Page 56 of The Trouble with Flings

“I’m not blowing you off,” she says firmly.

“Then what are you doing?” I step closer. “Because it sure feels that way, and I’m done playing games.” I hold her gaze, wanting her to hear every word I say. “You know where I stand. Where I’ve stood since we reconnected in Costa Rica. I know what you said about not wanting a relationship, and I don’t want to push you into something you don’t want. But until recently, you haven’t been acting like you’re done with me.” My voice drops. “Is any of this real for you? Or am I reading—”

“I’m pregnant” rushes out of her.

The words knock the air clean out of me, shock and disbelief causing my brain to short-circuit. “What? Wait…” I try to form a rational thought, but “What?” is all I can manage.

“I’m pregnant, Fitz,” she says softly, like she’s saying it as much for herself as she is for me.

A car horn blares, two women walk past us talking, and I am standing completely still with my heart slamming against my ribs, my mind trying to catch up to those two words that just rearranged everything.

“Are you sure?” I study her careful composure, the way she’s holding herself like she’s bracing for impact, and the two weeks of off-and-on texts suddenly start to make sense. Jesus. Pregnant.

She nods. “I just saw my doctor.”

“Is that why you’ve been avoiding me?” shoots out like an accusation, driven by the question I fucking hate asking, but can’t avoid. “Do you know if it’s mine? You were with that other guy right before Costa Rica.”

She flinches, and it’s like watching a door slam shut. Her chin comes up, her eyes narrowing. “Not like that. We broke up three weeks before the trip, and we hadn’t slept together for a couple of weeks before that. I told you we weren’t in a relationship. We barely saw each other.” Her eyes hold mine, steady and direct despite everything. “And trust me, I wouldn’t be standing here telling you if there was any chance it wasn’t yours.”

I believe her. She’s as forthright as they come, which I realize is probably why she hasn’t texted much. She’s been carrying this alone.

We stand there looking at each other, and the noise of the city feels very far away. My mind is running in six directions at once, but one thing cuts through the noise with absolute clarity. I want this with her at any cost, but that’s not my decision to make.

“Have you decided what you want to do?” I ask gently. “Keep it, or…?”

She squares her shoulders, but I catch the slightest tremor in her chin. It’s there and gone so fast, I would have missed it if I weren’t watching her so closely. “I’m keeping it,” she says resolutely. “If you don’t want to be involved, that’s fine. I understand. You don’t owe me anything, and I don’t need your money, so you don’t have to worry about that.”

My chest seizes up.

“Jennifer.” I close the distance between us, but I don’t reach for her, because I don’t know yet if she’ll let me. “Of course I want you to keep it. If that’s what you want. I mean, I want you to keep it either way, but I’d never ask you to carry a baby you don’t want.”

Her eyes well with tears, and she looks away, blinking against them, her jaw tightening as she reclaims her composure. When she turns back to me, her eyes are clearer, but something in them has changed.

“Let’s go inside,” she says quietly. “We should talk.”

She unlocks the front door. I hold it open for her and follow her into a narrow entryway with scuffed baseboards and rows of metal mailboxes that have seen better decades. There’s a steep, narrow staircase to the left. The kind that was built before anyone thought about what you might need to carry up it.

“No elevator?” I ask as she heads upstairs.

She glances over her shoulder. “How do you think I got this great ass?”

That surprises a laugh out of me, and for a second she almost smiles. I file that away. She’s still in there, underneath all of this.

As we trek up, I notice a loose banister at the top of the first flight and a dim bulb at the second landing. By the time we reach the third floor, I’ve started a mental list of things I’m not going to say out loud. Not tonight.

She leads me to the end of the hall, and we head into her apartment. There’s a tiny living room to our right, an alley kitchen to the left, and straight ahead I can see into a bedroom. Her life fits into an apartment that’s smaller than my garage, and that stops me cold for a second.

Not because it’s small but because it’s so much less than what she deserves.

The moment I step farther inside, I understand something about Jennifer Stone that I’ve been piecing together since we got together on Silver Island. Everything in here is well thought out and intentional, except the surfboard. A charcoal couch with two rust-and-cream throw pillows. A cognac leather armchair, worn in the coziest places, sits beside a small side table with a lamp that has an amber base and a red lampshade. Framed photos sit atop a bookshelf lined with novels sporting worn spines, suggesting she actually reads them. There’s tasteful artwork on the walls, giving the room pops of color, and thriving plants by the windows, proving she’s good at keeping things alive, and in the middle of her classy-on-a-budget living space is the surfboard I gave her. It takes up most of the living room, propped on two boxes in front of the sofa, a stack of books and a candle sitting on top of it like it’s always been there.

“I like your place,” I say as she drops her bag on a narrow table by the door.

“Thanks.” She hangs her coat on a hook by the door. “Do you want something to drink?”

“Sure. Water’s fine.” I shrug off my bomber jacket and hang it beside hers.

She moves to the kitchen, which is barely wide enough for one person, and I head into the living room to check out the photographs. I recognize Jace and his wife, Dixie, whom I haven’t met but have seen pictures of. Jace is holding his adorable baby boy, Maximus. The last time my uncle Maddox was on the island, he showed off pictures of little Maximus as if he were the kid’s grandfather. My mind skips ahead, imagining how he’ll dote on our baby.