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“You are out of your mind.” I didn’t know whether to laugh or leave. “No one can keep a goldfish alive.”
“But I’m just figuring out how to be an adult—and your girlfriend, for that matter. I have no idea how to be a mother.” Her eyes misted over. “I’m scared I’m going to mess this up. I’m scared I’ll mess it up, and you’ll leave me. Like you did yesterday.”
The puzzle pieces fit together in my head, despite my brain still functioning below capacity. It all made sense. I didn’t like it. In fact, I hated it. But I got it.
“First of all, I swear, I willneverleave you,” I said, the pain of not being with Gemma worse than any hangover or heart attack. “I know I haven’t had a lot of time to earn your trust, but please hear me when I say, there is nothing I would love more than to be with you for the rest of my life. Okay? I’m sorry I walked out on you yesterday. I needed time to think and process it.”
When she nodded, I continued, “You think, because of your experiences, that you have to do everything on your own, but you don’t. I want you to do what you want, live your dreams, and I will be here to support you. I don’t want you to be afraid I’ll sneak out one night after a fight or something. I am not going anywhere.”
Giving in a little, she slanted closer to me as one tear fell over her cheek. I wiped it away.
“Second of all, you are not a screw-up or a mess or any stupid idea you have of yourself.” I held her face between my hands, forcing her to look me in the eyes. “You are brilliant, creative, kind, and so fucking stubborn. When you put your mind to something, you do it. You jump in headfirst, you’re brave and wild, and you think I’m this, like, robot who never makes mistakes, but I only ever do things I know I can be good at. I don’t like to color outside the lines, and you, Gemma, you are an artist. You showed me how life is better when you take chances.”
When she chewed on her bottom lip, I tugged it free of her teeth, and she nestled into my touch. “I…I never expected to fall in love with you so fast. I never expected—” Her hands cupped her flat belly. “I never expected us to have a baby so soon.”
“So…” My heart pulsed in a funny rhythm, my stomach flopping around. “That means you actually want to have this baby?”
Her gaze skirted around behind me for a few moments before landing back on my face. “Yes. But do you?”
Frantic now, desperate for her to understand my feelings, I couldn’t stop my words from tumbling out. “I know this isn’t what you expected. It’s not what I expected either, but we can do this. I want to do this with you. I will make mistakes. You will make mistakes. Let’s make mistakes together.”
A corner of her lips rose, her brown eyes finding life again. And that gave me life.
“With your good heart and my good looks, this baby is going to turn out amazing, no matter how bad we screw up.”
“Get out of here.” She laughed, a balm to my weary soul, although when I tried to pull her to me, she strong-armed me. “With everything going on, I didn’t get you a birthday present.”
“You really think I care about a birthday present? I don’t. I only want you.”
I tangled my hands in her hair and lowered my lips to hers. It was our first real kiss in over two weeks. I dipped my tongue into her mouth, a man tasting his first drink of water after a long drought, and she wrapped her arms around my neck, allowing me better access.
One of my hands slipped over her spine to her backside, and a startled squeak leaped from her parted mouth when I gave her ass a good squeeze. She smiled, her hands roaming over the planes of my chest before her fingers clawed at my shirt, yanking me closer to trail kisses down my jaw, before settling next to my Adam’s apple, where her teeth nipped at the tender flesh.
“God, I missed you,” I bit out, wrapping my arms around her waist, taking much of her weight against me in a snug embrace. I crushed my lips to hers, my patience wearing thin with the need to get her underneath me, and I started off toward the bedroom. The toe of my shoe caught on a broken piece of linoleum, and I stumbled, clunking our heads together.
“Ow.”
“Shit. Sorry.”
We separated a few inches, laughing. I kissed the reddening circle on Gemma’s forehead, changing my mind. “You want to go for a drive?”
“You don’t want to take a nap first?”
I grabbed her coat. “No, I have to show you something. Come on.”
A light snow covered the hard ground as Gemma and I stepped out of her car, our breaths forming puffs of smoke. I led her by the hand to the middle of an open field, and she spun in a tight circle, examining the sparse, flat land dotted with evergreen trees and a low-lying mountain range in the distance. “This is what you had to show me?”
“We’re breaking ground in the spring.”
She pointed to the dead grass. “Oh? This is it? This is going to be your famous environmentally green development?”
I held my arms open. “What do you think?”
“I think it’s a tremendous waste of resources,” she said, her dark eyes twinkling at the line she’d tossed at me a few months ago.
I took both of her hands in mine then brought them to my chest. “How much would you hate it if I wasted some of those resources on a house for us?”
“Huh?”
