Take Me On

  She went off alert. He turned away and bumped his thigh lightly with his fist, trying to get a grip, trying to think.

  “What are you thinking?” she asked, and he almost laughed at the timing of the question.

  “I don’t know. I really don’t.”

  “Yeah. I know the feeling.”

  “Have you told anyone else?”

  “No. I thought you deserved to know first.”

  “Jesus. You have so many plans, Gabby. This is…I just can’t fucking believe this.”

  That was all it boiled down to. She was standing here telling him everything about their lives was going to change in a handful of months, and for the most part, she was being so cool about it. He just couldn’t wrap his head around it yet.

  “Don’t worry about me. I have a strong support system. And those plans did include a baby someday…just not anytime soon.” She cleared her throat. “Anyway. I should go check on Candace.”

  “Wait. We should get together later and talk about this.”

  “What’s to talk about?”

  “You just walked in here and told me I’m going to be a father. Did you think I’m not going to take that shit seriously?”

  “We were together for one night. I wasn’t expecting a proposal, and I don’t want one.”

  “I wasn’t offering one. But I’m not gonna turn my back on the situation either. I’m not gonna shrug it off.”

  “Why not?”

  Was she kidding him right now? “Goddammit, Gabby.” He crossed the room to her in only a couple of strides. “You think just because we were only together one night that I don’t give a shit about you, or about this? You got under my skin. Ever since that night, I haven’t been able to fucking stop thinking about you. I haven’t been able to sleep for imagining you beside me. Now you tell me that against all odds, we created a life. I still can’t believe it, but if you’re thinking I’m content with just being the fucking sperm donor, you’re wrong.”

  All at once, his own words informed him how he felt; he’d just needed his brain to catch up with his mouth. Despite the shock, despite the dismay and the worry and the “Oh, shit, what have I done?” running on an endless loop in his head—this was a chance to set all the wrong things right in his life. All the hurt, all the emotions he’d kept buried so deep were boiling to the surface. Not in anger. In eagerness to be dealt with once and for all.

  He’d hoped for a softening of her expression as he spoke, hoped that his lame words could convey what he’d been feeling about her for the past few weeks, but he must’ve failed. Her gaze remained steady on his, riveted, but in the end, she was unmoved. “What do you think is going to happen? I’m not changing any of my plans until I absolutely have to. I’m still leaving in a couple of weeks. There’s nothing for me here.”

  “How can you leave? That support system you were talking about? They’re all here. Even if you don’t need me, you need them.”

  She pushed his hands away. “See, this is what I don’t want—you trying to make decisions for me. It’s still my life. I have plenty of support there too.”

  He stepped back, seething, feeling his heart wrench in his chest. “If you don’t want my input or my help, then what the fuck did you tell me for? One last kick to the nuts before you blow out of town with my baby?”

  “Because I figured it would get back to you anyway, since you work with my brother. I didn’t want you finding out that way.”

  “So it’s like, ‘Hey, by the way, I’m knocked up. Have a nice life’?”

  “No. I don’t want to shut you out, Ian, I just don’t want…” She trailed off, and he noticed the way her hand strayed to her still-flat belly. “We didn’t expect this, obviously. I don’t want it to disrupt your life any more than it has to. It might not be right, it might not make sense, but I feel a little bit of guilt about it.”

  “What about your life? It’s gonna get pretty damn disrupted. It’s only fair mine does too. You didn’t do this by yourself.”

  “I know that. But what do you want? To move back to Dallas with me? To throw away that fresh start you wanted?” She paused for a moment to take a couple of breaths. “The morning we parted ways, I thought about what I hoped you would find in life. It wasn’t me. More like that cute blonde out there who was apparently slipping you her number.”

  As far as his moving back to Dallas, she was right. He liked it here; he liked the quiet; he loved the people he worked with. But the news she’d dropped on him a couple of minutes ago…it changed everything.

  Everything. The girl out front was a non-issue.

  “You’ve got me all figured out, huh?”

