A Little Bit Pregnant

by Susan Mallery

  “Should I put them on the table?” he asked.

  “Sure.”

  The dining room had already been set for two. He liked how the place settings were so close together. Obviously she had an intimate meal planned. He must have been imagining things with the kiss.

  He took a step toward the living room, then paused. Unless Nicki had regrets about what had happened in L.A. The first time they’d made love, she’d asked that things return to a “friends only” footing. While he hadn’t been excited by the idea, he’d agreed because he hadn’t wanted to push her. But things were different now. Somehow he was going to have to convince her of that.

  He walked into the living room and found her by the sofa. He took a seat close to her.

  “How was your flight?”

  “What’s going on at work?”

  They spoke at the same time. Nicki smiled. “You first.”

  “How’s work?” he asked.

  “Good. Everyone is very excited about the contract with the prince and princess. Jeff said Ashley is already talking about vacationing there.”

  “With three kids?”

  “I don’t think it’s a thought out plan at this point.”

  “They’re nice people.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “The prince and princess?”

  “Yeah. She’s American. Sensible.”

  Nicki laughed. “You mean exotically beautiful.”

  “That, too, but I barely noticed.” He shifted closer, suddenly wanting to tell her that while it probably wasn’t a good idea, he had missed her. “Nicki, I—”

  She cut him off. “I haven’t offered you anything to drink. What would you like? That wine you brought? Does it need to breathe?”

  There was something about the way she spoke. Something about her body, as if she were stiff all over. Zane hadn’t wanted to see the signs, but as he looked more closely, he saw tension in the set of her mouth and worry in her eyes.

  Damn. He knew exactly what was wrong. Okay, maybe he didn’t want to hear it, but if Nicki wanted to end their physical relationship, he had no right to stop her. Ignoring the knot in his gut, he took her hands in his.

  “I don’t need a drink,” he said, “but I do need you to tell me what the hell is going on.”

  She stared at him. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “Something’s wrong. I can sense it.”

  She glanced down at their clasped hands, then back at him. “You’re right,” she said in a low voice.

  The knot turned into a vice. Zane wanted to bolt out of the room. He wanted to demand that she not try to change things. Instead he sat and waited.

  “We used to be friends,” she said slowly. “Just friends. I liked that. It was certainly much less complicated. Then we went to that party together and you came back here and, well, you know what happened.”

  “We made love.”

  She nodded and pulled her hands free. He tried not to take the withdrawal personally. Not that he did a very good job of convincing himself.

  “We didn’t plan it,” she said. “I know it just happened. I don’t regret that. I can’t. But it changed things.”

  He braced himself for her rejection. “Then we got back together in Los Angeles.”

  She frowned. “Yes, but that doesn’t really have anything to do with this.”

  “What? Of course it does. You want us to go back to being friends.”

  Her eyes widened. “Is that what you think? No, Zane. It’s not that at all.” She swallowed. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I’m pregnant.”

  Nicki kept talking, but Zane couldn’t hear anything else. He couldn’t think, couldn’t move. There was only that single word reverberating in his brain.

  Pregnant.

  Involuntarily his gaze dropped to her stomach. It was as flat as it had ever been. But if she was talking about that first night together, she was only a few weeks along.

  He swore silently. The room shifted and instead of Nicki, he saw Amber. Laughing, beautiful Amber telling him that she had a surprise. Amber handing him a small box tied with a yellow ribbon. He’d opened it to find baby booties inside.

  He remembered feeling elated beyond words. She was going to have a baby. They were going to be a family. Then he remembered nothing but the fiery explosion that had destroyed his world.

  No, he thought as he pushed to his feet. Not again. He couldn’t survive it.

  “What the hell happened?” he growled.

  Nicki’s half smile faded. “The usual. You were here that night. We did it more than once and we didn’t use protection.”

  A condom. Right. He always used a condom. But he hadn’t expected to make love with Nicki so he hadn’t had one with him. Not at her place and not in L.A. For the first time in his life, birth control and protection had never crossed his mind.

  “You’re on the Pill.”

  “I was,” she said apologetically. “I went off a few months ago when I was between guys. I wanted to give my body a rest. Boyd and I didn’t seem to be heading into bed, so I didn’t think about it.” She squared her shoulders. “I didn’t do this on purpose.”

  He knew that, he thought as he paced the length of her living room. Nicki wasn’t deceitful. He believed it was just one of those things. It had happened and now they had to deal with it.

  His brain flashed again on those tiny baby booties, on Amber’s smile, on the heat of the explosion.

  No! He couldn’t do this. Not again. Not ever. What if Nicki died?

  Panic swirled into fear. A fear that crawled inside so deep, he knew he would never get it out.

  He looked at her, then headed for the door.

  The slam of the front door echoed in the quiet house. Nicki had expected a lot of reactions, but she’d never thought Zane would bolt. She hurt as if she’d been dragged for miles. But more damaging to the pain in her body was the ache in her soul.

  The timer dinged, telling her the lasagna was ready. She knew she had to go take it out of the oven. If she didn’t it would burn and what would that accomplish?

