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Silence reigned, making me think that nope, that was the wrong guess.
Perhaps he’d taken a proactive position, wanting to assure them we would get married before I told them about the kid on the way? But that was also insane, considering we hadn’t discussed marriage. We had not even discussed actual commitment. The word girlfriend had been tossed about—mostly in my own head—but that was not enough to marriage make.
“Baby?” My mother leaped up from the table and jogged around it to physically grab my flat—well, mostly flat-ish, at least pre-bacon gorging—stomach. “You have a baby in there? His baby?”
“Unless all those dreams about Ian Somerhalder paid off in ways I never imagined.”
Oliver grunted and shifted to lean against the stove, lifting a mug of coffee to his lips. “I didn’t tell them. I figured you wanted to.”
“Kind of you.” I shook my head as my mother finally stopped groping my stomach for signs of life and backed off. “Maybe you could have held off on the wedding talk too? I mean, wedding, seriously? What’s gotten into you?”
“You told me what you wanted last night. Spelled it out quite clearly.” He lifted a shoulder and sipped as if he was making all the sense in the world and I was just being silly. Much as he’d done for the entirety of our relationship up until Vegas—which explained why I had wanted to off him in bloody and inventive ways most of the time. “I just assumed you were serious.”
“You assumed an awful lot it sounds like.”
“Okay, rewind some of this for us.” My mother sagged into the seat opposite me and reached out to grab my father’s hand for support. He had seemingly gone mute. Traumatized beyond speech, perhaps. “You quite obviously spent the night here with him and were wearing his clothes, indicating you’re involved at the very least.” Her ears went pink. “And you’re pregnant?”
I nodded and poked at my cooling eggs. I’d lost all will to eat. Dang shame. “Yes. I just found out last night before Ally had her baby.”
“Oh, she did! Is he adorable beyond belief?”
“He was in the picture I saw. I was supposed to go back this morning, but it’s actually getting late.” I glanced at my watch. For the first time in history, I was actually excited to go to work. Anything to escape this hot mess of a breakfast. “I have a shift at the diner soon.”
“You don’t need to worry about that any longer.”
Oliver’s dismissive tone made me frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You truly have forgotten everything you said last night.”
“I didn’t say anything about my job.” Had I been sleep-talking or something? Or could be he’d just started reading minds.
Except he was wrong. I’d rather deal with Greta’s grumpiness than spend more time trying to figure out how we’d gone from incredible, slightly kinky sex and beautiful rose gold necklaces to picking venues for our wedding when he hadn’t even proposed to me. Forget that, he hadn’t even mentioned us moving in together. Or even having a standing date at the Sherman Inn for Monday Night Football and the wing special. Nothing.
“You most certainly did. I asked you your preferred scenario for having this baby, and you said you wanted to be married and a housewife. In a manner of speaking,” he added as I tugged at my turtleneck sweater. My face might as well have been on fire. “And if we’re going to do the whole traditional deal, we should do it now before you start to show.”
“Oh, should we now? Because God forbid the blessed Hamilton name be tarnished by an out-of-wedlock baby.”
“It’s a small town,” he said tightly. “I didn’t want people to speculate. Just easier all the way around. But if it’s not what you want—”
“Oh, what I want matters now? I also didn’t say I wanted to be married to you.”
Ugh, I so didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I just meant we’d been talking hypotheticals last night, and he’d gotten way specific without doing the usual things that led to that point.
Like saying “I love you” and “Will you marry me, Sage?”
Then waiting for an answer to such before booking the hall. Or judge’s chambers. Because knowing Oliver, expedient would mean the quickest, lowest-frills venue possible.
Christ, we might as well have had Elvis do the deed. It would’ve been more romantic than what Oliver probably had in mind.
No time for love and romance! Bun in the oven. What will people say?
Well, fuck the hell right out of that. As for appearances? Screw them too. I wasn’t making life-changing decisions in case some of the town biddies or buddies might have something to say about my big belly. It was 2018, and a woman could be married or unmarried or heterosexual or bisexual or anything else, and no one had any right to say jack about it.
“Excuse me for assuming.” He crossed his arms, his jaw tightening. “I figured since you spent the night in my bed that the idea probably wasn’t abhorrent.”
“It might not be abhorrent if you weren’t going about this all wrong.” My throat was aching so much it was amazing I could even speak.
“Oh, am I? At least I didn’t tell you I wanted to get married, just not to you.”
