But she wasn’t my girl, not really. I knew that right now, I was just a convenient port on a stormy day. I was going to appreciate the hell out of this temporary bliss, but I knew my job was to make sure Peyton knew that she had options. That she wasn’t alone.
So as soon as her breathing calmed a little, I eased back and tipped her chin upward. “I’m so sorry, Peyton. I wish this wasn’t happening to you.” I hesitated a moment. “For what it’s worth, I don’t know that Ryan’s spreading the news around. I think I just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time when I heard him talking to Mike and Andy.”
“Maybe.” She rolled one shoulder and reached for her little pocketbook for a tissue. “Doesn’t really matter, though, does it? In the Cove, the news is going to spread fast. If I’m lucky, I’ll get to break the news to my parents—” Her face crumpled again. “Oh, God, I’m going to have to tell my parents that I’m pregnant. I’m going to have to tell them that I’m not going to college in the fall, after all. They were so proud when I got into Florida State—and then I got the scholarship, too.” She glanced up at me. “Did you know that? I got a fucking scholarship that was going to make sure I was the first one in my family to graduate from college.”
“Yeah, I know.” I sighed. “And I get that it’s going to be a little harder to do college with a baby, but there’s got to be some way?—”
“For me to go to college with a baby?” She laughed, and it was a harsh sound. “First, I’d have to tell the admissions department that I can’t make it this fall, because I’ll be too busy getting ready to give birth. I highly doubt they’ll say they’ll hold my place for me.”
“You don’t know,” I argued. “But listen, Peyton, even if it isn’t FSU, you can still go to college. And—” I took a deep breath, bracing myself to say what it was I’d come here to tell her. “Peyton, you don’t have to do this alone. What I wanted to tell you—I want to be with you.”
Her brow furrowed again in confusion, and I rushed to clarify. “I mean, I want to help you. I—” I swallowed hard. “I’ll be your baby’s father. I’ll stay by your side the whole time. I—I want to marry you, Peyton.”
Peyton’s eyes widened, and her mouth formed an O.
“Oh, Nash.”
“I’m serious, Peyton. I am. Listen.” I took her hands again, this time holding both in my own. “Let’s get through today and tomorrow. Don’t say anything to anyone—we’ll graduate, and then after that, we’ll talk to our parents. First yours, and then mine. We’ll tell them . . .” I was making this up as I was going along. “We’ll tell them that the baby is mine. That I’m the father. And then we’ll let them know that we have a plan.”
“We do?” Peyton cocked a brow. “We have a plan?”
“Well, we will,” I amended. “I mean, I’m thinking already. I’m going to Andersonville in Georgia?—”
“I know that.” A faint smile ghosted over her face. “I remember things, too, Nash.”
“Right.” It felt good that she actually cared enough to recall about details of my life. “They have married student housing. We could move in there, and after the baby comes, you could start classes, too.”
“With a baby in tow?” Peyton sounded dubious.
“We’ll set up our schedule so one of us can be with him—her—well, the baby, I mean—while the other one is in class.”
“And how am I going to afford to pay for those classes?” She tossed up both hands. “I really needed that scholarship, you know, to be able to make it at FSU. My parents can’t afford to send me to college. And once I tell them I’m going to make them grandparents before I even start classes, I have a feeling they’re going to be even less inclined to contribute.”
“There are a whole bunch of scholarships and grants out there for non-traditional students. I saw them when I was applying, mostly because I didn’t qualify for any of them.” I grinned. “But now maybe we will.”
“Nash.” Peyton turned her hands within mine so that our palms were pressed together, our fingers linked, and I thought I’d died and gone to heaven. How many times had I wished for this? Not under these circumstances, maybe, but still . . .
“Nash, I’m just . . . I can’t believe you’d offer to do this for me. I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve your friendship. I don’t deserveyou.” She bit her bottom lip. “I can’t let you throw away your future because I was too much of a moron to see that Ryan was—that he never—” She shook her head. “I wanted to believe things about Ryan that have never been true, and it’s only now that I know how wrong I was. But it’s not fair for you to suffer because I was so blind.”
“I wouldn’t be suffering.” Crazy bold for once in my life, I raised our joined hands to my lips and kissed her knuckles. “Don’t you know how long I’ve been crazy for you, Peyton? Don’t you know how long I’ve waited for you to see me—toreallysee me?”
Her green eyes filled with tears again. “I wish I had known sooner—how you felt. I never—I mean, I might have suspected it, I guess, but then I felt terrible for even thinking about you that way. I thought I owed it to Ryan to stick with him. We were together for so long. But if I’d seen you—really seen you—” She echoed my own words, perhaps unconsciously. “Then maybe I wouldn’t be in this mess right now.”
“It doesn’t matter how it happened.” I ducked my head to gaze into her eyes. “And it’s okay if you don’t—if you don’t feel the same way about me yet. We have time. You might grow to love me, you know?”
Peyton glanced away, emotions at war on her face. “Nash, are you sure about this? I don’t want you to regret—well, anything. Taking on another guy’s baby?—”
“This is your baby, and that’s the only thing I’ll ever see,” I promised. “Peyton, I couldn’t do anything but love someone who’s a part of you.” I tightened my hold on her hands. “All you have to do is say yes.”
For a long moment, the only sound was the crash of the waves and the whisper of the wind. Then Peyton lifted her eyes to mine and nodded.
“Okay. Yes.”
“All right.” I let a whoosh of breath I hadn’t realized I’d been holding. I knewjubilantwasn’t how I should be feeling at the moment, but I couldn’t help it. Peyton had said yes to me. She was going to be my wife. We were going to be a family, and even if it took a while for her to fall in love with me, that was fine. I knew it would work out.
I stood up, tugging Peyton to her feet, too. “After graduation, we’ll talk to your parents, and then to mine. Will you be okay until then? Or do you want to go see your folks now?” A crazier notion occurred to me. “We could always drive to Georgia tonight and get married, and then come back tomorrow to tell both of our families that it’s a done deal.”
“Oh.” She pressed her fingers to her lips. “I don’t think so—let’s not move that fast, Nash. I think it would break my mama’s heart if she wasn’t there when I got married. And like you said, we just have to get past graduation, and then we can worry about everything else.”
