Page 52 of Santa Baby Maybe
“Ow!”
“You say that and then you were making out with someone practically the next day,” she charged.
“First, I wasn’t making out. I was trying to prove something to myself and it didn’t work. Or maybe I should say, it did work. It proved what an idiot I was being. This whole time I’ve been trying to meet a person. Someone I could imagine settling down with. The whole time I had this idea in my head of who that person would be. And while I was searching and looking everywhere, you were the one I wanted to be with. You, who doesn’t fit me at all, in fact fits me perfectly.”
“You have mommy issues,” she accused. “She was an artist. I’m an artist. That’s why you don’t want to go there with me.”
“I do,” I finally admitted. “I took all my baggage with her and I dumped it on you and I’m sorry. You’re not like her at all. You’re steady and consistent. You’re an incredible professional as well as an amazing artist who understands the value of your work. I also don’t think you’re the type of person who would ever let your kid go hungry on principle. Because that’s crazy.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know if I can trust you. Can you see that from my point of view? The tug and push has been really confusing.”
I nodded and took her hand. “I know that. I do. Because I wanted you, but I didn’twantto want you. Can you understand that?”
She frowned. “It’s not very flattering. To be wanted against your better judgment. I suddenly have an appreciation of why Elizabeth Bennet was so pissed off at Darcy all the time.”
“But I’m done with that,” I promised her. “It was entirely stupid. Having this image of who my wife should be in the first place. Resisting everything that you are, when all I wanted was to be with you. What the hell do you think I was doing, waiting for you outside the building that Sunday when you fell and hurt your ankle?”
Her eyes narrowed. “You said you were shopping.”
“You were freezing me out. I could tell. And I hated it. I wanted to see you.”
Her eyes narrowed even more. “You know I don’t trust you when you say nice things to me now.”
“Sorry.” I huffed out a laugh. “Because I’m pretty sure I’m going to say nothing but nice things to you from now on. I want to date you, Joy. I want to know you. I want to fuck you. I want… all of it.”
She looked down at our clasped hands. Then something came over her and she tugged her hand free.
“I’m pretty sure you weren’t thinking of a baby when you said that.”
That sobered us both up pretty quickly.
“No. I wasn’t thinking of a baby,” I said slowly. “But it certainly wouldn’t be hard to imagine you as a mother if that’s what you want.”
She shifted and faced me, and I had a hard time keeping my eyes from dipping to her breasts. Breasts that were so perfect that the idea she’d ever been self-conscious about them seemed incredible. Breasts she’d obviously wanted to show off tonight, no doubt to torture me with what I’d lost.
I had the sudden and amazing image of a baby suckling her on one of those luscious breasts and blinked.
“Really? Are you staring at my boobs right now?”
“Yes, but in a good and noble way,” I told her.
“Noble?” she asked.
“Yes, you have incredibly noble breasts, Joy. Which you’re presenting in that very noble dress.”
She scowled at me. “W.B., this is serious.”
That was true. About as serious as it got. Which I guess meant I had to ask the big question.
“Joy, have you thought about what you would do if you are pregnant?”
She shook her head. “Are you kidding? It just dawned on me, like, a couple of hours ago it might be a reality. I’ve been too freaked out all night. By the what-if, by you.”
“Me?”
“Yes. You! What if you showed up with one of your blind dates? What if I vomited on your shoes because it made me sick to look at you with another woman? What if you could see how I felt?”
That felt like a good sign. “And how do you feel?”
