Page 54 of The Seduction

And if the modeling world didn’t want her anymore, she could do something else, right? She could knit, for instance. She could knit nonstop and sell fingerless gloves on Etsy and…deep breaths. Deep breaths.

She’d had to take a lot of deep breaths before calling Granger. They hadn’t spoken since she’d left Lake Bittersweet—she’d figured he was furious with her, and rightly so.

“I’m telling you because you have a right to know, not because I expect anything. You have no obligation as far as I’m concerned. We only knew each other for a few days.”

Long silence had followed. “Where are you? We have to talk. In person.”

He’d driven down from Boston, where they met at a quiet café around the corner from her Gramercy Park co-op. They didn’t touch, not at first, but her heart stuttered at the sight of his large form in his dark wool overcoat. When their eyes met, the same electric current from before seemed to pass between them.

“I know this isn’t what either of us planned,” he said quietly as his big hands played with his coffee mug. “But…I’d never want a child of mine not to know their father. I want to be involved as much as I can be. We could…we could get married.”

Her heart had nearly stopped at that suggestion.Married?They’d only known each other a few days. Getting married seemed like one of those impulsive acts that would backfire on her later. “That’s…I mean, we barely know each other. But I think we can work out a co-parenting arrangement. I agree that the baby should know both parents. I always wished I had more time with Gault than I did. It’s important to me that this baby has both of us.”

He let out a breath of relief, but she didn’t know if it was because she’d said “no” to marriage, or because she wasn’t going to fight him being part of the baby’s life.

“Why’d you leave Lake Bittersweet the way you did?” he finally asked.

Fair question. She straightened her shoulders and fought back the nausea that kept threatening. She was sicka lot.“It was my mess, and I didn’t want anyone to get hurt. Especially you. I saw how you dove into our hotel suite after it had been ransacked. That’s how you are, you put yourself in danger. I didn’t want you doing that on my account. I went to DC and reported everything to the higher-ups at the State Department. I took care of business. It felt really good.” She sipped some water, praying it would hold back the queasiness.

He looked impressed, which meant the world to her. “Good for you. Well done.”

“Thank you.”

“So there was no other reason?” His searching gaze seemed to see right into her.

“You mean, like, I finally had enough of your coffee obsession and neat-freak tendencies?” She managed a laugh despite her tight throat. “No, nothing like that.”

“What I’m asking is,” he cleared his throat, “do you have any negative feelings about me that I should know about?”

His vulnerable expression made her want to cuddle him like a child—an enormous one with outsize muscles and a warrior heart. “No negative feelings.”

“Then you won’t mind if I stay close?”

“How close?”

“How close can you handle? Down the street? Next door? Same apartment? We did okay last time we shared a living space.”

She forgot her nausea for a moment. “But what about your job? Your own life? Do you want to just leave all of that behind so you can be with someone you aren’t even in a relationship with?”

“We’re in a relationship, Bliss. We’re having a baby. That’s a relationship. Whatkindof relationship is up to us.”

At that point, she couldn’t fight nature any longer, and fled to the bathroom. Granger had helped her get home, tidied up her apartment, and made her soup that settled her stomach. That did it—she’d invited him to move in for the duration of her pregnancy.

He took a leave of absence from the FBI and moved to New York about a month later. For the past ten weeks or so he’d been living in her guest room. They took one day at a time, and many of those days, she was so sick she didn’t have energy to worry about defining their relationship. Pregnancy did not agree with her. She was exhausted, nauseous, crabby, and sore.

Granger took it all in stride. He kept her hydrated, ran to the corner store for Pedialyte, and left her alone with her knitting when she needed that.

Also, he brought Moses with him. Moses! The emotions she felt when he plopped the pet carrier on the apartment floor and said, “I sure hope pets are allowed this time,” nearly cracked her heart in two.

Now her favorite thing was to settle Moses next to her on the bed while she dozed and fantasized about alternate career paths that wouldn’t keep her on the road for so many days of the year.

To be fair, she also fantasized about Granger.

When she wasn’t nauseous, she was exceptionally horny. One night, after dreaming of Granger coming to her, naked and glistening in the moonlight, muscles flexing as he braced himself over her, she went into the guest room and slid into bed next to his big body.

He welcomed her without question. It took barely a touch of his palm against her sex for her to explode in a long, deep freight train of an orgasm. Then he’d slid inside her—no need for a condom now—and fucked her until they both shuddered into a simultaneous climax.

Then she climbed on top of him and teased him with her wet sex against his groin until he was ready to go again. Hips pumping, his hands filled with her breasts, he came again, and she for the third time. And still she wanted more.

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