Just Married (More than Friends) by Jenna Bayley-Burke

Author:Jenna Bayley-Burke [Bayley-Burke, Jenna]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Published: 2016-08-30T04:00:00+00:00

10

Cal’s colorful world went black-and-white. And heavy. He released her hand and rested his palms on his thighs, needing some kind of solid ground. He kept his mouth shut tight, trapping the censure inside. His skin felt too tight, a hurricane of thoughts and accusations, fear and ramifications.

What the actual hell?

He stuffed down the emotions battling for attention. There was one good thing his parents had taught him: Feelings had no place in decisions. He needed facts, and nothing more.

“You’re pregnant?” He sat up straight in the chair and tried to look at her objectively. There was no telltale bump, no outward signs. He’d turned her inside out last weekend—had it happened then?

“Fourteen weeks.”

His pulse crashed like thunder in his ears. “You waited three months to tell me?”

She folded her hands in her lap and spoke as if she were reporting the news. “I had no idea until two weeks ago when I went in for a checkup. When my doctor told me, I thought she had me confused with another patient. I was as stunned as you are.”

He nodded because he had no frame of reference for how to respond. He’d always been meticulously careful when it came to sex because he’d never wanted to find himself here. But with her, he’d let his guard down. She seemed so vigilant about taking her pills. Had that been to lull him into a false sense of security?

Her slim shoulders tensed, the heavy silence growing deeper until she shook her head and continued. “I know what you’re thinking. I should have told you last weekend. I’d planned to.”

“You did mention that we needed to talk, but sex was a higher priority for you.” She slammed her eyes shut at his words, and while he knew better, he couldn’t see past the suspicion of betrayal. She knew exactly how he felt about having children.

“I went to New York to tell you, and I just couldn’t. You were happy, and I wanted you to have that.” The quiver in her voice reached for him, but he’d lost his ability to respond.

“Did you plan this?” His entire body went cold, as if somehow the death of the future he wanted had caused him to bleed out.

“Do you really think I would do that?” Mira stared at him with wide eyes and shook her head. “Wow. I played this out a hundred ways in my mind, and never once did you accuse me of tricking you into this. How would that even work, Cal? I didn’t think I could get pregnant.”

“So you stopped taking your pills?” He flexed his hands, wanting to strangle himself for being so careless.

“No, I took them like it was my religion. My OB thinks it might have happened because I took antibiotics the week before I went to New York. But even then, I’d been told there was too much scarring to conceive without intervention. I never thought this could happen.” She lifted her hands to her head, but stopped short of grabbing her hair.

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