Page 33 of Knocked Up in Alaska

“Well, why the hell not?” she demanded.

“Gee, Bridget, I don’t know.” She threw her arms out to encompass all the obvious reasons. “Maybe because I’m super pregnant, and I have zero experience putting moves on men, and he doesn’t think of me that way even if I did know what the heck I was doing.”

“You don’t know how he thinks of you,” she pointed out.

“I do, actually.”

Izzy tipped her head to the side. “How?”

Frustration had actually eased her embarrassment, but it came rushing back now with a vengeance. “Because of what happened after I went to bed.”

Bridget rubbed her palms together. “Okay. Now we’re getting somewhere. What happened?”

“I fell asleep. I didn’t think I would after packing up in the middle of the night, in a rainstorm, hauling myself across town, and imposing on his hospitality again, but I was tired, I guess, and I drifted off. I dreamed of Shay,” she added, just now remembering that detail.

Beside her, Bridget snapped to attention. “Did you?” The question came out oddly careful.

“I did. It seemed so real.” In the theater of her mind, she replayed the dream. “He sat at the end of the bed, said my name, and reached for me.” Thinking of it, she shook her head. “I’ve never had a dream like that before. I felt awake, completely convinced in that moment that he was right there in my room with me.”

Izzy wrapped her arms around herself. “Sounds scary.”

“No.” She answered automatically but then thought about it and realized the automatic answer was a true one. “I wasn’t scared. He looked the same. Handsome. Whole. He smiled, very—I don’t know—devil-may-care and peaceful at the same time. At first, I felt so happy. Happy to see him. Then I remembered he was dead, and I started to cry. He told me he was sorry.” She looked over at Bridget, then Izzy. “And you know what? I’m really tired of men telling me they’re sorry. The next man who tells me he’s sorry, I’m going to give him something to feel sorry about.”

Minor tirade, she acknowledged, and didn’t miss the pointed look her friends exchanged.

“As well you should,” Bridget muttered. “So, you were crying, and Shay was apologizing, and then…?”

“I guess I was crying in my dream, but crying for real, too, and making enough noise to wake Ford. The next thing I knew, he was on the bed, half naked, holding me and telling me to wake up, and I did. Every part of me woke up. Every last overactive hormone, and they just kind of…took control.”

“Oh. My. God.” Bridget’s eyes went wide. “You had sex with Ford.”

“No.” She covered her face with her hands. “He held me—I think he was in shock—while I…I…I used him to make myself…” She groaned into her hands, then dropped them. “I used him to make myself feel better, if you get what I mean.”

Izzy laughed, but in an understanding way. “Yeah, Lilah. We get what you mean.”

“Wait, wait, wait.” Bridget held up a hand. “Before you cast Ford in the role of unsuspecting sex-toy—”

“Bridget…” Izzy sent her an exasperated look.

“Whatever. Before you decide you took advantage of him, let’s pin down a few facts. First, who’s bigger and stronger, you or Ford?”

“He is, but—”

“Ah.” Bridget cut her off. “And who came into who’s room in the wee hours of the morning?”

“He came into mine. Because he thought I was having a nightmare,” she tacked on quickly.

Bridget gave her a pitying look. “If I’d been having a nightmare in his guest room last night, he would have banged on the wall and yelled at me to shut the hell up and let him get some sleep.”

“You’re engaged.”

She brushed that off with a careless bat of her hand. “Even before. He doesn’t feel that way about me.”

“Oh, please. He cares for you. He kissed you that one time.” Something she wished she could forget.

She waved her hand again. “I kissed him. He just went along, because he’s a friend. He’s not going to leave me hanging if he can help me out, but that’s as far as it goes. He doesn’t have tender feelings for me. Nor does he have them for Izzy. Remember how he shot her foot off during our little paintball competition? But you? That’s a different story. He didn’t so much as graze you with a paint pellet. When you’re on shift at The Goose, he sends you on breaks every hour—he doesn’t do that with Silent Mike or Owen or any of the others.”

“They’re not pregnant.” For some reason, her throat felt tight. Then her stomach twisted in a not-unfamiliar tightness. Braxton-Hicks contractions—she’d had them earlier in her pregnancy, and Dr. D has assured her they were normal and often brought on by stress. Even so, the weird panic returned to her chest. Sitting still took more self-restraint than she could possibly sustain. On a careful inhale, she rubbed her belly over the spot that had suddenly turned hard as a barrel.

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