Page 72 of Crashing the Altar
After hopping into the shower to rinse off the grime from a hard day’s work on the ranch, I stepped out of the bathroom to find Penny pacing the length of the cabin.
I could literally feel the tension radiating off of her in waves. The cork on whatever she’d been bottling up was about to pop.
Tossing the towel slung around my neck in the hamper, I approached slowly, speaking softly so as not to startleher. “Penny?”
She spun around, and when her wide eyes landed on me, all the color drained from her face.
That wasn’t a good sign.
“Lucky, tell me what’s going on. I’m worried about you.”
A bark of laughter sounded. “Ha! You haven’t seen nothing yet, mister.”
I took her hands in mine. “Whatever it is, we can handle it together, but you have to let me in.”
“You should probably sit down for this,” she urged.
Dread settled like a rock in my stomach, but I obeyed, dropping onto the edge of the mattress.
Penny’s pacing resumed. Her sharp, rapid inhales were so pronounced that her chest went concave with each one.
Shit. She was going to hyperventilate if she kept going.
“You know what? I need to sit down,” she huffed out, breathless, before collapsing onto the couch.
With every muscle coiled tight, I was ready for whatever battle she faced to become my own.
“I’m pregnant.”
Those words acted like a vacuum, sucking the air right from my lungs.
Stunned, I could barely manage a response. “Already?”
That’s the best you could do? Hope the kid never asks how you reacted the day you learned you were going to become a father.
Oh my God. I was going to become a father.
My wife’s scoff brought my brain back online. “Apparently, those Sullivan swimmers of yours are strong.”
Obviously, I’d known this was a possibility. We hadn’t done much to prevent it and were fucking pretty much every chance we got. But still, it was going to take a minute to wrap my mind around this life-changing news.
There was a tremble in Penny’s voice when she spoke again. “I really need you not to freak out about this because I’m freaking out enough for the both of us.”
That was enough to center me, and without conscious thought, I crossed the room to pull her into my arms.
She buried her face in my chest, her arms snaking around my middle, hugging me so tight that my ribs groaned in protest.
Stroking her back, I said, “You did ask me to put a baby in you.”
Her humph came out muffled before she lifted her head to cry, “Well, I didn’t think you were actually gonna do it!”
I wasn’t quick enough to stifle my laughter. “What did you think was going to happen when we skipped out on contraception?”
Lower lip pushing out in a pout, she huffed, “I don’t know.”
“It’s gonna be okay,” I vowed softly. She had to know that, right? That I would do whatever was necessary to take care of her, of our baby? The love we shared was only set to expand with the addition of a little person we created together—a little person that was half Penny, half me.
Excitement buzzed beneath my skin as I began to imagine our unborn child.
