Page 129 of Problematic Summer Romance

“Precisely. And I don’t think it’s fair of me to demand acommitment of you this early on. Not after being so fucking stupid for three years.”

He’s right. I may be sick in love with him, but not so much that I cannot see it. “Then…?”

“Then, we…” He runs a hand through his hair, like this is a stressful topic for him, and often revisited. I wonder how many hours, days, weeks he’s lain in bed awake to figure out a solution that would allow us to be together without shackling me to him. “We start back from where we left off.”

My eyes widen. “Last night?”

“No, I—” His fingers find the bridge of his nose. “I meant, ten months ago.”

“Oh. So, we…talk on the phone like it’s the nineties and live on different continents?”

“No. Or, yes, if you want to. Maya, I will take as much or as little of you as you’ll let me have. But I stand by what I said last night. I want you to be in charge.”

“Conor.” My hand slides across the table, knuckles brushing against his. “If it’s pegging you want, you only have to ask.”

He hangs his head, but not before I notice his grin. When he looks up, he’s serious again. “Thereisa power differential here. I have and will again admit to having been a stubborn idiot when it comes to you, but to be clear, I do not think that the issues I brought up are no longer there. You remain much younger. I mean, I’d bet a good third of my assets that the waiter is currently wondering why I can’t look away from my daughter.”

I lean forward. Spot the twentysomething idling under one of the umbrellas, a bored look as he waits for the lunch crowd to swarm the restaurant. With a small smile, I twine my fingers withConor’s. Lift his palm to my lips. Press a kiss to the middle of it. A gentle scrape of my teeth.

“I think he just figured out that we’re not related,” I murmur.

Conor shakes his head, that smile still tugging at his lips, his voice raspy as he starts again. “My point is, we do have to acknowledge that I’m older, have more life experience, and have more financial means.”

I glance down at myself. “Just because there’s sand on my romper and I spilled granita all over it, it doesn’t mean that I don’t have my very own exchange-traded fund.”

“Right, yes.” He’s grinning again. So open, I just…My heart, it’s going to stretch to the sky. He looks at the sleep-deprived mess of me, shakes his head, and says, “Granita spillage notwithstanding, you’re still a bit too beautiful for my taste.”

“I just want to reassure you, in case your worry is that you’d be saddling yourself with the burden of someone who’s younger and poor, that I do have a job lined up, and I’ve been financially independent for several years, and—”

“Maya, it’s theexactopposite. Iwantto take care of you. Iwantto throw money at your problems and solve them for you, which is why I need to be very careful not to overwhelm you—”

“Which is why you’re stopping yourself from proposing, yeah.” I take back my hand, pretending to be annoyed. “I guess we’ll be waiting to get started on those babies, hmm?”

He freezes. Flushes. Glances away. “Maya, I don’t—”

“Plan to get me pregnant?”

He closes his eyes, mortified. “That was bad of me to say without first discussing it with you. It was…”

“Problematic.”

“Yes. Maya, I wouldneverask you to have a baby if you weren’t ready. I would never ask you to keep a baby you didn’t want—”

“Conor, relax. You can be a fan of reproductive rightsandthink that coming inside me is hot.”

He covers his eyes. “Christ.”

“There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. Lots of people have a breeding kink.”

“Fucking—I don’t.”

“Oh, Conor. Yes, you do.”

“Such a fucking menace,” he grumbles. Red-cheeked. Adorable.

“It’s fine. I’m into weird stuff, too.”

“Yeah?”

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