Page 167 of Lovely Venom

“Talk me through it,” he murmurs.

“What if something happens to you?”

“Nothing’s going to happen to me,” he assures me.

“You can’t know that.”

“I know we aren’t taking any chances with security measures,” he says. “All our vessels are under constant surveillance, here and at the marina. We have boats patrolling the island and eyes on every block within a two-mile radius of our businesses. Nobody is getting near any of us unnoticed.”

“You know, it’s really annoying how calm you are about everything all the time,” I complain. “Sometimes I just need someone to panic with me.”

“Sorry, baby.” A smile teases his lips.

“Are you really?”

“No.”

“I figured as much.” I lean back against my chair and try to relax so we can have a rational conversation, though that’s pretty difficult for me right now. “Does this mean you’re going back to work in your downtown office?”

“Do you not want me to go back to work in my downtown office?” he asks.

This feels like a trick question, but I answer anyway, not caring how absurd it sounds.

“No.”

“Then I’ll keep working from home until things settle down,” he says.

“Really?”

“Are you surprised?” Amusement flickers in his eyes when he sees the skeptical look on my face.

“Yes.”

“Well, you shouldn’t be.” His thumb traces the curve of my jaw. “That’s how relationships are supposed to work.”

“I wouldn’t know.” I avert my gaze.

My first relationship turned out to be hell on earth, and the ones around me weren’t any better.

Cristian studies me as I take a sudden interest in my tea, but he doesn’t push me to elaborate.

“When do you have to leave?” I ask.

“Soon,” he answers vaguely.

I’m pretty sure he’s waiting to be certain I won’t have a panic attack when he goes.

I force myself to meet his gaze, wondering if I should just tell him right now. But it doesn’t seem like the kind of thing you should blurt out right before someone’s about to leave.

I’ve been trying to find the courage to break the pregnancy news for the last three weeks, and I’ve been failing miserably. Every time I think I might actually get the words out, they end up lodged in my throat.

I know he’ll be happy, and I’m sure it won’t come as a surprise, but there’s no denying how this raises the stakes considerably. Once I tell him, everything will change. We’ll be tied together in a permanent way, and as patient as he’s been with me, it can’t last forever. He’ll want to know who he’s having a baby with. But there’s still a huge part of me that’s terrified of his rejection.

It didn’t really hit me until Mariella printed out my sonogram pictures and I saw our baby for the first time. I had no idea how many emotions it would bring up in me.

I was so young when my mother died, I felt her absence my entire life. Now that I’m going to be a mother myself, I can only imagine how much fear she must have had that I’d be left alone without her. It’s why she gave me the music box, and a way out, even if she couldn’t come with me.

There are so many uncertainties about how Cristian will react to the truth I’ve been hiding. And while I know he would never hurt me, there’s every chance he could still end up hating me.