I guess I deserved that.
Leaning against the doorframe as if unaffected, I ask, “Mind if I come in?”
Too polite to tell me no, Laurel shakes her head and takes a step back.
It’s a small bathroom—maybe normal by some standards, but compared to even the smallest bathroom in my house, this is a pantry. Hell, my pantry is larger than this bathroom.
I shut the door behind me and take a step forward. Laurel is close already because it’s so crammed in here, but I’m not one to pussyfoot around. Rather than wait for an invitation that won’t come from a woman I’ve let slip away from me, I reach out and wrap an arm around her shoulders, pulling her into the sanctuary of my chest. I hear her sigh, then feel her relief as she settles into my embrace. Her relief feeds mine. Perhaps she hasn’t recovered her trust in me, perhaps mine isn’t the face she wanted to see when she opened the door, but now she moves into my arms like I’m someone she likes. Like she did those days in Chicago when she followed her instincts instead of common sense and decided she could trust me.
It’s my fault Laurel trusted me. I gave her every encouragement to do so, and it seemed harmless at the time. It was only a fling, after all. I could reside in her memory as a good experience, she would be the same for me, and safely tucked away from one another for the rest of all time, it could be true. I could have simply been the handsome stranger she spent a wonderful weekend with.
If only the goddamn condom hadn’t failed us.
Now she gets the reality of me. Usually women I’m only casually involved with get the fun experience, the charming Rafe, not the one my girlfriends have to deal with. There’s a reason I don’t have girlfriends all that often; I’m much more appealing as a hook-up, and I know that about myself.
Laurel didn’t. Laurel believed in the fantasy I showed her, and now even though she has seen it blown all to shit, she is letting me hold her. That gives me hope. Perhaps Sin doesn’t have his hooks sunk all the way into her yet. Hell, if showing her the truth worked to dull my shine, I could easily do the same thing to her vision of him. I have no idea what Laurel actually knows about Sin, but I know it can’t be the whole truth or she wouldn’t look at him the way she does.
Now’s not the time for that, though. For whatever reason, she’s sniffling into my dress shirt. I didn’t understand why she got so upset all of a sudden, but when she rushed off looking like she was about to burst into tears, I looked at Sin for an explanation.
“Hormones,” he said, simply.
Now I rub Laurel’s back, knowing this is probably my fault, too. If she really hasn’t had sex with anyone else, then I have to be the one responsible for impregnating her. I still don’t know how, and I’m never going to trust another condom again as long as I live, but it’s starting to seem like this is real.
“Tell me what’s wrong,” I murmur.
“Everything,” she says, rather dramatically.
“Let’s narrow it down. What are the top three things that are wrong right now? I have an entire criminal empire at my disposal, you have that giant Price brain in your pretty head; surely together we can fix three things, can’t we?”
Another sniffle. Then she mutters, “I’m pregnant. You’re the father. You sure you want a third thing? I can keep going into double digits if you want me to.”
I smile faintly, even though she’s emotional and annoyed at me. She can’t see my face while she’s tucked into my chest, so I’m safe. “Do you not want to be pregnant?” I ask her.
She doesn’t answer me. I don’t know whether she’s afraid to admit how she feels, or afraid of my response, so I go on.
“If you don’t, I understand. You’re only 19 and this isn’t your home. But if you do, that’s fine, too. It’s perfectly understandable if you want to make the best of a bad situation. I know you didn’t get pregnant on purpose. There’s no way you could have. I’m the one who provided the condoms, not you.”
After a moment, her tone still low, she asks, “Why did you have to be so mean? This is the Rafe I thought I was coming to see.”
I run a slow hand up and down her back in a gentle, reassuring motion. “No one can be at their best all the time, kitten. Surely you know that.”
Now she bends her head up to look at me. “I didn’t expect you at your best all the time, I just expected ‘not cruel.’ I don’t think that’s an excessively high expectation to have.”
I brush her hair back behind her ear, running a hand along her jawline. “No, you’re right; it wasn’t a lot to expect. I’m the one who reacted like a scared 19-year-old and you were the one who behaved like an adult.”
Laurel nods. “Next thing you know, I’ll start running your mafia. I’ll probably be better at that, too.”
She startles a little laugh out of me. “Maybe. You want to be queen for a day? I’ll let you call all the shots.”
“Psh, for a day,” she murmurs good-naturedly. “I’m gonna run this city.”
“Mm hmm. As long as you never have to lie,” I state, recalling her horrendous attempt at lying to her sister on the phone.
“I need time to prepare before lying. I can’t pull it off on the fly like that.”
“Yes, if I didn’t pick that up by
the time you name-dropped your friend Wennifer, it hit home then.”