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Nora-Jean stared at him, her green gaze anxiously moving across his face in order to catch any glimpse of a reaction from the man who sat across from her at the foot of the bed. With every moment that passed, her stomach twisted in another knot—and the silence was enough to make her sick.
Or was that the baby?
She swallowed hard and resisted the urge to place a hand over her flat stomach. Nora couldn’t be sure how far along she was, but she knew her period was four weeks late. It’s why she’d taken the pregnancy test. If not for the little plastic stick, she would have been in complete denial about the whole thing.
Sometimes, even that wasn’t enough to keep her from spiraling into a state of denial.
She hadn’t experienced morning sickness. The nausea, which came and went, felt more like a recurring bodily reaction during the moments when reality started to settle and she was cognizant of how badly she’d screwed up. If she thought about it too hard, about the consequences of her actions over the past year, she felt the tug of a bleakness so profound it could swallow her whole and never spit her out. It was a tug she willed herself to shake off, even in the present moment.
She no longer had the choice to wallow in her mistakes. She was going to be a mother. While this wasn’t how she’d planned it, while the man who gaped at her wasn’t the man she loved or the man she’d always thought would father her children, he was the reason she was pregnant. Even though she could tell he was just as shocked as she had been when she’d first found out, a partof her hoped they could face the future together. They’d been a duo for months now—making music and chasing a dream they shared. If they could make a baby together, surely they could be parents together, too.
“Creed…say somethin’. Please,” she begged on a whisper.
He blinked his golden-brown eyes and blew out a huff of air. The side of his mouth curled in a tiny version of his smile, which was equal parts goofy and sexy. It was the same smile he used to convince her they could be more than just partners on the stage. It was the same smile he casted her way whenever she played him a new song on her guitar. It was the glimmer of hope she needed, and she breathed a little deeper at the sight of it.
“Got to be honest with you, babe—I sure as hell was not expectin’ to hear you say that,” he drawled.
“Yeah. Trust me, I was just as surprised,” she replied, sweeping a few strands of hair behind her ears.
“So, what do you want to do?”
“What—what do you mean?”
His goofy smile spread into a handsome grin. “Nora, babe, you know how I feel about you. I want to be with you. I want to keep makin’ music with you. You’re a star, and you’re one hell-of-a writer. What we’re doin’ right now? We’ve got gigs in Nashville every weekend. We’rethis closeto everything we’ve been workin’ for. But—a baby? You can’t tell me that’s not a major wrench in our plans.”
Nora-Jean frowned. This time, she didn’t stop herself from sliding her hand over her belly, the glimmer of hope she felt just a minute before gone in an instant.
“What are you sayin’?”
“Nora…” Creed sat closer, sliding a hand onto her thigh as he held her gaze. “We’re only gonna get one chance at this.”
“I’m sorry, are you implyin’ that I should—you want me to get rid of this baby?”
Now Creed was frowning, too. “You sayin’ you want to keep it?”
“It’s a baby, Creed,” she argued, shoving his hand away. “It’s a life—a lifewemade—not a song to be scrapped from our set list.”
“Babe—”
He reached for her again, but she stood from the bed and began to pace. Burying her fingers in her hair, she held on tight and forced herself to concentrate on her breaths. The tug toward that bleak, black hole felt stronger than ever. This was wrong. Everything about her current situation was wrong.
How did I end up with someone who knows me so little that he thought I could ever take the life of a baby? My baby? Our baby…
“Nora—”
“You’ve never met my mama,” she began, interrupting him. She stopped pacing, resting her hands at her hips as she told him, “She’s the most selfish person I’ve ever met in my entire life. All I wanted growin’ up was to get away from her. And I swore, IsworeI would never be like her. Not ever. Not in any way. And I get it. A baby doesn’t fit into our plans—but plans change, Creed. Life happens. I’m keepin’ this baby. Now, are you in or are you out?”
He didn’t say anything for what felt like an eternity but what was probably less than sixty seconds. Nevertheless, it was long enough for Nora’s vision to grow blurry with tears.
It was impossible for Creed to break her heart. It had been broken when they’d met. All these months later, all the music they’d made together, the relationship they’d forged, it was never enough to put the pieces of her heart back together. She was convinced there was only one man she’d ever love with her whole heart, and he wasn’t an option anymore.
Even still, the thought of bringing a child into the world all on her own terrified her. Knowing the man she’d let into her bed didn’t care about her enough to—
“Hey,” Creed murmured.
Nora-Jean hadn’t noticed when he got to his feet and closed the distance between them. When he gently took hold of her face and wiped her tears with his thumbs, she focused her gaze on his face.
“I’m sorry, okay? I don’t want to lose you, you hear me? Count on that.”