  “No! I really don’t. I really don’t know anything about you.” She gave a crooked smile. “Except how you are in bed, which is what got us into trouble.”

  “I’ll clue you in a little.” He drew a deep breath that burned his lungs. “I had a shitty childhood. I never knew my real dad much, and my stepdad once cracked a beer bottle on my head.” Her eyes widened as he traced the scar through his eyebrow. “I always vowed any kid of mine would never grow up in a situation like that. I can know with you as a mom, he or she won’t. My mom…she loved me, but she was as scared of him as I was. You…I know as much about you as you do about me, but I can already tell you’re fearless. You wouldn’t stand for something like that. But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be involved. It doesn’t mean I can walk away, wash my hands of the situation. I want to be around.”

  “You can,” she said. “You can be around. God, Ian. I’m sorry.”

  “I didn’t tell you that so you could pity me. I told you so you could understand.” He didn’t know why it happened at that particular moment, but her beauty stole his breath. Her skin seemed lit from within; the harsh overhead lights cast a halo on her silky hair. Imagining her in a few months, her belly round with his baby… His heart gave an aching leap. He wanted more than to be around. He wanted to be there. Always there, at her side, taking this journey with her. If he told her that, though, she would run.

  She held his gaze for a seemingly endless moment while neither of them spoke. At last, she looked down.

  “Give me your phone number, and we’ll talk more about it later,” he said, his voice tight. She recited it as he entered it into his contacts. “I’ll call you.”

  “Okay. Now I’m really going to check on Candace.”

  As she left without another word, he stayed and shoved his thumb and forefinger into his closed eyes until he saw multicolored starbursts. His head pounded in rhythm with his heart, where disbelief still warred with outright panic.

  He’d gotten his boss’s sister pregnant.

  Jesus. What a fucking day.

  Chapter Ten

  Gabby’s hands were shaking. She felt like she was going to throw up. Walking in Brian’s office, though, she saw two more people who looked as if they felt the same way.

  Candace sat at his desk, her head in both hands and her hair sticking crazily through her fingers. Her damp eyes stared straight ahead, not acknowledging Gabby’s presence. Brian stood against the wall, inked arms crossed, looking as if he were gnawing the inside of his cheek.

  “How are we doing in here?” Gabby asked, trying to sound as if she hadn’t just gone through an emotional trauma of her own.

  “We’re okay,” Candace said dully.

  “Dizziness? Nausea? Pain?”

  “Nausea. That’s about it.” Join the club, honey. “Macy left to go get me a pregnancy test. She said she couldn’t stand it. She has to know.”

  Gabby had an extra they could’ve used, but she figured that might raise some eyebrows. “I take it you don’t want to?” She chuckled. “Hey, at least you might rule it out.”

  “You don’t think I will, though, do you?”

  She wanted to laugh and say something like we Rosses are extremely fertile and potent creatures, but that might make them wonder.

  “I don’t know, hon. Anything’s possible.”

>   “I keep telling her she should be happy about this,” Brian said, speaking up for the first time. “Whatever happens, it’s gonna be okay.”

  That was surprising, coming from him. Especially now when he looked a little green. “He’s right, you know,” she said to Candace.

  “I know. It’s just not ideal timing.”

  “Well, they say if you wait for the ideal time, you’ll never do it.” It was the same thing she’d been telling herself since seeing that plus sign. Sure, she’d dreamed about it, but realistically, when would she ever have planned to have kids? After med school? Then she’d be a doctor with a crazy schedule. Married to another doctor with a crazy schedule, if she and Mark had worked out.

  Plans. There was no place for them in her life anymore, it seemed. They never panned out, and the best things happened to her when she allowed herself to deviate from them. She hadn’t planned to spend a night of ecstasy with Ian when she first met him. Now he’d made her a mother.

