From Enemies to Expecting

He glanced up to see her standing there, leaning on the door frame as if it was the only thing keeping her from joining him on the floor.

“What way did you plan for me to find out?” It came out a little harsher than he’d intended, but she’d promised to tell him if this happened, and after ignoring all his messages—

The first tendril of blackness snaked through his stomach as he stared at her flushed face. The lack of welcome. The way she could barely look at him. The cold silence on her end of the line once he’d returned from New York.

“You weren’t going to tell me, were you?” How he got that sentence out around the baseball in his throat was nothing short of miraculous.

After the longest pause in history, she shook her head. “But not because I didn’t want to. Because—” Something choked off her words and she bent nearly double, scrubbing at her face with the heel of her hand.

He had no trouble filling in that blank. Because it wasn’t his baby.

Dark, ugly jealousy flooded his chest as he stared at her. While he’d been falling for her and trying to reconcile all of these strange, wondrous emotions, she’d been seeing other people. Why wouldn’t she? They hadn’t established any exclusivity. He’d just assumed...

And look where that had gotten him. He followed the rules and she broke them. She’d never had any interest in having a family, not the way he did. They were always going to be opposites and pregnancy was an irreversible showstopper.

Thank God he hadn’t told her he wanted more like he’d half considered while in New York, or this gutting would definitely be worse. Though he had a hard time seeing how when it felt like his stomach was on fire.

How was it possible that he’d been trying to figure out how to take the next step with her while she’d been backing away as fast as she could?

* * *

The longer Logan sat on her bathroom floor by the open cabinet, the more Trinity genuinely thought she might throw up right then and there.

Morning sickness had picked a hell of a time to whack her. She’d called in sick to work, a first, but Cass had totally understood despite the fact that she’d never once done it herself.

Trinity was too miserable to care that she was not the champion pregnant woman among Fyra’s executives. Now Logan had forced her to deal with him, too.

When she’d opened the door, the first thing that had slammed through her body was relief. Thank God. He was here and she didn’t have to do this by herself. All she’d wanted to do was fall into his arms, to babble endless words about how much she’d missed him, how beautiful and strong and solid he was. How she knew he was going to make everything better.

Good thing she hadn’t. As soon as she realized he was in the bathroom going through her cabinets, she’d hurled herself out of bed to stop him. But it was too late. And judging by the look on his face, this pregnancy conversation was not going to end well.

He was furious.

“You didn’t want to tell me?” he ground out through clenched teeth. “You didn’t think I had a right to know?”

She’d never heard his voice sound so tightly controlled, so much like he was holding himself in. It frightened her a little. Hadn’t he said he wanted kids and had every intention of being in the baby’s life? Or had she completely misremembered that?

“I...”

Have no defense.

Really, she didn’t. It was only due to her own cowardice that she hadn’t told him right away, and as a result, she’d ended up alone over the last couple of days anyway. Nausea turned her stomach over and threatened to expel the chicken noodle soup she’d eaten earlier to settle it.

“I can’t do this now,” she whispered and sank to the hardwood floor outside her bathroom. She’d thought...well, it didn’t matter that she’d thought maybe there was a chance things might magically work out.

“Or ever?” he countered. “You didn’t want to tell me because you realized our publicity campaign would be over, right?”

Stricken, she stared at him. He thought she’d kept this quiet because she was worried about publicity? “That makes no sense, Logan. Why would our opportunities for publicity end just because I’m pregnant?”

As if that was the most important thing to hash out. He hadn’t asked how she was dealing with it, how far along she was. Whether she’d gone to the doctor. None of the things she’d expected. His reaction was almost...cold.

A shiver worked down her spine. This situation was unraveling fast. Potential for miscarriage aside, now that he knew, she’d honestly expected more of a positive reaction.