by Tracy Wolff
But she and Nic still had things to talk about—such as her ground rules and whether or not he really wanted to do this now that he’d seen just how small her apartment was. “It’s fine,” she told him, stepping back so he could enter.
He must have read the tiredness on her face, though, because he shook his head. “I think I’ll get going. Let you get some rest.” He pulled his phone out of his pocket, then looked a little shamefaced as he asked, “Can I get your number again? I promise not to erase it this time.”
“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see about that,” she said.
She’d meant it as a joke, but his eyes shot to hers. He was deadly serious—deadly earnest—when he told her, “I’m not going anywhere, Desi.”
Yeah, that’s what they all said. And somehow it had never quite worked out that way for her. Oh, they all had a really good reason for why they had to leave—or why she had to—but the results were always the same. Her, alone, trying to pick up the pieces of a heart broken by too many people too many ways and too many times.
But she was done with that, she told herself as she rattled off her phone number. Done with opening herself up to someone only to watch the person walk away. So she’d give Nic a chance, she’d let him into this baby’s life, but that was it. There was no way she would let herself depend on him. No way she would let him hurt her when he finally decided to walk away.
It had taken him eight weeks to erase her from his phone when she didn’t answer his texts. Once the baby was born and everything got harder, how long would it take him to leave them both?
Not very long was her bet. Not very long, at all.
“Get some sleep,” he told her after saving her number. “I’ll call you tomorrow and we’ll talk about the logistics of me moving in. I want to do it as soon as possible.”
“How soon is that?” she asked warily.
“This coming weekend, if that’s okay with you. I’d do it sooner, but I know you have work and the last thing I want to do is rock the boat for you at the paper.”
She snorted. “Yeah, well, I think that boat has already been rocked pretty hard today.” The memory made her wince even as it brought the guilt back. She’d almost ruined Nic and his brother, almost brought down their entire company, and yet here he was, telling her that he didn’t want to disrupt her job. If things had been reversed, she’d probably be calling for his head on a silver platter, baby or no baby.
“I’m sorry,” she told him. “An apology is not close to being enough when my carelessness nearly cost you and your family everything, but I don’t know what else to say.”
“Clean slate, remember?” He leaned over then and pressed a lingering kiss to her forehead. “We’re starting over.”
Were they? His gentle, platonic kiss somehow managed to send heat sizzling along her nerve endings. Because from where she stood, it felt as if they were picking up right where they’d left off eighteen weeks before.
It was an alarming idea, considering the close quarters they would be living in. And the no-sex rule she was serious about enforcing. Chemistry between them had never been a problem, and she knew if she let him back in her bed, getting rid of him would take a hell of a lot longer than it would otherwise. After all, how would they find out how incompatible they were in real life if they never actually got out of bed?
She knew this, understood it, even believed it wholeheartedly. And still her body swayed toward him, still she tilted her face up for a kiss that shouldn’t happen. Still she longed to feel his hard, calloused hands brushing over her skin.
Nic’s eyes darkened as she stared up into them. They turned the same green as the storm-tossed Atlantic, and she felt more of her resistance give way. If he kissed her right now…if he touched her, she wasn’t sure she’d have the strength to say no.
But in the end, he did neither. Instead, he took a couple of steps back, until he was no longer in touching distance. He gave her a sweet smile—sweeter than anything she thought a guy like him was capable of—and said, “Go get some sleep. I’ll call you in the morning and we’ll get the details of my move worked out. We’ll both feel better then.”
She was glad he sounded certain, because suddenly she was anything but. Still, she nodded, gave him the best smile she could muster. “Yeah. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
They stood there for several long seconds more, neither of them taking the first move to break the new and tenuous connection between them. All she had to do was step back and close the door. All he had to do was turn and walk away. And still they silently watched each other. Silently imagined what might be coming next…for both of them.
Despite her best intentions, she felt herself softening toward him. Felt herself wondering if maybe he would stick around for a while—for the baby, of course, not for her.
But after everything she’d been through, after all the people she’d had to tell goodbye over the years, even thinking he might stay for the baby felt like a weakness. More, it felt like a betrayal.
And so she found the will to step back.
Found the will to whisper a soft good-night.
And somehow she even found the will to close the door in Nic’s very handsome, very sexy, very sweet face.
By Sunday, Desi still wasn’t over her moment of weakness. In fact, she’d spent the better part of the week berating herself for it even as she felt herself falling a little more under Nic’s spell with each day that passed.
He’d called her twice a day, every day, just to check on her. He had a small basket of fresh fruit delivered to her doorstep each morning and a healthy, delicious dinner delivered each night. He even drove up from San Diego one day to meet her for lunch so he could check on her and the baby. And through it all, he had never voiced a word of dissension at the increasingly ridiculous rules she’d insisted on making up for their living arrangement.
The guy definitely had his eye on the endgame, and that wasn’t going to do. Not when he was being so nice about it. And not when she felt as if she was one small step away from getting sucked into a vortex of need and want and emotional attachment.
