Page 41 of Say You Love Me

“Do you?” he prompts.

The words are so quiet I’m not even sure I say them. “I don’t know.”

Rylee lets out a frustrated groan. I know the threads of his neck strain as he does it. I’ve seen it many times before. But back then, I never looked at him as anything more than a friend. What is he now?

A friend with benefits?

A toy for me and my husband?

A plaster to cover our wounds?

“I want you, Fin. I can’t stop thinking about you. I never thought I’d be in a situation to say this, but I don’t care if your husband watches. I want you. I’ll take you any way I can have you.” He sucks in a deep breath. “Just say you want me too. Tell me you’re not doing this just for him.”

I close my eyes. I can’t say any of those things without lying and for some reason, I can’t lie to Rylee. He is the one person I’ve been the most honest with. He’s the one person who has never asked anything of me.

“I’ve got to go. Talk later.”

“Fin please—”

I turn my phone off so he can’t call me back.

I must fall asleep there on the couch, because Hudson wakes me in the morning. I startle when he touches me, confused about where I am, why I’m here. But when I look up into Hudson’s eyes, it all comes flooding back.

“Morning,” he says and presses a kiss to the top of my head.

He doesn’t ask why I slept downstairs. Maybe he doesn’t care. But it’s the first time he’s kissed me good morning in months. He’s already ready and dressed for work. He looks so good in a suit. He looks good without one too.

I clear my throat nervously, unsure what to say to him but not wanting to let this moment go by. “Did you sleep well?”

It sounds so pathetic considering everything that went on last night, but he merely smiles and nods. “See you tonight.”

I get up from the couch and follow him to the door. “Anything you feel like for dinner?”

He shakes his head. “Surprise me.”

It’s such a normal conversation, one we’ve had numerous times over the years, but this one feels monumental. It sparks hope within me.

Hope that one day we might be who we were before.

Hope that one day he might love me again.

chapter eighteen

THEN

~

FINITY

I sit on the toilet and stare at the two blue lines. It has only been a few months since Hudson brought up the idea of having children. It had been one Friday night as we were sitting on the couch and he’d just blurted it out. No preamble, no time for me to prepare a response, he’d just said it.

“I want to have a child.”

I laughed but Hudson didn’t. He was serious. He was eager and he wanted us to start straight away. At first, the thought had panicked me, but the more I thought about the possibility of sharing a child with the man I loved, the more I came around to the idea.

A few weeks later, I stopped taking the pill. And now it has happened. Quickly. Too quickly. I don’t feel prepared. I’m not ready. I thought it would take months of trying, years even. But the results are there, right in front of my eyes.

I’m pregnant.

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