I knew his mother got pregnant young and was abandoned, but he probably came inside me ten times yesterday without one of us reaching for a condom.
Is he…regretting last night? His promise to support me?
The whole time we spent together?
I twist my hands in my lap, despairing, my eye straying to the clock.
One hour until the man I’ve fallen in love with drops me off and leaves.
Barry
What the hell was I thinking last night?
This girl probably can’t wait to get the hell away from me.
I lost my mind. I was like an animal in that hotel room. I couldn’t stop fucking her. Couldn’t stop slaking myself over and over with her tight body. My dick wouldn’t quit getting hard. It was as if…Iwantedto get her pregnant.
As if that was my goal.
Are you pretending it wasn’t?
Even now, I am very close to pulling over and taking her behind a gas station because what if she only needs one more load to conceive? I have one ready. I could give it to her deep and hot. She’d not only allow my touch, but she would also enjoy it. I don’t know when or how the lines got blurred between our professional and personal relationship, but there is no doubt in my mind she found physical release with me. Countless times. I can still feel her shaking. Hear her moaning my name.
But I don’t want to be her client anymore.
I want to be her man.
Forever.
I want to drive right past Vegas and keep going, all the way to my cabin in the nature preserve. I’m having dangerous thoughts of keeping her there, whether she likes it or not, but no. God, no. That’s not me. I want her tochooseme. Against all odds.
And if she doesn’t?
That possibility is what keeps me in a chokehold as we draw closer to her home. A house she shares with her sisters in a suburb of Vegas. According to the GPS, I’m only a few blocks away and my palms are beginning to sweat on the steering wheel. She’s so quiet, staring pensively out the window, her spine ramrod straight. Is she dreading us parting ways, or is she dying to get away from me?
I don’t have time to brace myself for her reaction.
As soon as I pull up in front of the house, she’s grabbing her overnight bag from the rear cab of my truck. She looks at me across the front seat. Her lower lip trembles. Then she bursts into tears, all but throwing herself out of the passenger side and running up the driveway to the house.
“Petra!” I shout, alarmed. Sick. Confused. “Petra, wait.”
What just happened?
I turn off the ignition, exit the truck and run after her. But before I can reach Petra where she’s standing on the front porch, the door flies open and she dashes in between two women. Actually, make that four.
Four very pissed-off women.
Each of them has a slight resemblance to Petra, but they don’t hold the same spark and wonder in their eyes. The same magic. No one does. No one in this world.
“Who are you?” one of them screeches.
“What did you do to our baby sister?”
“I’m Barry.Petra!” I shout, over the noise, panicking. She was crying and I need to make it stop. Immediately. “I need to see her. Please.”
