Fuck.
“I didn’t use a condom,” I admit. “Wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.” I tuck a lock of hair behind her ear, then grab a paper towel from the roll on the bench. “Best I can do for clean up until I get you into my shower.”
I gently wipe us both down, then grab her panties and the loose pants she was wearing and put them both back on her.
“What do you want and need to do to fix that?” I ask.
“Tomorrow, we go get tested,” Maren says pragmatically.
“We can do that. Are you on the pill?”
Maren shakes her head. “I’m not. So, I guess the question is, do you want kids?”
Jesus. I only just mentally admitted I love Maren. Haven’t even said the words out loud. But kids?
As soon as I think that, an image pops into my head of me piling kids, multiples of them, and Maren, onto our boat for a day out on the water.
I think of making love to Maren with the pregnant swell of her stomach in my hands.
And sure enough, my cock, which shriveled at the thought I fucked everything up going without a condom, stirs.
“With you? Yes. They take my name, though. None of this double-barrel bullshit. Can’t have my brother’s nephew having the same name as the man who killed him.”
“I agree.”
I scrub a hand over my face. “Jesus. I’m gonna be in my sixties before they get to college. And that’s just the first one, if we assume we just made one.”
Maren chuckles. “Good job I’m so young, then. I’ll be able to keep up with their running around.”
“Hey. I’m not that fucking old.”
“There will be more than one. One of my biggest fantasies is sex that leads to getting pregnant, assuming both of us can.”
I groan as I kiss her neck. “Can’t be talking to me like that.”
She smiles and then looks around the garage. “A lot has shifted in the last hour.”
“For good or for bad?” I ask.
“I’m starting to think forever.”
And when Maren looks back at me, I think she might be right.
29
MAREN
Morning comes to me in fractured pieces.
The first thing to hit me is the way Knox has me pinned to him. His arms are wrapped tightly around me. My thigh between his. And my head rests just below his chin.
His breath rises and falls in slow and steady movement, and the hairs on his chest tickle my cheek as he does. I see shirtless Hollywood actors in movies, all smooth chested and buff. But I much prefer Knox’s hairy chest and solid muscle built for survival, not aesthetics.
I blink, disoriented for a second, and the roof of the clubhouse comes into focus. There’s the quiet hum of the air conditioning, and I feel…
Shit.
The memory of everything else floods in.
