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James went back to his car to grab his overnight bag and the groceries he’d bought. He needed a shower, food, and sleep in that order.
After months of no appetite, why did hers show up full force tonight? Melissa lay on her bed, reading her book, cursing that she was still on the same page she’d been on before James got home an hour ago. Of course, it might be the tantalizing aromas wafting from the kitchen, stimulating her gnawing stomach. James had always been a good cook.
What was he doing? Didn’t he know that showing up last night, working at her office today, coming home tonight, cooking in her kitchen now, that all those things confused her?
Maybe she was over-analyzing his motives.
He’d told her their baby’s well-being drove his actions.
Could it be that simple? That once the baby was born he’d step out of her life except for the awkward moments of dropping off their child or picking him up?
When he’d held her, kissed her, he hadn’t felt like a man who had no feelings for her, though. Quite the opposite. The attraction still existed between them. Strong, powerful, demanding.
An attraction that she hadn’t had the strength to deny.
Hadn’t wanted to deny.
One touch of his lips and she’d been ready to drag him back into her bed.
He’d wanted her. No words could convince her otherwise. She had felt the evidence of his desire. So why had he pushed her away?
James munched on a carrot and surveyed the meal he’d thrown together. Baked chicken breasts over a bed of wild rice, green beans, fresh carrot sticks that she must have purchased sometime during the past week, bread rolls because, quite frankly, she needed the carbs, and apple sauce for desert.
He poured two glasses of milk and set them on the table.
Now the question was whether or not Melissa was going to stay in her room pouting all night.
Nursing her wounds might be more accurate.
Because he’d hurt her. Not intentionally, but he wouldn’t lie to her. He didn’t want their old life back. Not ever.
Not that he didn’t want Melissa, but he wanted commitment. Mental, physical, emotional, spiritual, he wanted it all.
And, damn it, tonight, when she’d looked at him, he’d have sworn Melissa wanted the same thing.
Definitely, she wanted him physically.
His stomach flip-flopped at the memory of her body pressed against his, of her sweet plea not to stop. How he’d found the strength, he didn’t know. Even now he hungered to burst into her bedroom, push her back on her bed, and have his way with her body, starting at her mouth and working his way down, kissing every inch of her delectable flesh, discovering firsthand the changes to her blossoming body.
If he made love to her, he’d be a slave to the power she held over him. He’d fall victim to the need to have her again and again. And he’d never be able to leave after the baby came. He wondered how he’d manage that anyway.
He had to tell her about Cailee. Soon. But not yet. He couldn’t bear it if he looked in her eyes and saw the disgust he felt toward himself for his mistakes.
Sighing, he knocked on her bedroom door. “Melissa? Dinner’s ready.”
No answer. Big surprise.
“You need to eat. For the baby.”
He heard movement, then the door opened and, without looking at him, she marched past.
James watched her head toward the kitchen in an almost six-months pregnant waddle. At least she planned to eat.
He’d keep the conversation light, establish peace between them. For the next few months his whole world would revolve around making Melissa’s life easier.
James listened to Caren Little, a hefty sixty-year-old who appeared much older, go on and on about her husband’s bunions, her daughters ignoring her, her neighbor’s penchant for gossiping, her second cousin Bertha’s cheating husband, and how the pharmaceutical companies were ripping off the poor. Surreptitiously, he glanced at his watch.
How long could she drone on without getting to the point of why she was at the clinic?
