by Elley Arden
It wasn’t like Tony professed his undying love for her. Besides, he hadn’t mentioned marriage since the night at his place, and even then, he only mentioned it in passing. Maybe it was all about getting her into bed—or on the couch. She shook away a fresh batch of tingles crawling up her face.
She was too late to get control of this situation, wasn’t she? A few months ago she would’ve sorted her feelings and made a plan by making a list of the pros and cons. She tapped her screen and opened a blank note, typing + vs. – of recreational sex with Tony, but then she stared at the electronic page, not a single bullet item, good or bad, forming in her head.
Pregnancy brain. Check.
Her phone chimed, and a text from Angie overtook the screen. ETA 5 seconds.
Straightening on an inhale, Trish deleted the note and tucked the phone into the pocket on her hip so she could meet the delivery truck at the door. As she watched the familiar van back into the driveway, her stupid heart thudded against her ribs, and her smile broadened.
Because Tony was driving.
Before Trish could get carried away with the anticipation of seeing him again, Angie leaped from the passenger side, steel-toed boots colliding with the pavers. She pointed to the Corcarelli Carpentry Co. logo over her left breast. “I must’ve forgotten how to read. Can you see if the word delivery or hauling is printed on here, because I’m confused. Every time I turn around he has me lugging something else, while my crew runs around million-dollar homes unsupervised.”
Trish patted Angie’s upper arm. “Your crew is behaving themselves beautifully.”
Angie nodded, a rare smile splitting her face. “Music to my ears.” She ripped the rubber band from her wrist and fastened her hair into a knot at her neck. “Seriously, though, who’d have thought garbage could weigh so freaking much?”
“It’s not garbage,” Tony said, rounding the front of the truck. “It’s art.” He said the words to Angie, but he was grinning at Trish. “Tell her, babe.”
Apparently Trish had upgraded from Boss Lady. Of course she blushed, but she managed to keep her smile intact and speak. “It’s art, and it’s perfect. Exactly what I wanted.”
“Cripes,” Angie said. “If I were in middle school, I’d be gagging myself with my finger, but since I’m all grown up and running a business here, I’ll forego the antics so we can work. Tony, if you can peel your eyes off of her for ten freaking minutes, then we can haul this trash inside.”
Angie clomped to the back of the truck, while Tony sauntered to Trish.
“Hey,” he said, widening his grin and looping his arm around her waist.
She was just about to protest when he pulled her against him, and thrilled her with a hard, hot kiss.
“Tony, so help me God…” Angie’s voice mixed with the truck’s clanging, rolling rear door.
Tony didn’t seem to care. His arms tightened around Trish’s waist, and she had to push palms to his chest to gain release.
“You should go before she gets angry,” Trish whispered.
“She’s always angry,” he replied loud enough for Angie to hear, and then he placed a kiss on Trish’s nose and joined his sister inside the truck.
Trish wandered after them, warmed by his kiss. Was this really her life, thriving design company, hot male companion who made marriage seem appealing, and a baby on the way? It sounded like a fairytale.
“Boss, we got a problem.” Nico Corcarelli held open the front door. “You need to call the plumber. Mickey hit the main line.”
That was when Trish remembered she never held much stock in fairytales. Real life got messy. Planning and preparing weren’t guarantees. Angie’s crew had blueprints and hashmarks, and still they had hit the line. Trish’s lists had pros and cons, and still some things fit both sides. She hated that, wished there was some way to control the chaos. But when she found herself standing ankle-deep in tap water, the only thing she could hope for was to be strong enough that chaos couldn’t wash her away.
* * *
“Can I stay?” Tony dragged his lips from Trish’s lobe to follow her jawline.
Since the Collins’s family room flooded, she’d been preoccupied. Tony hoped a little lovin’ would put her body and mind to rest, but she had yet to reciprocate his advances, so he figured he better ask, being a gentleman and all.
Technically, she wasn’t his “woman” to be pawing anyway.
“If you want.” She fidgeted beside him on her living room couch.
He winced and sat up, giving her some space. “Do you want? ’Cause right now it doesn’t seem like you want me here.”
She sighed. “I’m sorry. I have a lot on my mind.”
“Like?”
“Work. You were there. You saw the mess.”
“It’s being professionally cleaned.”
“But it’s a setback and more dollar signs.” She ran her fingers through her shiny hair, tugging on a clump when she reached the ends. “And then there’s this.” She patted her stomach. “Am I? Am I not? It’s a constant back and forth.”
He slid his arm along the back of the sofa, lifting his hand to play with her hair.
“And then there’s this.” She gestured at his hand.
Tony froze with a strand wrapped around his index finger. “What? This?” He tugged the strand.
“Yes.” She lifted her shoulders and shuddered.
“What about this?” He dropped his hand to her head and rubbed.
“What is this?” She shrugged again, this time acting an awful lot like she wanted to be free of him.
He could take a hint. “A massage,” he said, dropping his hand and sliding a few inches away.
“That’s not what I meant. I’m sorry. I’m…” she sighed and shook her head. “Maybe it’s the hormones making me cranky.”