  Holy shit, a mother. There had been times when she treated sweet little babies in the nursery and positively ached to have one of her own to hold and smell and cuddle. Maybe she was hormonal, but she wanted to burst into tears with knowing that was soon to come for her, and maybe even for Candace. She’d have someone to go through this craziness with her.

  Ian wanted to go through it with her too. That was…unexpected. But nice. She wondered what he would think if he knew the main thing that had been running through her mind while she faced him was that she wanted to maul him where he stood. Despite the high emotions, despite his story—or maybe because of it—she’d wanted him again with an intensity that shocked her. She wanted to take that pain he’d tried so valiantly to hide and eradicate it completely. Shower him with…love.

  Jesus, she couldn’t go there. Not yet. But she wondered what he was doing right now, what he was thinking—

  Macy rushed into the room with her boyfriend at her heels, rattling a white plastic drug store bag. “Got it! Or them. I got several.”

  “The staff at Walgreens is thinking I’m the stud of the world,” Ghost said.

  “Yeah, tell them about your winking and flirting with the girl at the counter while I’m paying for a bunch of pregnancy tests,” Macy said, rolling her eyes. “Can’t take you anywhere.”

  “It was a joke! I couldn’t resist. Damn, she looked at me like I was a cretin. Y’all should have seen it.”

  “Oh, I know. It was freaking hilarious. Just wait until it’s our turn. We’ll see how funny you are then.” She smacked Ghost on the arm and looked at her friend. “Ready to pee on a stick?”

  “No.”

  “Am I going to have to make you?”

  “This I’d like to see,” Ghost said. “Wait, no…not that. I don’t wanna see that.”

  “Candace,” Gabby scolded gently. “Go get it over with.”

  Candace stood and rounded the desk, taking the bag from Macy on her way to the door.

  “Do it and come back out,” Macy said, following her while practically bouncing on her toes. “We’ll wait on the results with you.”

  Brian shot forward then, putting himself between Candace and her friend. “I’ll wait with her. You guys go back up front.”

  Macy planted her hands on her hips. “Excuse me—”

  “Come on, babe,” Ghost said, putting his arm around Macy’s shoulders and steering her toward the door. “This is between them.”

  “But—”

  “Sorry, Macy,” Candace said. “I just want to be with him. I’ll let you know in a few minutes.”

  Macy looked crestfallen but allowed Ghost to guide her out without comment. Gabby followed them, glancing back to see Brian kiss Candace’s forehead before she went into the bathroom and shut the door. Once Brian was alone, though, leaning against the wall in pretty much the same position he’d taken in his office, she went back to him. He glanced up at her as she approached.

  “This is scary as hell,” he said.

  Didn’t she know it. “You said it, though, little brother. It’s going to be okay.”

  “What happened to ‘little shit’?”

  “It’s on hold temporarily.”

  He chuckled. “Yeah, I know it’s gonna be okay.”

  “Imagine how happy Mom will be.”

  “Oh, she’ll be over the fuckin’ moon.”

  She’ll be over Pluto. Little do you know she’ll have two babies to snuggle at roughly the same time.

  “Imagine how unhappy Candace’s mom will be,” he said.

  Gabby waved her hand dismissively. “Come on. This is almost worth it for that alone.”

  That got a laugh out of him. “Right? Do you know how many lectures I’ve sat through about not knocking her up?”

  “Tell her you can’t help it, you’re just that potent. That’ll shut her up.”

  “Yeah. I’d love to see the look on her face.”

  “Did you even take precautions?”

  He shrugged. “She was on the pill. But she came down with strep throat a few weeks back and took antibiotics. I remember her saying something about us needing to be more careful, but I guess we weren’t. Looks like it may have caught up with us.”

  “Yeah. That probably did it.”

  The bathroom door opened, and Candace emerged, holding the little white stick in her hand. She stopped short when she saw Gabby. “I’ll go back up front,” Gabby said quickly, taking a step away.

  “No, you can stay,” Candace said. The corner of her mouth lifted in a crooked smile. “The directions said we should wait five minutes, but I don’t think we need them. Unless this second pink line might go away in five minutes.” She held the little display up to Brian. “We’re pregnant.”