  She’d thought things would go better. Maybe Zane would be upset or shocked or even mad. Maybe he would yell at her. She’d braced herself for his anger, but she’d never thought he wouldn’t react at all. If she lived to be a hundred, she would never forget the blankness that had overtaken his expression. She’d had no way to know what he was thinking, even though she guessed it was bad.

  She had been willing to fight with him, to reason, but how was she supposed to battle an empty room?

  Forcing herself to move, she headed for the kitchen. After removing the lasagna from the oven and setting it on a hot pad, she leaned back in her chair and fought a wave of nausea.

  She had a feeling this upset had nothing to do with the baby and everything to do with her broken heart. Zane hadn’t been delighted or confessed his undying love or wanted them to be a family. Apparently he hadn’t wanted anything but to be gone.

  Only now did she allow herself to admit that if her most pressing fantasy wasn’t to come true, she’d hoped that Zane would at least be happy about the child. That he would want to be a part of its life. That they could be a part-time family if nothing else. Apparently that wasn’t going to happen, either.

  Nicki covered her face with her hands. She had to accept that she was in this alone. That Zane wasn’t interested in the baby. Or her.

  Tears burned her eyes. She fought them for a couple of seconds, then let them fall. What did it matter if she cried? There wasn’t anyone to see or judge.

  She wasn’t sure how long she sat there. Eventually the tears ran out and she had to go in search of a tissue or five.

  In the bright light of her bathroom, with her nose and eyes red and her face blotchy, she was forced to face the truth.

  Zane didn’t love her. She’d known he wasn’t into commitments or long-term relationships when she’d invited him into her bed. He hadn’t changed the rules, she had. So it w
asn’t his fault that she was now left alone and shattered.

  While the truth should have cleansed her, instead it only made her want to weep more. If she’d been unable to get over her simple schoolgirl crush on Zane, how would she ever get over being in love with the father of her child?

  Zane didn’t remember leaving Nicki’s house, or driving, but somehow he ended up by the water. As he stared out over the sound, he saw the first wisps of fog forming and felt the chill in the air. Soon the dampness would seep into him. He welcomed the discomfort. Maybe it would distract him from the images filling his brain.

  He saw Amber again—laughing, smiling. In his mind, she moved closer and spoke his name, but when he reached for her, she was gone, her presence no more substantial than the fog.

  They’d been happy, he remembered, closing his eyes against the present. The clank of the sailboat riggings and the smell of the sea all faded as he recalled warm, sunny days. Happy and content days. For him, it had been a first. He’d grown up on the street. His gang had been his family, but not Amber. She’d been one of four kids, the only girl, and the only child to follow in the family tradition of a life in the military.

  They’d met in officer training school, both young and excited about the possibilities of a career with the Marines.

  He remembered her as an erotic combination of tough and feminine. Every guy had wanted her, and for reasons he’d never understood, she’d chosen him.

  He remembered Amber telling him that eventually one of them was going to have to learn how to cook. Amber insisting they shower together each morning, even when there wasn’t any time and they were always late because showering lead to other things. Amber inviting him to spend Christmas with her family then laughingly complaining that it had sure taken him long enough when he’d finally proposed. Amber saying she was pregnant.

  Her smile, he thought grimly. He remembered that the most. That and the explosion.

  He’d been there. He’d watched her smile and wave as she’d stepped onto the helicopter. He’d stood on the tarmac as the machine rose up and up, then headed east. Suddenly it had swerved and without warning it had plowed into the side of a mountain.

  He opened his eyes, but the explosion didn’t fade. He could see it, smell it, hear it.

  He’d done it, he reminded himself. He’d killed her as surely as if he’d flown the helicopter into the mountain himself. And now Nicki was pregnant.

  The fear returned and with it a metallic taste, like blood on his tongue. Guilt fed the fear until it was all he could feel.

  Not again, he told himself. He couldn’t go through that again. He couldn’t lose Nicki, too.

  But he’d been unable to keep Amber safe. How could he protect Nicki and their baby?

  Ironic, he thought. His job was to protect others and yet he’d been unable to save those he cared about most.

  He clutched the railing, gripping the cold, damp metal until it bit into his hands. He couldn’t change the past, but he could secure the future. Somehow he was going to have to make this turn out right. He would explain—make her see why he had to be in charge. Why he had to know everything. He only knew one way to do that.

  He climbed back in his car and started the engine.

  When he arrived at Nicki’s place, he hurried up the walkway, then pounded on the front door.

  “Nicki, it’s me,” he called. He heard the click of a lock.

  He could see that she’d been crying. While she was the kind of person who laughed easily, he’d rarely seen her cry and his chest tightened at the thought of him hurting her. He wondered if it would help to tell her why.

  Later, he thought. First he had to get her to agree. Once he knew he could keep her safe, he could take the time to explain.

  “You didn’t have to come back,” she said. “You made it clear how you feel about this.”

  “You couldn’t be more wrong.”

  He stepped into the house, then led the way to the living room. When he perched on the edge of the sofa, she stopped several feet away.

