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Spreading her arms, my mother enters the living room. “Candice, it’s gorgeous.”
“You saw it this morning, Mom,” Candice says with a wry smile. “You helped me set up the patio furniture.”
“Yes, but I was saying that for everyone else’s benefit.” She turns at a scuffing sound in the hallway, and my throat tightens at the sight of Rudy and his grandmother arm-in-arm.
I haven’t seen Rudy since Monday, and somehow, I’d forgotten how good he looks. He’s wearing navy pants and a fitted white shirt. The top few buttons are undone, and the shirt clings to every hard muscle slabbed over his frame. He looks like a magazine advertisement. He looks like sex. He looks like my dream man.
Meeting my gaze, his eyes heat. He looks me up and down, taking in the airy summer dress I’m wearing before his eyes soften on mine. Those lush, kissable lip tilt into a smile that I know is meant just for me.
I want to bulldoze everyone as I run and fling myself into his arms. I want to pull him into a broom closet, flip my skirt up, and beg him to screw me. I want to feel his arms wrapped around my body. I want to growl at any other woman who comes close to him so she knows he belongs to me.
Uh oh.
Those are not good feelings. Those are not the type of feelings one gets when one is about to drop a bombshell on a budding relationship.
My mother hooks her arm into Rudy’s free one and gives his bicep a squeeze. “Isn’t he just gorgeous?” She looks at me. “Isn’t he, Lily?”
Oh no.
Somehow, my mother knows. She knows about last weekend, about everything. She might not know she knows, but she knows.
I squeeze my eyes. That doesn’t even make sense. I need a drink.
No, I don’t. I’m pregnant. And I have cancer. And I’m in a room full of people and no one knows the full truth but me. They all think I’m free to date Rudy and give them things to gossip about, but how will they react when I tell them what’s really going on?
How will Rudy react when I tell him what’s going on?
I turn my back on the new arrivals and stride to the nearest door. I’m startled to find it’s a storage closet, then my brain helpfully provides images of me and Rudy together in a dark closet with my skirt bunched around my waist.
What the hell is wrong with me?
“Bathroom is down the hall, Lily,” Candice says, her voice strangely muted.
“Thanks.” I find the bathroom behind the next door I open, and lock myself inside. Flipping the toilet cover down, I sit and bury my face in my hands.
Last weekend was a mistake. A very fun, very pleasurable mistake, but a mistake nonetheless. The sight of Rudy makes me want to forget about all my issues, but my issues aren’t going away. I’m already in my second trimester, and I have a doctor’s appointment early next week where I’ll schedule my mastectomy. Within a month or so, I’ll have a baby bump.
I. Cannot. Date. Rudy.
Ever.
Especially not now.
But the thought of him standing there, being a doting-grandson-cum-male-model as he led his grandmother into Candice’s house makes my body heat. I’m sitting on a toilet, horny as hell, feeling like world is ending.
This has got to be hormone related. My feelings are not normal. Everything just feels so…big. Big emotions, pulling me apart limb from limb. How the hell am I going to go back out there and face them all?
I don’t know how long I sit there, but it’s long enough for a knock to sound on the door and make me jump. My butt has gone numb.
“I’ll be out in a minute!”
“It’s me,” Rudy’s deep voice says from the other side of the door. “Will you let me in?”
Glancing at myself in the mirror, I’m glad to see I only look a little frazzled. Apparently, the hurricane of worry and stress and lust within me has stayed right where it should be—buried deep inside. I unlock the door and open it, and Rudy enters without hesitation.
The powder room is a good size, but it still feels too cramped for two people. I back up until my legs hit the closed toilet, keeping my eyes averted. The door closes. Rudy hooks his hand around my waist and pulls me close. Catching myself against his chest, I let out a shuddering breath.
“Iliana.”
