Page 118 of Say My Name

“It is inefficient.”

This is the moment to stop, to retreat to logistics. But I don’t. “Then stay longer.”

Her lips part.

The real proposal is there in my own words, before I can disguise it as convenience.

I put both hands on the island. “We’re going to be seeing each other more often either way. My house is closer to the office. You wouldn’t have to pack a bag every night or worry about travel interfering with the schedule. You’d sleep more, which the doctor specifically recommended.”

“Do you hear yourself?”

“Perfectly.”

“You’re proposing cohabitation as a fertility optimization strategy.”

“It’s practical.”

“No, Dominic.” She shakes her head, her disbelief softening into something more vulnerable. “It isn’t.”

I know that. I knew it before I suggested it.

There is nothing practical about the image that has been in my head since we left the specialist’s office. Elena’s shoes beside mine at the door. Her coffee in my kitchen every morning. Her laptop open in the library while I finish calls. Her body in my bed without a date on the calendar giving either of us permission.

Efficiency is easier to say than any of that.

“Okay,” I say.

She blinks. “Okay?”

“You said no.”

“I know what I said.”

I could list a dozen other reasons, but I won’t. Her answer cannot cost her anything. “Then I’m not going to argue with you.”

Some of the tension leaves her shoulders, although she keeps studying me, expecting the negotiation to resume.

It won’t. I can want more without turning that desire into pressure. Being her employer already requires more care than any relationship I’ve ever had. The rest of this makes respecting her answer nonnegotiable.

Elena folds her arms. “You had more points prepared.”

“I did.”

“And you’re abandoning them?”

“I’m respecting your answer.”

Her gaze drops to the counter between us. “Living together would change things.”

“They’ve already changed.”

“That doesn’t mean we have to complicate it.”

“Is that what this has become?”

Her eyes lift sharply.

I hold her gaze. If this has become a burden to her, then everything I’ve done has been a failure. “Worse?”