AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Aurora rolled into him and rested her head on his chest, and then she found her fingers wanting to explore the dips in his ribs, and the hair on his stomach, but before she caved in and did, Aurora rolled away.
And at midnight Nico woke up hard and pressed against her, so he turned onto his back and tried to think boring, unsexy thoughts.
It was a joke that they’d pretended either of them would sleep. Nico wanted sex. And the woman he wanted to have sex with lay beside him. He could feel her desire in the thick air between them.
Yet sex could only muddy the waters.
He could tell that she was awake next to him.
‘Nico?’ she said. ‘We have to talk…’
She said it as ifhewas the one who was reluctant—as ifhewas the one who had shut down the conversation two hours ago.
Life with Aurora!
But he didn’t bother pointing it out, for indeed itwastime to talk, to work things out. Here in the dark.
‘What do you want to happen, Aurora?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You must have thought about it or at least considered it.’
‘I’m confused,’ she admitted, and when he took her hand, she squeezed his back.
‘Then let’s talk it out.’
‘From what I can see I have two options.’
‘Options are good—so tell me.’
‘I want to tell you…’ She just did not know how.
But as she lay in the darkness she found a way, and she spoke to him as she had to Louanna the night before Gabe had been born.
‘I wanted to tell—’ She had been about to say,to tell you, but held it in. ‘From the moment I found out I was pregnant I wanted to tell the baby’s father. After all, there is no doubt that Gabe is his. And I believe he would support the baby.’
‘Of course he would,’ Nico answered carefully. He would give the world to get her real thoughts, and if taking himself out of the equation helped, then that was fine with him.
‘But I worry,’ Aurora said, ‘that he might suggest the other option.’
Nico was silent.
‘Marriage,’ she said. ‘You see, he turned me down once, and I would always feel I had forced him into it.’
‘Okay…’
It was a gentleokay. It gave no indication as to his thoughts. More an acknowledgment that he had heard her.
‘I think,’ Aurora said, ‘that he will want the second option—even if he doesn’treallywant it. He’s a good man, and very respected by my family. They would certainly expect him to marry me.’
‘And you don’t want that?’
‘No. I think I would prefer option one.’
‘Okay…?’
It was the same response as before, but it contained a question.
