“I believe in love. Hell, my brothers and sisters keep dropping off because of what they call true love. It’s just not for me. There are reasons why, but they don’t matter. This isn’t the early nineteen hundreds, Allie. You’ll be able to find the love of your life even if you have a kid from another relationship.”
“A one-night stand. It wasn’t even a relationship.” She sobs, her head falling into her hands in shame.
“Regardless, you’ll still find your Mr. Right.”
She sniffles and leans away from me, wiping her eyes. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay. I know pregnancy hormones are crazy.”
She narrows her eyes at me. “I need to go home. Please take me to my car.”
But I see the red-rimmed eyes and the bags under them. She looks exhausted.
“Just sleep here tonight.”
She scoffs. “I’m not sleeping with you.” Her hands press to the cushions and she stands, but I take her hand before she gets too far.
“You’re exhausted. It’s late. You can sleep in my bed, and I’ll crash in Jed’s old room.”
Molly demanded a new bed, so he left his behind.
“I’m fine. I’m just a little tired. I was working in a private practice for months and I’m not used to the long shifts on my feet again yet.”
I decide to try a different tactic. “It would save me from having to drive you to your car and then following you home.”
She shakes her head like Rylan would do when he’d refuse to eat his vegetables as a kid. “You aren’t my protector.”
“Just stay.”
I’m not sure what I say to convince her, but two minutes later, she relents. We head upstairs to my room, and I pull out a T-shirt and shorts for her to sleep in.
“Good night, Allie,” I say, hovering by the door.
“Thank you. Good night.”
We stand in awkward silence for a moment, but she heads into the master bathroom, so I leave the room.
I go to Jed’s old room and sit on the edge of the bed, thinking about how different my life is about to be. It might be impulsive, but her moving in here is the right move. She shouldn’t be living alone and pregnant. I’m closer to her work and she’ll still have privacy while I’m working, but at the same time, my family lives pretty close. Should anything go wrong and I can’t get to her, they can.
I stand and unbutton my shirt, taking it off and laying it over the chair Jed also left behind. Apparently Molly didn’t want anything he screwed another girl on moving to the new place with them. It’s then I realize I don’t have shorts to sleep in. I hate sleeping in boxer briefs. They’re way too restrictive. But with her in the house, sleeping naked like I normally would, feels weird.
I walk across the hall and rest my hand on the doorknob. I lightly tap, expecting her to probably be asleep by now. Her lack of an answer confirms my suspicion, so I slowly open the door and step in.
“Fisher!” she yells. She’s walking out of the bathroom toward the bed where her clothes are laid out—and she’s naked.
I freeze, staring at her body that’s so different from the night we had sex. The belly I saw under her baggy clothes is so much more pronounced. Her tits are fuller, and damn if my dick doesn’t harden with the thought of sliding between them and titty fucking her.
“Sorry,” I mumble, still frozen.
“Get out!” she yells, grabbing the shirt and covering herself with it.
“Sorry again.” I shut the door and place my forehead on it.
Damn, she’s still fucking hot, and now I’m going to have to beat off to the thought of fucking her if I have any hope of getting some sleep. I just wish I didn’t have to do it in Jed’s bed.
I cannot believe I put myself in this position.
Fisher is still sleeping, and I’m stranded at his house with no one to come and pick me up. I could call an Uber, but news travels way too fast in this town. Being picked up in the morning at Fisher Greene’s house isn’t going to be on the latest Scandals of Sunrise episode if I can help it.
I call the one person who might be a better option for me other than walking all the way back to the hospital.
“Well, well, well…” Kingston answers Stella’s phone. “Have we told the bastard yet?”
Stella’s husband, Kingston, is a firefighter, and he owns half the sports complex where most kids in the area go for sports. He also knows way more about my business than he should.
“Where’s your lovely wife?” I ask.
“She’s on diaper duty. You’re in luck, you’ve got me.” There’s some kind of ruckus in the background. “Oh man, what did you do, Maven?”
“I take it you’re on toddler duty while she’s on baby duty?”
I’m envious of the way Kingston and Stella juggle their kids, especially with a newborn in the mix.
“She has something I don’t have to help out in that department.” He laughs, and Maven’s cries begin in the background. “Oh crap. Hold on. It’s okay, sweetie. Mistakes happen. Spills happen.”
She continues to sob.
“Let me get Stella, I have to calm down my perfectionist daughter.” He groans, getting up from what I expect is the floor of Maven’s toy room. “Stell?”
“Shh… she’s finally down,” Stella says.
“Down? She can’t fall asleep. I have an important day of errands today and I need her to sleep during them,” Kingston says. I think he covered the phone, but I can hear him anyway.
“You can’t make infants sleep when you want them to,” Stella says.
The muffling sound stops before he says to me, “Here. Let me know if I have to beat anyone up. I know he’s the sheriff, but I know people.”
Then I hear a kiss between them. Two seconds later, a door shuts and there’s no more Maven crying.
“I saw your text from the middle of the night. So?” Stella whispers like we’re about to gossip about our latest Netflix binge.
“My life is not a soap opera.”
“Actually, Allie, it kind of is right now.”
I sit on his couch and glance at the stairway. Still not one peep coming from upstairs. Covering my mouth, I whisper, “I’m still at his house. I spent the night.”
Dead silence.
“I didn’t sleep with him!”
“Oh. Phew.” A long breath flows over the line as though we were in a life-and-death situation. “You scared me.”
“Thanks for the vote of confidence.” I rise from the couch, needing anything to get rid of the gnawing in my stomach.
“Why would you stay there?”
“By the time we were done talking, it was really late and I was tired and—”
“Uh-huh, keep the excuses coming.”
I open the fridge to find beef jerky, a few eggs, and not one vegetable in sight. Taking the bag of beef jerky, I go back to the family room, stopping to listen for a moment at the stairs.
Still no sound.
“They’re not excuses. Three a.m. is a perfectly reasonable time to have a deep conversation when you work the shifts we do.” I tear a piece of jerky with my teeth. Surprisingly, it’s not that bad.