“Maybe. Or maybe you’re realizing you don’t like me as much as you thought you did.” It didn’t sound like the joke he meant for it to be. He leaned forward, embarrassed he sounded so needy.
“No.” She flattened a hand against his back. “That’s definitely not it.”
The heat from her hand seeped beneath his skin, warming his blood until his breathing quickened. “Good,” was all he could manage to say.
“I just feel a lot of pressure, and I worry it’s somehow going to end badly, you know?”
He nodded. Despite the great sex and his strange lack of horror at the thought of marrying Trish, he could relate to her worry. Hard not to, with Angie warning him daily of the potential for doom. Two days ago, she backed him against the tool cabinet in her garage and threatened to castrate him if he fucked up. Talk about pressure.
“And the more we carry on like this, the more I worry we’re kidding ourselves that we’ll be able to be objective if…” her hand dropped from his back, “I’m not pregnant, and Nonna...” She huffed. “I’m sorry.”
Glancing over his shoulder at her bunched face, he reached across the cushion and took her hand. “Don’t be. Nothin’ to be sorry about. You’re a thinker. That’s a good thing. I should probably do a little more of that.”
She shrugged, but then settled into tracing her thumb over his knuckle. He liked the way her hand looked smaller in his. “Thinking is good,” she said. “Overthinking is not. There should be a balance.”
He straightened, moving closer, keeping her hand wrapped in his. “Like you should feel as much as you think?”
“Exactly.”
He wanted to kiss her again. “I can help with that, you know?” He lifted her hand from his lap and placed it on his chest as he moved in for that kiss. ‘If you want me to.”
“I do,” she said, tickling his lips with her whisper.
And he did.
After two nights of half-hearted sleep on surprisingly uncomfortable couches, Tony hauled Trish to bed. Of course, they didn’t sleep much once they got there either, and that sort of bothered him. He slipped out of bed, making a mental note to Google sex during pregnancy before he kept her up
again.
While she slept, bathed in moonlight, he showered and brushed his teeth with the spare toothbrush she magically produced the night before. It only partially wigged him out that she kept it in the holder next to hers.
Without waking her, he headed downstairs for coffee. Two nights and days in a row, and somehow it felt like routine. All he needed was a change of clothes and it’d be like he was living here.
The thought stopped him on the bottom stair. He glanced around the flashy, floral surroundings lit by the soft glow of the crown molding lights. Hardly what he’d call his style, but damn, he liked that sixty-inch TV. And the bed. And the family room couch. Hell, every piece of upholstered furniture here.
That thought got him moving again, eyeing each piece he’d created. Some of his best work lived in this house. He swelled with pride, and then he thought about his child, being raised here, climbing all over that couch. Something sparked beneath his breast.
The spark lingered, even after a lightning-quick bike ride to his apartment through the dark and driving rain. Hours later, in the late of day, standing in the middle of Angie’s garage, the flash of feeling only intensified. The next thing he knew, he was sketching plans for a rocking chair. Suddenly, nothing seemed more important than taking care of Trish and his kid.
“I’m headed over to Nonna’s. You wanna come?”
Tony looked up from the sketches and blinked a few times to clear his head. Somebody else was pretty damn important. “Yeah. I do.”
Angie nodded, glancing at the papers pressed beneath his hands. “You ready now?”
“Yep,” he said, folding the papers and stuffing them into his pocket.
“Top secret plans?”
“Maybe.”
Angie narrowed her eyes as she hit the button, raising the garage door. “Would you show me if I asked?”
“No. You called my table trash.” He fell in step beside her as she walked to her car.
“I was kidding.”
“You hurt my feelings.”
“You’re an ass.”
When they were both inside the car, she gripped his headrest and narrowed her eyes again. “Show me.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m curious.”
“You’re nosy.”
“Whatever. Same thing.”
Tony propped his elbow on the door and stared at the basketball hoop missing its net outside the window. “They’re plans for a chair.”
She started the engine and backed the car from the drive. “For Nonna?”
Tony closed his eyes and rested his forehead against his palm. He’d been hoping his family wouldn’t ask questions about his contribution to the list. Chaos surrounding Nonna’s decline bought him some time, but not enough. With Vin’s concert at the end of the week, the list had once again become the family’s favorite topic.
“Yeah, sorta,” he said, partly to get Angie off his back, and partly because it was true. The chair might be for Trish and the baby, but as far as he was concerned, the baby was for Nonna.
“What kind of chair?”
“Ange, forget about it. You’ll see it when everyone else sees it.”
“I’ll see it as soon as you start working on it, dork. My garage is your workshop. Remember?”
He dropped a fist to the vinyl-clad door.
“Is it a recliner?”
“No.”
“A wing chair?”
“No.” She wasn’t going to let it go. “Fine. It’s a rocking chair,” he said, none too happy he caved.
She nodded, eyes never shifting from the road. She drove a few blocks before she spoke again. “Maybe she’ll rock the baby to sleep.”
Tony looked at her long enough to notice a single unshed tear, gathering at the corner of her lashes. “Maybe,” he said with the image clogging his throat.