Wasn’t going to happen.
Which was why, on this fine Sunday morning in July, she stood in the middle of her very small kitchen watching her neighbor Serena direct her burly boyfriend and brother, telling them where in Desi’s apartment they should put the French provincial sofa they were currently carrying. Not that it really mattered. The thing would dominate the room wherever they put it.
How could it not? It was huge and ugly and the most atrocious shade of hot pink she had ever seen. It was also curved and hard as a rock and would be absolutely miserable for Nic to sleep on. One night on the thing and his back would never be the same.
At another time, she might feel badly about conspiring to torture Nic while he was being so determinedly supportive, but desperate times called for desperate measures. He was moving in later that afternoon, and with the way her stupid pregnancy hormones were all out of whack, she didn’t trust herself not to jump him. Or much worse, fall for him.
Which was why she’d begged Serena to let her borrow her friend’s most prized piece of furniture. It would cost Desi a couple of hundred bucks and an entire day spent at the spa, but at this point, that seemed a small price to pay. Nic had to go and he had to go fast.
She would make those words her mantra and use them every time she felt her resolve weakening. Which lately seemed to be every time she saw Nic or heard his voice on the phone or even thought about him—which she was doing more and more lately.
Stupid pregnancy hormones.
By the time Nic showed up at her door with two suitcases and a laptop case filled with electronics, she was a wreck. Especially since she hadn’t had anything to do but sit around and wait for him to appear.
Normally she spent Sunday mornings cleaning her ap
artment, but a cleaning service had shown up before she’d left for work on Thursday. When she’d tried to turn them away, thinking they’d gotten the apartment number wrong, they’d assured her that Nic had sent them. And that they’d be back every week to make sure her apartment was “spick-and-span.” Their words, not hers.
When she’d tried to talk to Nic about it, to tell him she didn’t need or want him to pay for a cleaning service, he’d told her it wasn’t for her, it was for him. He was a total pig, he claimed, and he needed someone to clean up after him.
The fact that she could hear the laughter in his voice as he said it—and called him on it—didn’t make him change his story. That was when she’d figured out what she’d only suspected when she’d gone home with him all those weeks ago—that she really had met her match.
“I cleared out half the closet for you,” she told him as he made his way into the apartment. “I figured you could use that chest for stuff you didn’t want to hang up.” She pointed at the arts and crafts–style highboy she had found at a garage sale right out of college. She’d brought it home, stripped it and painted it a bright sunshiny yellow that she loved—and that, it turned out, clashed horribly with the hot pink French provincial sofa that now dominated her living area.
Normally she used the chest to hold her books, but for now they were in boxes under her bed. If she played her cards right, the books would be back where they belonged by Wednesday. Maybe sooner, if that couch was as uncomfortable to stretch out on as she imagined it would be.
“Thanks,” he said with a smile that was way too sexy for her peace of mind. “I really appreciate that.”
Guilt slithered through her, made her palms sweat and her stomach swirl. But she shoved it back down, hard. Nic had to go and he had to go now. She repeated her mantra like the lifeline it was.
“Do you need help unpacking?” she asked, reaching for one of his suitcases.
“I’ve got it.” He held the bag away from her. “Why don’t you sit down and rest while I empty these suitcases, and then I’ll take you to lunch.”
“I’m pregnant, Nic, not an invalid.”
“True, but I am neither pregnant nor an invalid, so I beat you.” He pointed to the monstrosity of a sofa without so much as batting an eye. “Now, sit.”
She did her best not to cringe. Why, oh why, had she not considered the fact that he would expect her to sit on that couch? Which wasn’t as bad as lying on it, obviously, but was still not good.
“I actually prefer the bar stools,” she said, gesturing to the three chairs that lined the overhanging counter on the outside edge of her kitchen.
As she turned away, she thought she heard him murmur, “I bet,” under his breath, but when she whirled back to look at him, his smile was perfectly innocent.
Yeah, as if she was buying that.
After grabbing her laptop off her desk, she settled at the bar to put the finishing touches on an article about the charity ball benefiting the LA Zoo that she’d attended the night before. It was due by five, but getting it in early could only help her career. Though Malcolm didn’t treat her any differently, she couldn’t help feeling as if she was persona non grata in the newsroom.
Or maybe that was her own sense of guilt and responsibility. Stephanie—who’d been at the Times for nearly ten years—had assured her that all reporters screwed up sometimes. Maybe that was true. But how many of them screwed up on their first major assignment? When she’d asked Stephanie that, her friend had suddenly needed to make a phone call. Which told Desi everything she already knew.
She’d written the zoo story earlier because she’d thought it’d be hard to work with Nic in her apartment. After all, the place was only about seven hundred square feet, and he was big enough that it felt as if he took up most of it.