  “What?” she asked as she wiped the tears from her face. “What do you want?”

  Too many things, he thought. A chance to undo what was done. A chance to change the past. As those were unavailable to him he would focus on keeping the future positive—on keeping her and the baby safe.

  He rose and crossed to her, then grabbed the arm of her chair and pulled her nearer to the sofa.

  Her gasp of outrage didn’t surprise him. It was one thing to help her in and out of the company plane, it was another to use her wheelchair against her by pushing her around.

  “I need you close,” he told her, before she could say anything.

  Her tight expression didn’t soften, but at least she didn’t yell at him.

  He leaned toward her and took one of her hands in his. He half expected her to pull away and when she didn’t, he took a moment to study her face. Her eyes, the shape of her mouth and her chin. Who would the baby look like? Would it favor one parent over the other, or would it be a blend of both of them? Boy or girl? Did it matter? He shook his head. All he cared about was keeping it from dying. And her.

  “I want us to get married right away,” he said, speaking quickly. “This week. Tomorrow. We’ll get a license and make it happen. Then you’ll have my name and I’ll be here for you every single minute. I mean that, Nicki. I’m not going anywhere. I want to keep you and the baby safe.”

  She didn’t speak. Her lips had parted slightly and all the color fled her face, but these weren’t the kind of signs that would tell him what she was thinking.

  He glanced around at her living room. “I’ll move in here. I know the houseboat is too hard for you. Plus it wouldn’t be safe to have a kid running around right on the water. Which is fine. There’s plenty of room. I can pack up a few things tonight, then move the rest of it over the next few days. The houseboat will sell fast. They’re always popular. I’ll put the money into a trust for you and the baby.” He frowned. “I need to get some life insurance, too. And we can start a college fund. Do you have a doctor? Have you seen one? Are you feeling all right?”

  There was too much to take in at once, Nicki thought. Even though she knew she was sitting in her chair, she felt as if the room were spinning.

  Zane was saying all the right things, but somehow she couldn’t believe them. Two hours ago he’d been so stunned by her announcement that he’d walked out without saying anything. Now he was back, talking about them getting married and moving in together. What had changed his mind?

  Maybe she would have been a little more quick to jump at his proposal if he’d looked the least bit happy about it. Instead his expression was grim and determined. As if this was a campaign he had to win, regardless of the odds stacked against him. Obviously he wasn’t happy about the baby. So why would he sacrifice himself if he—

  Then she got it. And with that truth came a pain so sharp, she thought it might slice her in two. She pulled her hand free of his grasp and folded her arms in front of her midsection, as if by pressing hard, she could hold herself together.

  Why Zane? She might have expected it from someone else, but never from him. He’d always acted as if the chair didn’t matter. Had it just been an act?

  Tears threatened, but she willed them away. She would not cry over this. Maybe over the baby and Zane not loving her, but not over this.

  “Stop,” she said quietly. “Just stop.”

  He stared at her. “My plan makes sense.”

  “Not to me.” She sighed. “I expected so much more of you, Zane. I thought we were friends.”

  He stared at her. “What the hell does that have to do with anything?”

  “Being in a wheelchair doesn’t make me any less capable. I’m perfectly healthy. I will carry this baby to term without any help from you. Being in a wheelchair doesn’t mean I can’t be a good mother.”

  He sprang to his feet. “Is that what you think? That this is about you being in a wheelchai
r? It’s not.”

  He paced the length of her living room, then turned and glared at her. “I don’t give a damn about the chair. This is about you and the baby and me wanting to be a part of things. This is about protecting you.”

  He sounded sincere, but he wasn’t making any sense. “Protecting us from what?”

  “Everything.”

  She could see the tension in his body. Obviously he wasn’t kidding about all of this, but she didn’t know what he was talking about. There was no “everything” to keep her or the baby safe from. Which meant his worries were about her abilities. There was no other reason for him to want to move in and take care of her.

  Ever since she’d met Zane, she’d thought he was one of the good guys. That he saw her as a regular person who happened to use a wheelchair to get around. But it wasn’t like that at all. She’d based her relationship with him on a lie. He was just better at hiding what he thought than most people.

  The truth hurt in ways she couldn’t yet define, but this wasn’t the time to deal with that. Later, when she was alone, she would curl up and lick her wounds, but not until then. While he was around, she would make sure she stayed strong.

  “Let’s come at this from a different direction,” she said quietly. “Here are the facts. I’m pregnant and you’re the father. Honestly, I didn’t think you’d have any interest in a child, but I can see I was wrong about that. I’m glad you want to be a part of the baby’s life. I’m willing to work with you to come up with some kind of a plan so you can be a part of things. Please understand that I don’t want to exclude you at all, but none of this is an invitation for you to move in here with me.”

  She wasn’t going to say anything about his proposal, mostly because she didn’t think she could get the words out without her voice cracking and she didn’t want Zane to know how much he’d wounded her.

  Zane shook his head. “We have to get married.”

  Not “I love you.” Not even “You really matter to me.” Just a bald statement of what he saw as fact.

  “Why?” she asked.