It was amazing how the separate pieces of his life had become so intertwined.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Trish stretched her arms behind her back and struggled with the gown’s zipper. If only her breasts weren’t aching monstrosities… If only Tony had brought his dress clothes with him when he spent the night… Then, she wouldn’t be having this problem. She’d have help with the zipper instead.
She glanced at the mounds of flesh screaming for release from the heart neckline. “No,” she snapped, forcing the zipper up her back, much to her bosom’s chagrin.
There was no way she was going to wear something comfortable and sensible to Nonna’s concert. Trish smoothed a hand over the bodice of the black satin dress. If she was as pregnant as she suspected she was, then this would be the last time she could squeeze into this blessed thing.
Leaning forward for a closer look in the bathroom mirror, she wrapped a thin strand of hair around her index finger and doused the spring with hairspray, careful not to breathe the fumes. She did the same thing on the other side, and then walked to her closet where a silver clutch perched on a shelf. Big enough for tampons, she thought. And immediately she followed the thought with a frown. She hated planning for both outcomes, but what was the alternative, blindly believing she was pregnant and ending up a mess at the concert? She shuddered. No way. Besides, she was being proactive, not negative. Carrying supplies wasn’t tantamount to a jinx.
Nodding twice for good measure, Trish swiped the purse from the shelf and filled it with lipstick, tissues, and a tampon. Then, she slipped into silver strappy heels.
“Not fair. Not fair.”
The smooth voice echoing in the bathroom made Trish smile. She glanced over her shoulder and batted her lashes at a grinning Tony. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He wrapped around her from behind, nuzzling his lips against her neck. “You were supposed to wait for me to get back so I could zip you.”
She giggled. “Uh huh, I can only imagine how that would’ve ended up.”
“With this dress on the floor,” he said, sliding his hands over her waist and hips, and then up over her breasts.
She flinched. “Careful.”
He lightened the touch of his hands and the pressure of his lips. “Still sore?”
“Still sore.” She worried about the resounding hope in her voice.
“That’s a good sign, right?”
“Right,” she answered, worrying about the resounding hope in his voice even more.
For a week now, they’d been living on the fumes of the hypothetical. If she was pregnant… If they got married… But they were building a house of cards. One negative test, and it would scatter.
Of course, they could try again, they would try again—as long as Nonna hung around. But there were no guarantees of that. And then what? Would Tony hang around and continue to play this game just so Trish could have a baby? She hated to think he wouldn’t. Each night they spent together led to another morning with Trish staring at the ceiling wondering who she wanted more: the baby or Tony.
He turned her in his arms, pressing her body to his, brushing his lips over her forehead. “You look beautiful.”
She smiled, taking her mind off her worry by admiring him. She’d seen the slim fit suit before, how the sleek black wool kissed every angle of his body, how the crisp white cotton shirt contrasted against his tanned throat. And yet each and every time she saw him dressed like this, she melted.
“You look beautiful, too.” Trish rolled onto her toes and craned her neck, placing her lips along his jaw, tasting the spice of his aftershave, breathing him into her soul.
She didn’t want just any baby. She wanted his baby. Because she wanted him. Period. The revelation forced her onto flat feet, where she stared at him like a lovesick fool. Love.
A little sound escaped her lips.
“What?”
“Nothing. I…the dress is tight, I guess.”
He grinned, glancing down at her overflowing neckline. “I like it tight.”
“I’m sure you do.” She swatted him to tease, but also to gain some distance.
/> Love was not part of her plan. Like? Yes. Respect? Absolutely. She wanted to co-parent with someone she could tolerate. The all-consuming attraction complicated things, but she figured that would fade. After all, how hot could he be for her when she was thirty pounds heavier with swollen feet, unshaved legs, and her face buried in a half-gallon of Rocky Road?
And how hot could she be for him when he was taking off on his motorcycle or throwing back a couple beers while she was walking the floors with a colicky newborn? Attraction would definitely fade, and then they would be left with common sense and commonalities like the baby, Angie, and work. But love? Crap. Love changed everything, especially if it was one-sided.
“We should get going. Vin said absolutely, positively nobody gets in late.”
Trish flashed a smile at Tony in the bathroom mirror. “Uh huh.” There was so much more to say, but there wasn’t time to say it, especially since what she wanted to say could rip their heads from the clouds and drive a wedge between them. Love? She had a feeling that one word would have Tony Corcarelli running away.
“You okay?” He slipped a hand across her lower back.
“Yep.” But she’d be better once she took a pregnancy test and she knew where they stood.
* * *
Tony looked around the Hillman Center lobby, wondering how Vin planned to uphold his no-late-admissions policy, considering the guest of honor was the one who was late. He’d be worried if Angie hadn’t just arrived, saying Ma, Aunt Connie, and Nonna were on their way. He’d be even more worried if Trish’s hand wasn’t nearby to hold. Having her here, with him, made him mellow.
“You need to clean up the garage. I swear if I trip over another tool, I’m going to beat you with it, and then I’m kicking you out,” Angie said.
The harsh words made him smile, considering they were delivered by a woman who could be considered a knockout if she wasn’t his pain-in-the-ass, know-it-all sister.