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15
Bronte was seated at the kitchen table in Chris’s kitchen, watching him at the stove. He’d found an apron in some drawer and promptly tied it around his waist before starting, but even the pink-and-green frills couldn’t hide the masculinity he exuded. With him in dark jeans that fit his legs and ass perfectly, like he was born in them, it was hard not to stare. His black Henley was pushed up to his elbows, displaying tanned forearms she wanted to memorize every inch of.
Although, she couldn’t, not with her cell phone continuously buzzing with texts from the girls. She’d briefly told them about how she’d kissed Chris, but with everything going on with her dad, her updates had been few and far between. Today, though, she’d have liked to tell them about their shopping excursion and how he looked hot in the kitchen. Except there were more important matters to discuss, like Gem’s hair falling out.
At the latest picture of Gem’s long hair clogging the shower drain, Bronte sucked in a breath. Hair in the drain always made her gag.
“What’s wrong?” Chris asked over his shoulder.
“Remember that friend I went to visit? Gemma, she had the baby?” At his nod, she went on, “Her hair is starting to fall out.”
Chris whirled around with a wooden spoon in his hand, a piece of wilted spinach stuck to it. “Her hair is falling out?”
She held her phone up for him to see. “Yeah, a couple months after you have a baby, your hair starts to fall out.” When his eyes bugged out, she explained, “It’s from the change in hormones.”
He shook his head with a huff. “What people go through to have babies.”
And her heart sank. “You think it’s gross? You don’t want kids?”
He lifted a shoulder then pivoted back around to the stove, where he put the spoon down in order to pour out the noodles into a strainer in the sink. “I never really thought about it. You know the situation with my family. I’ve basically spent my whole life resenting them…never really left a lot of time to think about what I wanted.”
Bronte’s phone buzzed in her hand with another picture, this one of Willow, her eyes the same color brown as her mother’s but with wisps of dark-blond hair like her father. She was in a onesie with purple and gold letters that spelled out Wild One. Bronte stood and leaned on the counter next to Chris, stealing his attention to show him the photo.
“This is Willow Jane.”
“She’s cute.” He placed a noodle on the bottom of a glass dish.
“She is,” Bronte said, refusing to hold back what she wanted. She’d done that with Hunter, and she wasn’t about to do it again. “And I want some like her.”
That made him pause. He rested his hands on a towel, his elbows locked, his shoulders up by his ears as he pressed his palms against the counter. “You want a bunch of babies named Willow Jane?”
“You know what I mean.” She knocked the back of her hand into his side so he’d look at her again. If they were going to be together, she was determined to be honest from the beginning.
She hadn’t turned into a completely different person, imagining a life where she and Chris would run off tomorrow, get married, and have a gaggle of kids right away, but she had to acknowledge that what she had with him felt more right than anything she’d ever had with Hunter. They still had so much to learn about each other, so much to talk about. She didn’t even know what his plans for the future were and still wasn’t sure what his occupation was, and yet, when it came down to it, she was purely following her instincts.
After a few moments, he relented and dropped his arms to his sides, his dark eyes roaming over her face. “You want kids.”
It wasn’t a question, but she nodded anyway.
He swallowed and gazed down at the floor to where the toes of his bare feet touched the tips of her ballet flats. “I think you’d be a great mom.” Then he cleared his throat and focused back on her face. “And I think whoever you chose to have those babies with would be very, very lucky.” She was about to ask who he thought that person should be, but he cut her off, pointing to the food, saying, “Gotta finish.”
Bronte let the conversation drop as he layered the lasagna then double-checked the directions and put it in the oven. Once finished, he turned around with a raised eyebrow as if to ask How’d I do?
“Very nice, Chef.”
He wiped off his hands on the apron before tossing it onto the counter.
“You missed a spot.” She reached out her thumb to wipe off a smudge of sauce from his cheek. “How’d you even get it on your face?”
“No idea,” he said, holding her thumb to his mouth to lick it off.
It was truly a miracle she could still stand, and the corner of his lips twisted up wickedly. He knew she was putty in his hands.
He gently pressed her back against the counter, his hands on either side of her waist, his feet outside of hers. “What’s up? You look like you want to say something.”
“How do you know?”
“This.” He touched the crease at her eyebrow. “So? Let’s have it.” When she hesitated, he grimaced. “That bad, huh?”
