“Really.” I brushed her hair out of her eyes and let my hand rest against the side of her face.
Hesitantly, she said, “That night. At Vincent’s party. When you were talking about us going out.”
“Mm.”
“Were you being serious?”
“Do you need me to answer that question? Really?”
Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. “Can I tell you something?”
“Always.”
“I’m really glad I brushed you off.” She rolled onto her stomach and looked at me earnestly. “Like, really glad I thought it was all a big joke.”
My eyebrows raised. “That’s a weird thing to tell a guy you’re cuddling on the grass.”
Her lips twitched. “Well, if I’d said yes, none of this would be happening, would it?”
“What do you mean?”
“If I’d agreed to go out with you on a date, that’s where the night would have ended. You wouldn’t have kept pursuing me, we never would have slept together—”
“Which would have been a shame because that was fucking great sex.”
“—And I wouldn’t be pregnant. Which means we wouldn’t be here right now.”
“I guess that makes sense.” I traced little circles on her back with my finger. “Although I’m an optimist and I like to think we would have made it here eventually.”
“You really think that?”
“Why wouldn’t I? We’re having a baby and I’m trying to date you for real, Ivy. It would say a lot about me if, when faced with an alternative scenario, I didn’t think this would happen.”
“I suppose,” she said softly. “I’ve just been thinking a lot today, that’s all.”
“Thinking? Oh, Jesus, no. Nothing good comes of a woman thinking a lot.”
She swatted my chest. “Oh, shut up.”
“What were you thinking about?”
“Everything.”
“That’s not very reassuring.”
Her lips twitched. “Stop it. I’m trying to be serious here and you keep making me laugh.”
“I’m not great at serious.”
“You’re better than I am. I’m not good with feelings. Unless I’m hungry or tired, then I have no issues vocalizing those.”
“Yes, I have to admit that I have noticed that.”
“Oh, go away.” She tried to get up, but I wrapped my arms around her and locked her against me, even hooking my leg over both of hers to make sure she couldn’t move.
If anyone walked past, they’d probably report us to the police.
“Kai, let me go.”
“No. Never.” I met her gaze. “Tell me what you thought about.”
Her blue eyes shone, and a myriad of emotions flashed through them. Apprehension, hope, hesitance—one by one they zipped past, each one barely lasting a second before it was replaced with something else.
“Tell me,” I encouraged her softly. “Tell me what you thought about, Ivy.”
“You.”
The spark that single word sent through me had the hair on the back of my neck standing on end. “Me?”
“You,” she confirmed quietly. “Me. Us. This whole situation. What if it is all because of the baby? You said you had feelings for me before, okay, fine, but what if mine are just because this is happening? Because I’m scared and vulnerable and lost and confused and you’re the one person who’s there through it all? What if I just think I have all these grand, amazing feelings for you but I really don’t?”
“Do you really believe that?”
“I don’t know. I don’t trust myself to eat before nine a.m., never mind make any decisions like this.”
My lips twitched at that. “Sorry. I shouldn’t laugh at that.”
“No, you shouldn’t, or I’ll start vomiting in your bathroom instead. It’s a bitch to get rid of the smell.”
I carefully untangled myself from her. She rolled onto her back and looked up at the sky where the stars were just beginning to peek through, and I propped my head on my hand so I could look down at her.
At the way her eyelashes cast shadows over her skin, and the little mole that hid itself at the crease of her nose, and the tiny scar that was reminiscent of a pimple at the corner of the lip.
At the little things you only saw when you really, truly looked at someone.
The little things that made them even more perfect to you.
“Tell me what you’re really afraid of, Ivy.”
“That all my doubts come true.” Her voice was barely a whisper, and her gaze stayed fixated on the stars. “That in a year I’ll realize this was all situational, that I only feel this way because of the baby. That I’ll have to hurt you, and you’ll have wasted your time on waiting for me.”
I waited for her to continue, and when she didn’t, I spoke. “If that’s how you feel, that’s how you feel. I’ll never begrudge you for your feelings, all right? Besides, I already told you that none of that matters. You and the baby are my priority.”
“But that’s a long time. A long time where you could be happy with—”
I pressed my finger to her lips. “Don’t you dare even say it,” I said in a low voice. “There is not a single person in this world who will ever make me happier than our baby.”
“But I don’t want you to waste—”
“Any time spent with you isn’t time wasted. There’s no other way I’d rather spend my time, okay?”
“I—”
“Okay?”
She swallowed and nodded, then slowly brought her hand up to mine. Her fingers wrapped around my wrist, the soft pads of her fingertips landing on my pulse point.
My pulse was racing, and if she didn’t know how I felt before, she definitely knew how she made me feel right now.
“It’s okay for you to be afraid of everything. I’m scared, too. I don’t know a thing about babies. All I know is that it’s almost the size of a raspberry right now.”
“How do you know that? Google again?”
“No. I downloaded an app to my phone so I don’t look like a total idiot the next time we see your doctor.”
Her lips twitched. “You downloaded an app?”
“Yeah, it’s great. Sends me a notification to tell me how big the baby is and what it’s doing this week.”
“What it’s doing? It’s a fetus, Kai. It’s not like it has a roaring social life in my uterus.”
“How it’s growing,” I clarified. “And turning from a little alien blob into a baby.”
“Go on, then. I’ll humor you.”
“You don’t have an app on your phone that tells you that?”
“No. I know I’m pregnant. My boobs, stomach, and bladder tell me at least twenty-five times a day. Why do I need an app?”
I grinned and sat up, still looking down at her. “You’re basically eight weeks, so…” I thought back to the information I’d read yesterday. “It’s just over a centimeter in size and the facial features are forming. The little alien tail is almost gone, and its legs are getting longer.”