Yet, as he unpacked, he was as unobtrusive as a gorgeous, six-foot-four man could be. He didn’t interrupt her, didn’t ask her where he should put his belongings. He just did his thing and let her do hers. If she’d had a little more self-control and actually been able to stop herself from stealing glances at him every five seconds, she probably would have finished proofing her article a heck of a lot faster.
As it was, they finished their tasks at the same time, after which Nic insisted on taking her out to lunch to celebrate their new living arrangement. He plied her with queso and guacamole and deep-fried ice cream—which was nowhere near as disgusting as it sounded—then took her for a walk around Griffith Park. It was crowded because it was a weekend, but it was fun all the same.
She’d spent so much of her life alone—by circumstance when she was young and by choice after she reached adulthood—that it hadn’t occurred to her how nice it could be to do things with someone else. How something as simple as a walk in the park became so much more fun when there was someone to share it with.
And when they finally made it back to her apartment and she saw what she’d missed earlier—three books on pregnancy and parenting that Nic had, if judging by the bookmark placement, been spending some serious time reading—it hit her that she might be in serious trouble.
Because for the first time since she’d decided to let Nic move in, she wasn’t thinking about how to get rid of him. Instead, she was thinking of ways to make him stay.
Twelve
Nic had just finished shaving early Monday morning when Desi called to him from the kitchen. “Nic! Come here! Hurry up!”
The urgency in her tone struck fear into his heart, and he rushed out of the bathroom and through the bedroom without even stopping to grab a shirt. “Are you okay?” he called as he ran through her matchbox-sized apartment. “What’s wrong?”
He got to the kitchen before she could answer, and he glanced around wildly, looking for some kind of threat. But there was nothing, only Desi leaning against the kitchen counter, her hand on her stomach and a huge smile on her face.
“Is something wrong with the baby?” he asked as he crossed the kitchen and stopped directly in front of her.
“He’s kicking!”
It was so not what he’d expected her to say that it took her words a few seconds to register. When they did, his gaze flew to her stomach. He’d felt that one small kick at her desk, but he’d been too surprised to appreciate it—or the fact that it happened on a regular basis. “He’s kicking?”
“Yes.” Rolling her eyes at his slowness, she pushed her clothes out of the way with one hand and grabbed his hand with the other. Then she brought his palm to her bare stomach and held it there.
For long moments, he didn’t feel anything and he looked at Desi questioningly. But she just nodded her encouragement, her hand tightening on his. So he waited, heart pounding and breath held, to feel…something.
And then, there it was. A gentle bump against his palm.
“He kicked me!” he crowed with delight.
“Actually, I think he kicked me,” she told him drily. “You’re just collateral damage.”
“Don’t listen to your mother,” he told the baby as he dropped to the ground at Desi’s feet and leaned his mouth close to her gently rounded tummy. “She’s just grumpy cuz she’s not allowed coffee in the mornings anymore.”
“Hey! Don’t be calling me grumpy to the baby.” Desi poked at his shoulder. “Or I won’t tell you the next time he kicks.”
“See, I told you she was grumpy. Mean, too.” He smoothed his palm over her stomach, checking out the changes to her body since the last time he’d been this close to her. There weren’t many yet, despite the fact that she was nearly halfway through her pregnancy. Just the added roundness to her tummy and the swelling of her breasts, both of which he found sexy as hell.
“You’d be mean, too, if you had to give up caffeine cold turkey.”
“No doubt,” he soothed, just as the baby kicked a second time.
“See! He got my hand again! I told you he was kicking me.”
She snorted. “No offense, but your hand pretty much covers my entire stomach at this point.”
He wasn’t sure what it was that did it, but suddenly he was much less aware of the baby and much more aware of the fact that he was on his knees in front of Desi, his hand resting on the bare, silky skin of her stomach and his mouth inches away from her sex.
Once the realization set in, he couldn’t stop himself from leaning forward slightly and breathing her in.
Desi stiffened against him and he froze, ready to apologize. But she didn’t push him away. Instead, her hands came to rest on his shoulders, then slid slowly up his neck so that her fingers could tangle in his hair.
Desire shot through him at the first touch of her hands, and he leaned forward even more, until he closed the last scant inch between her stomach and his lips.
She groaned at his mouth on her skin, but again she didn’t push him away. Instead she pulled him closer, her body arching against his as her fingers tightened in his hair. He’d read in one of the pregnancy manuals he’d picked up that women’s hormones went crazy during pregnancy, which often caused a spike in their libido. If that was what was happening now, he didn’t want to take advantage of it, even though his whole body ached with the need to touch her, to kiss her, to slide inside her welcoming heat and feel her clench around him.
But at the same time, he didn’t want to leave her like this, either. He could feel her arousal in the way she was moving restlessly against him, could hear it in the soft sounds of distress she was making in the back of her throat. Could smell it in the sexy warmth of her skin.
“Let me make you feel good,” he whispered against her skin as he skimmed his lips across her belly. “Just that. Nothing else.”
