“Where would you go?” I’ve asked myself that whenever I’ve thought of leaving town.
“No fucking clue,” I admit. “Sorry, I’m trying not to swear in front of the baby.” He smiles big now. “But I don’t know. I thought about it a lot, though. I keep thinking the baby will also be looked down on, and I don’t think I can handle that.”
“You aren’t your parents.” The words come out filled with anger. “I bet you that anyone with half a brain cell that you ask will tell you that what your parents did is on them and not on you. If they don’t think that, then maybe, just maybe, they are the problem and not you.”
“Spoken like someone who didn’t grow up with a dark cloud following them.”
“I can’t undo what happened in the past, but what I can do is vow I’m going to do whatever I have to do to make sure you aren’t touched by anything going forward. And not just because you are going to be with me, but because my child is never going to feel unwanted a day in their life. Not. One. Fucking. Day.” He kisses my lips softly. “Give me a chance to prove it to you.”
“Okay, but I have a condition,” I tell him, and he grins.
“I’ll agree to anything.” His words make me shiver.
“If we get back to town and we’re out, and you feel even remotely uncomfortable being with me, you walk away and you do it without feeling guilty or sorry for me.” The lump in my throat feels like it’s so big it’ll be hard to swallow. “Can you promise me that?”
“I will,” he vows, “but you have to promise me something in return. If we go out and you feel the slightest bit uncomfortable, you have to tell me.”
“Why?”
“For a couple of reasons. One, so I can get you away from it, and two, so I can tell whoever is making you uncomfortable to fuck off.”
I don’t know if it’s the nerves from having this conversation, or if it’s the fact I can actually see him doing this, but my head goes back, and the sound of my laugh fills the whole room. My eyes close.
I feel his lips on my neck. “You have the most beautiful laugh I’ve ever heard,” he declares, and my head comes forward to look at him. “It’s a shame you don’t do it enough.” He kisses the side of my lips. “It’s now going to be my mission to make sure I always make you laugh like that.”
“There hasn’t been much in my life that I’ve had to laugh about.” I smile sadly. “But with you?—”
“Yeah, with me, you’ll be doing it a fuckton more. First thing we do when we get back home”—he moves away from me—“is go out on a date.” Just the thought of that makes me feel like throwing up. “I’ll get Sierra and Caleb to come with us, we can?—”
“No,” I interrupt. “The last thing I need is to be humiliated in front of you and them. It’ll be a nightmare, I—” I don’t say another word because his lips are on mine and his tongue is sliding into my mouth. My palms lay against his chest, feeling his heart under my fingers, loving that it’s beating just as fast as mine.
The kiss is like no other kiss I’ve ever gotten before. It’s full of need and want. It starts off slow, but then it takes off. With one hand on my cheek and the other going into my hair, he pulls me closer to him. My legs wrap around his waist as my hands roam up his chest and around his neck. I could spend all day kissing him.
“If you don’t stop,” he warns me, “I’m going to forget I have to feed you, and instead take you back upstairs.”
“I don’t know if I would be sad about that,” I admit, and the minute I do, I want to take it back and cringe.
“Is that so?” he asks me with a smirk.
I push him away from me, my legs slipping from his hips. “I’m not going to tell you how hot you are, Mr. Prom King.”
He laughs, and my hand automatically goes out so I can touch his neck. “I like it when you laugh, too,” I say softly.
The features on his face change. “You’re doing it again,” he says in a low voice, “and I am this close”—he holds his thumb and forefinger close together—“to fucking it all and carrying you—” The doorbell rings.
“Saved by the bell,” I tease. “Literally.” I lean forward, kissing him chastely before he turns to walk to the door. I get off the counter, watching his back.
I hear voices, and then he’s coming back into the room with a huge white pizza box in his hand, a brown bag on top of it. “Where do you want to eat?” he asks me.
“The table. I’ll get some plates and stuff.”
He places the pizza on the counter. “No, you go sit and I’ll get everything.”
“I’d fight you on that,” I tell him, picking up the pizza, “but it might be faster for you to grab the things instead of me trying to find them.”
I put the pizza on the table, then open the brown bag. Fries and onion rings. I put them to the side, and he comes to the table with two plates, forks, and knives.
“Where do you usually sit?” I ask him.
