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“No, I’m being realistic.” Seeing his mouth open, his expression geared to argue, she held up her hand, stopping him. “It’s okay, Levi. It’s not as if I expected anything from you.”
He grabbed her outstretched hand, clasped it in his. “You may not have, but I did.”
Wanting to jerk her scorched fingers away but unable to bring herself to do so, Madison squinted at him. “I’m not sure I understand.”
His gaze lowered to where his much larger hand engulfed hers. “You might not have expected anything, but I expected much more from me. From us.”
She waited for him to elaborate, hoping he’d expand on what he meant. What was he saying? And why was he holding her hand so tightly, as if he was afraid she’d run away if he loosened his grip? The same way he’d held her hand at the gala, as if she were his lifeline.
“As in?” she prompted when he remained silent, pensive, lost in his thoughts. If not for how tightly he grasped her hand, she might think he’d forgotten she was even there.
When his gaze lifted to hers, fierce determination shone there. So much so that her breath caught. She couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything more than wait for him.
“As in we should get married.”
If her breath had been caught before, she’d just hit total oxygen depletion. Total. As in complete respiratory failure with all the delirium that ensued.
“Excuse me?” she said when she’d recovered enough to find her voice. Getting married so hadn’t been what she’d expected him to say. Not at any point during her lifetime.
But he didn’t retract his insanity, just stared at her with a tenacity that had her wanting to tap on the privacy window and beg the driver to let her out at the curb.
“You heard me.”
Yep, she’d heard him all right.
“I’m probably not pregnant.” And even if she was, she wouldn’t get married like this. What made him think she would?
“You might be.”
“I might not be,” she insisted, panic bubbling up her throat. The car seemed to be closing in around her, trapping her, claustrophobia overcoming her, threatening to steal her ability to remain calm. She reached over with her free hand to crack the window, to let in some air. “This is crazy.”
He didn’t deny her words, just nodded. “Having unprotected sex was crazy. This is facing the repercussions.”
“What repercussions?” she demanded, trying to pull her hand away but only managing to have him pull her closer to him. “Do you have some magical medical way of knowing I’m pregnant? Because you’re starting to freak me out a little.”
“I’m trying to be realistic here, Madison, like you said you were being earlier. If you are pregnant, we need to marry as quickly as possible.”
“Because?”
“Because you’ll start showing and our kid will be able to count back the days and know…”
“Know what?”
“Know he or she was conceived out of wedlock.”
Madison snorted. She couldn’t help herself. “That’s no reason for us to marry. Kids have been counting back and coming up short on the months for centuries, Levi.”
“Not my kid.”
Madison stared blankly at him, not quite believing they were having this conversation, not quite believing she’d made love with him, sweet, passionate love, and now they were having a conversation about babies and marriage and counting months.
It was enough to make her puke.
Not that she could do that. He’d have her marching down the aisle if she so much as hinted at nausea. Not that her nausea had a thing to do with pregnancy. Just sickness at their current conversation.
At least, she hoped it wasn’t anything to do with pregnancy.
Yet there was the late menstrual period.
