Page 75 of First Comes Marriage

“Good?” he asked with a knowing grin when she moaned around a bit of calamari.

“So good.”

“It’s all my favorites from the restaurant. Well, and Tessa’s latest pregnancy craving,” he said, gesturing with a plantain on the end of his fork.

They ate without speaking, and she was surprised to find the quiet wasn’t awkward. Instead they slowly drifted closer together, until she was half leaning against his chest as she took her last bites of ravioli. The sun had fully set by then, leavingthem cloaked in the deep blue black of night, the only light from the handful of stars and the lampposts on the bridge. Sebastian set their plates aside and wrapped his arm around her, tugging her against his chest. She sank back against him, watching the bay ripple in the starlight, the reflection of the bridge a flicker on the waves.

“I’m glad you moved back.” Sebastian’s voice was deep and smooth, a stone polished by the bay. He nuzzled against her temple.

“I am too.”

“I know we didn’t plan on any of this, but—”

“I don’t think I want kids.” The words burst from her before she could stop them, and then hung there between them, almost like she could see them twisting in the air, taunting her. She turned so she could see his face in the half-light from the lampposts. “I might not even be able to have children. PCOS can make it harder, and I was always told… I never let myself think about if I wanted them. And the other day when you said you wanted a mural, I should have told you then. Because the thing is, it wasn’t about a mural.”

His lip twitched. “I’m aware.”

“And I don’t want you thinking that I’m going to paint a mural with you when I might not be able to, or I might not want to. It wouldn’t be fair to you. Since you do know that you want, you know, a mural.” Her voice faded away as she realized how absolutely batshit she sounded rambling on and on aboutmuralsfor the second time in as many weeks.

“Can we stop calling our potential children murals now?” There was that lip twitch again.

She shoved him with a little burst of indignation. “Don’t laugh. It’s not funny.”

“It’s a little funny.”

She tried to shove him again, but he caught her wrist, stroking his thumb over the sensitive skin there. “First of all,I said maybe. I don’t know if I want kids either, Sabrina. After your sister—” He stopped himself, rolling his lips between his teeth. They didn’t talk about Holly, not anymore, not now that there was so much more between them. “I didn’t let myself think about it either.”

“What if you decide you want them and I can’t give them to you?”

He pressed his lips to her palm. “There are lots of ways to become parents. If someday we both decide that’s something we want.”

Someday.

There was so much tied up in that little word.

When Sebastian was close like this, trailing his lips along the inside of her forearm, looking unfairly handsome in the moonlight, talking aboutsomeday, it was so much harder to remember that she wasn’t supposed to want any of it. Not the someday promises, not the sweet dating, not the marriage.

But she did.

She wanted it. She wanted right now and she wanted someday and, God help her, she wanted the marriage, even knowing how much he could take from her—not just her business and her sense of home, but this feeling that someone finally saw her, that for once she wasn’t a disappointment, that for once she was enough, nervous babbling and questionable career choices and all. Her father’s paperwork could safeguard her business, but what about the rest of it?

“Wildflower,” he rumbled against her hair, the tip of his nose tracing the shell of her ear, “you’re thinking too much.”

She met his eyes, like those ice blue irises could anchor her. “This was only supposed to be temporary,” she breathed, some strange mix of wonder and worry wrinkling her brow.

“Health insurance and sex,” he said with another one of those lip quirks.

She wanted to bite it, to taste the amusement on his lips.Maybe then she could also be amused instead of so damn scared.

He smoothed the crease between her brows with the pad of his thumb, traced her cheekbone, dragged his thumb over her bottom lip, and she felt it everywhere. Her skin sparked to life under his too gentle caresses and careful touches.

“I don’t think we’re cut out for temporary,” he said.

“I’m scared,” she whispered.

His face softened and he cupped her cheek. “I know. Me too. Let’s be scared together.”

Chapter Twenty-eight

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