First Time For Everything

Stunned, he stared at her retreating back, his previous thought echoing in his head.

She’d never say yes.

Several seconds passed before he had the ability to function enough to catch up with her.

His fear had now reached towering proportions, engulfing his ability to fake composure. “Would you stop walking away from me?” he said as he took her arm, bringing her up short. “And why do you always have to be so damn irrational?”

She turned to face him, the color draining from her cheeks, and an ominous sensation settled low in his spine. Because he was sure their discussion was about to take a turn for the worse.

TWELVE

Irrational.

The word echoed in Jax’s head. Irrational. Or, as her last boyfriend had so tactlessly phrased it, unstable.

The word slashed deeper with each reverberation in her brain, draining every drop of blood from her face. Leaving her soul bleeding. Instinctively Jax placed a less-than-steady hand on her abdomen, searching for strength from the scars that represented the hard-fought war she’d waged in the past and won.

The horrendous demons she’d faced and slayed.

The larger scars were palpable beneath her silk dress, her baby ensconced protectively somewhere beneath.

Warrior, Jax. You are a warrior.

But right now she didn’t feel like one. She’d done her best to keep her disappointment with his unromantic proposal from showing. The one that was all about logic and nothing to do with love. She’d been willing to cut him a little slack, given the baby news was so recent and raw. But, unfortunately, his proposal was rapidly approaching more of a dictate.

And now she was beginning to wonder if his behavior had mostly to do with his worries about her history....

Jax sucked in a breath as she fought for control. “You know,” she said, struggling to keep the tremor from her voice, “just because we are having a baby together, it doesn’t mean we have to get married.” Her lips set, she pulled her arm from his grip. “’Cuz God knows we wouldn’t want you to be stuck with an irrational wife.”

But her attempt at sarcasm fell far short of the mark.

“Jax,” he said, the return of his levelheaded look and matter-of-fact tone grating on her sensitive nerves. “You’re being unreasonable.”

His ability to sound so rational made her want to scream, and it was a struggle to keep her voice low. “I’m being unreasonable?” she said. “You’re the one who is trying to dictate when I’ll get married. Where I’ll work.”

And she knew what was driving him now.

Fear.

All along she’d thought he’d accepted her past. The history behind her scars. But it simply took a baby to cut through the facade.

With each passing second, her anger at his attitude climbed higher. But the anger warred with the pain for control of her heart. Her dreams of a happy family crumbling again, right before her eyes. Just when she’d thought she’d found a place to belong.

How many times must she be forced to learn the same lesson?

She briefly squeezed her eyes shut before going on. “And you know what?” she said, a tremor in her voice finally slipping through. “In all the times I fantasized about getting married and having a family of my own, I never once hoped it would be with a man who considered me unstable.”

Articulating the words out loud hurt, and pain washed through her, clogging her throat.

“I did not say you were unstable,” he said, a frown replacing the calm demeanor. “You’re putting words in my mouth.”

Emotion drove her to take a step closer. “Don’t lawyer-speak me,” she said, her anger kicking up another notch. “You called me irrational.” She planted a fist on her hip. “It isn’t much of a leap from one to the other.”

“What’s wrong with wanting to marry the mother of my baby?”

She stared up at Blake, torn between telling him she’d marry him—because the thought of living without him was awful—and telling him no. Because living with a man who doubted her stability would be torture. She’d had those doubts about herself in the past. She couldn’t go down that path again.

Especially not while being escorted along by her husband.