  “Oh baby,” he breathed, encircling her with his arms and lifting her feet off the floor. She buried her face in his neck and sniffled.

  And that was what Gabriella had wanted. Someone she loved, someone who loved her back, someone she trusted. Someone to take her in his arms and comfort her. Let her know with hardly any words it was all going to be okay.

  But Ian had done that, hadn’t he? He’d tried. “Okay, I’m getting misty,” she said, giving Brian’s arm a pat. “I’ll leave you two alone.”

  “I’m taking her home,” he said over Candace’s shoulder. “Tell Macy she’ll call her later.”

  Probably a good idea. The second Gabby emerged from the hallway, Macy practically mobbed her. “Do you know? Did she tell you?”

  “They’re going home. She’ll call you later.”

  Macy huffed. “Well, it’s obviously positive, then.”

  “Maybe, maybe not.” She looked past Macy to Ian, who lounged over by his station, not a single thing about his demeanor giving her an indication he suffered any emotional turmoil himself. “I’m going,” Gabby said, mostly to him, though Macy stood directly in front of her. “See you guys later.”

  She left to absentminded farewells and hit a wall of humidity outside. At least her and Candace’s spring due dates would spare them being gigantic in the Texas summer heat, but it would be hell on the nausea. Before she’d even reached her car, her cell phone dinged in her purse.

  Ian.

  My place tonight? I’ll cut out early.

  He’d said they would talk later but never specified when. Tonight… She wasn’t sure it was “later” enough, but she should probably take what she could get. Sure, she sent back. Eightish?

  See you then.

  Chapter Eleven

  The door opened to her knock at 7:58—she’d stared at the digital time display on her car’s console for three minutes and then glanced at her watch twice before knocking—and Gabby pasted on a smile she hoped was bright.

  If the one Ian gave her in return was any indication, she succeeded. He’d changed since leaving work, now wearing black jeans and an emerald T-shirt. Both hugged him in all the right places, and the latter deepened the color of his eyes until they almost matched the jewel-tone of his shirt. Momentarily,
she lost her breath. That smile of his, so unaffected—it gave her hope that they could sort this out. It warmed her from within.

  “Hi,” she said as he stepped aside to let her enter and closed the door behind her.

  “Are you hungry?”

  Was he kidding? She was ravenous. But her nerves were as jumpy as a teenager’s on her first date. She wanted to eat her weight in Chinese food, but she also worried that she might throw up at any minute. “Um…yes and no. And if you were pregnant and hormonal, maybe that would make total sense to you.”

  He chuckled. “I’ll take your word for it.”

  His apartment was a total bachelor pad, functional but not much else. She hadn’t expected anything more, really, but it was a jumping-off point for her mind to go crazy. Was the motorcycle his only means of transportation? Not that she expected the guy to go buy a minivan, but…ah, God. This would never, ever work, would it?

  “Well, I’m not much for cooking, so I thought we could go out if you wanted, or I could get some take-out. I didn’t know what you like.”

  “Um…I’m easy to please.”

  “Or we could sit here and talk,” he said, watching her face and apparently reading her mind.

  “I think that’s best. I’m not going to be able to eat until…I don’t know. I was going to say ‘until we figure this out’, but I don’t know if there’s a solution to be found, really.”

  “How about this?” He took both her hands in his bigger, warmer ones. She looked up at him, getting lost in those complicated eyes. While his shirt brought out the striations of green, the amber still smoldered, making her think of sunlight on a hot spring day. “We take it day by day. You don’t change any of your major plans, and I won’t change any of mine. Because I think you’re right—there aren’t any answers to be found right now. We’re both in the dark about each other.”

  Okay, yes. He was definitely right about that. “I’m so used to having control. All this uncertainty is…hard for me.”

  “I’m used to having control too,” he said. “But I rarely have a plan. It’s possible, if it’s what works for you.”