Page 56 of Inked Devotion

Either this baby would come out with a sweet tooth, or they were nice to their mommy at work.

“Mommy,” I whispered, a smile sliding over my face. I was going to be amommy.

While Benjamin was the daddy. To say that this wasn’t what I had in mind when I planned this part of my life would be an understatement. It wasn’t even close to being any part of it.

Yet, here I was, doing my best to pretend that I was okay.

The doorbell rang, and I pulled myself out of my thoughts and wiped my hands on my jeans. Today was just for planning. The future. Not about what future I thought I would have.

That dream was long gone, and now I needed to focus on what I could change, which meant not concentrating merely on myself. After all, I wasn’t going to be focusing on myself alone when it came to having a child.

I let out a breath and made my way to the front door, looked through the peephole, and I didn’t relax. Instead, a new tension rode me, and I was afraid, not of Benjamin, but of what he represented.

I’d wanted him. Damn it. Even though I told myself I shouldn’t, and it would be a horrible mistake, I did. I had wanted him before, and I wanted him even more now, and with the complications that were our life, wanting him at all would be a terrible mistake. I should know better. Only I couldn’t.

I opened the door, and Benjamin stood there, a single lily in his hand and a bottle of sparkling cider. “You know me and flowers. I usually bring plants over to people, but I wasn’t sure if you’d like the whole thing or just a single flower, so I went with this. And the sparkling cider sounded pretty good. For me. You can get your own.” He winked as he said it, and he sounded as nervous as I did.

I took a step back and blushed as he handed me the flower. “It’s beautiful.”

“I’ve given you prettier flowers over the years, but sometimes the single flower does the trick.”

“I’m sure you know the Latin names of everything.”

“Clematis occidentalis.”

I rolled my eyes. “I could tell you how to bake a cake without having to look at a recipe, so that counts for something.”

“I like cake. That makes me happy.”

“Dinner is in the Crock-Pot. It’s some form of chicken stew that I could easily begin this morning before I headed to work.” My stomach rumbled, and I groaned. “Hopefully, I’ll be able to eat it.”

“Let me stick this cider in the fridge, and I’ll help you set the table.”

“Oh, I didn’t even think about that. I was mostly just thinking I’d eat at the sink like I usually do.”

He raised a brow. “That’s how you eat dinner?”

“I’m a single woman living alone. It’s what I do.”

“You’re not going to be living alone for long.”

For some reason, it took me a moment to register that he was speaking of our child and not him moving in with me.

He must’ve seen the confusion on my face because he winced. “I suppose we should make true plans instead of you thinking I’m just going to move in here. Although I think my house is bigger if that’s the path we take, and I have two extra rooms.”

“Because even Montgomerys like to build big,” I grumbled. “And we’re not moving in together, Benjamin. We’re not even going to sleep together again.”

He raised a brow, and I put my hand over my mouth before setting the flower down.

“I’m going to be sick,” I grumbled. My bare feet slapped against my wooden floors as I ran to the bathroom and threw myself in front of the toilet, vomiting the lunch that I had been able to keep down for longer than usual.

I heard Benjamin moving around behind me, and then he was at my side, holding my hair back and pressing a cool washcloth to the back of my neck. I sighed in relief, even before I threw up again, and cursed at myself. “I hate this. Why is morning sickness not in the morning?”

“Have you been able to keep anything down?” he asked, his voice soft.

“Cake.”

“Brenna,” he muttered. “You know that could be a sign of something wrong.”

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