His expression shifts the second our eyes meet.
“Are you sick?” he asks immediately.
“I—” I stop, because yes. No. Maybe. God.
His thumb brushes over my cheekbone. “Elsa.”
The gentleness almost undoes me more than pressure would.
My laugh comes out breathless and shaky. “I’m fine. I’m just…” I trail off, because I’m not fine, and the words are all wrong, no matter which ones I try first.
He waits.
That’s somehow worse.
Nopushing. No filling the silence. Just that steady look and those hands on me, holding me in place, holding me upright.
I glance toward the kitchen where Bianca and Elena had stood, where they’d looked at each other over my head like they already knew something I didn’t want to know.
Antonio’s eyes track that glance. His jaw tightens.
I close my eyes for a second. Just a second. Then I open them again and force the words out before I can lose my nerve.
“I think,” I whisper, “I might be pregnant.”
Silence.
Not long. Not dramatic. But enough that I feel every beat of my heart in my fingertips.
Antonio doesn’t let go of me.
He doesn’t step back.
He just goes very still.
I can’t breathe properly.
“It’s probably nothing,” I say too fast, because the stillness is unbearable and I need to fill it before it crushes me. “Stress. The week. Everything that happened. I’ve been nauseous, and dizzy, and emotional, but that could be anything. It probably is anything. Something. I’m sure it is.”
My voice keeps climbing, and I hateit.
Antonio’s gaze doesn’t leave my face. “You think you’re pregnant?”
“I don’t know,” I say, and my voice goes too high and a little hysterical. “I can’t exactly go out and get a pregnancy test or-or-or make an appointment. So, yeah, Ithink.”
He watches me for another long second, then shifts his hands, one sliding around my back, the other moving to the base of my skull, his fingers tangling gently in my hair. He lowers his head and presses his lips to mine.
The kiss is soft. Soft enough to make my chest ache. Not demanding anything. Just… quiet. It stops the shaking in my hands for a second.
When he pulls back, he rests his forehead against mine. He closes his eyes.
“I was terrified,” he says, and the words are so quiet, I barely hear them, “that you were going to tell me you wanted to leave.”
My breath catches.
He opens his eyes.
“Pregnant,” he says, like he’s testing the word out. His thumb strokes the back of my neck. There’s no shock on his face. No anger. Just something that looks a hell of a lot like… wonder.
