Then, just because I needed him to know I wasn’t rejecting him, I added, “I love that you care.”
His whole expression softened in a way that made my stomach flutter. He leaned over and kissed me slowly, like he was sealing the apology and understanding with love. Then he stood and started stripping off his hoodie.
That was when he glanced toward the window and stopped.
“Baby.” He turned fully toward the big window in my room. The curtains were pushed back, and the top half was cracked open enough to let cold air drift in. “It’s February and snowing.”
I poked my lip out. “But I’msohot.”
He stared at the window, then at me. “It’s fucking freezing in here.”
“I ampregnant. I cannot help that my body is doing hellish things.”
He barked out a laugh.
“I wake up sweating. I’m hot all day. I’msuffering.”
He walked over to the window. “This is insane.”
I folded my arms. “You bet’ not close it.”
He stood there for a second like he was trying to decide whether to argue more or just accept that he was in love with a pregnant woman who liked her bedroom climate set to meat locker.
I raised a brow dramatically. “Luckily, we don’t live together, so you can go to your own place if it’s too cold.”
He stuck his middle finger up at me as he came back to the bed, stripped down to his draws, and slid under the blanket beside me.
The second his cold feet touched my leg, I jumped and yelped, “Oh my God!”
He grinned. “Mm humph.”
I laughed and pushed at his shoulder while he pulled me against him anyway, with one hand settling over my stomach.
I let out a satisfied breath and smiled into the pillow.
TWO WEEKS LATER
23
AVA REYNOLDS
Ihad been in pain all damn day. My back hurt like somebody was slowly twisting something at the bottom of my stomach. My stomach kept getting hard and tight, then easing up just enough to let me think maybe it was passing, only for the pressure to come back worse. My pelvis felt like Cairo was down there with a battering ram, and every time I stood up, I had this deep ache and pressure between my legs that made me pause and breathe through it.
It felt like all the stuff women always talked about right before labor.
A few days earlier, I had dragged myself to the hospital convinced I was in labor, only for them to tell me it was Braxton Hicks contractions and to take my dramatic ass back home. So now I was determined not to go running back too soon just to get sent home again feeling stupid and swollen.
That was easier said than done when every cramp had me second-guessing willing to go through with this, as if I had a choice.
I was in the living room in one of Reek’s T-shirts and some soft shorts that barely fit over my belly now. I had the waistbandfolded down under my stomach because anything pressing into it made me irritated. One of my hands stayed on the small of my back, and the other kept rubbing over the front of my stomach like that was going to make Cairo show some mercy.
Reek had been at my place since that morning. He had canceled whatever he had going on and barely left my side except to get me things; water, snacks I didn’t want after two bites, the heating pad, my fuzzy socks that I ended up throwing off because I got hot again. He had been patient, kind, and so locked in on me that it almost made me emotional all over again.
Actually, everything made me emotional those days. Part of that was hormones. The other part was fear. Even though Reek had committed to me and had really been my partner the last two weeks, even though he had been acting like commitment had never scared him a day in his life, even though he had been sweet, attentive, and all over me in the best ways, a little fear still sat in the back of my mind. I was scared that once the baby was really here, once Cairo was no longer a belly for Reek to kiss and rub and talk to, once he was a real live little person crying and taking up space, Reek would panic and run.
I hated that I still feared that. But I did. And that made every contraction and every kind thing he did make my heart melt and ache with fear at the same time.
He was in the kitchen when another wave of pain hit. I bent over the arm of the couch and gritted my teeth through it.
