“Honey,” Thatch said and moved to stand beside her. He placed both hands on her shoulders and refused to let her shrug them off. “I’m not spouting off crazy bullshit right now. I honestly think you might be pregnant.”
She shook her head, and her face morphed into utter disbelief. “Do you even realize how insane you sound? I’m on birth control. There’s no way I’m pregnant.”
“I think you need to take a test, honey,” he said, voice soft. “When was your last period?”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she scoffed. “I’m not going to recount my ovulation cycle with you.”
But even as the words flowed past her lips, her face showed that maybe she wasn’t so certain.
Winnie’s unyielding voice sounded from the other side of the room.
“Come on, Cass. Let’s go get a test.”
She looked at Winnie for a long moment until she nodded without even an attempt to argue. Winnie had undeniable authority.
I immediately pictured her bent over my desk, a red reminder of my handprint on her ass.
Goddammit.
“Fine,” Cassie relented and tossed her hands in the air. She turned toward Thatch and stabbed her finger into his chest. “Get ready to be proven wrong.”
Thatch smirked, but the gentleness in his eyes showed he wasn’t even considering being wrong in this scenario. That was a look of a man who was certain. And he wasn’t the least bit upset but the possibility.
No, he looked thrilled.
“I’m not pregnant,” I said and opened the pregnancy test package. “I’m on birth control. There’s no fucking way I’m pregnant.”
Right? I took the pill every day. I hadn’t been on any antibiotics. There had been zero hiccups with my cycle. Shit was normal. Well, besides the constant need to bone, but I lived with a giant who could fuck like a god. I’d like to find the woman who wouldn’t want to have constant sex in that scenario.
I glanced at Georgia and Winnie. They were both leaning against the bathroom counter, watching me damn near tear the package in two. And neither had expressed they were on the same page as me. The Cassie Isn’t Pregnant page.
I narrowed my eyes at Georgia when I noted the soft expression on her face and her frequent glances toward my belly. “No, Wheorgie,” I said and pointed the test at her. “Go ahead and get those thoughts right out of your head. I’m. Not. Pregnant.”
Her expression grew softer, and she smiled.
“Seriously. Stop looking at me like that.”
“Just go take the test, Cass,” she finally said.
I groaned and stepped into the bathroom stall. This was about the most ridiculous situation I had ever been involved in. Taking a goddamn pregnancy test inside Duane Reade while the guys waited outside in the parking lot. Go back ten years and put us in a high school bathroom and this could’ve been an episode of Teen Mom.
Granted, it wasn’t his choice that Thatcher wasn’t with me.
I had refused to let him join me while I peed on a stick. With the excited expression I had witnessed on his face, I had a feeling he would’ve been hovering over the toilet and holding the stick while I peed.
I was in and out of the stall in less than two minutes. After I set the test down on a clean paper towel, I washed my hands while Winnie and Georgia looked down at it the entire time.
“Seriously, you guys can stop staring at it. I already told you the answer. I’m not pregnant,” I said as I dried off my hands and tossed the used paper towel in the trash. I leaned against the bathroom counter, crossed my arms over my chest, and looked everywhere but at the test.
That stupid test. I wasn’t pregnant.
Seriously, how many times did I have to tell these idiots I wasn’t pregnant?
Thatch couldn’t have been more wrong about this. I was sure of it.
“Cass,” Georgia whispered, “You should probably look at this.”
I glanced over at her and watched her eyes go wide.
“No,” I refused. “I’m not looking at it. I already know the answer.”
“Cassie,” Winnie chimed in, “Georgia’s right. You need to check the results yourself.”
I rolled my eyes. “Don’t be ridiculous. Just tell me what it says… Go ahead,” I said, gesturing with my hand. “Just say Not Pregnant, and then we can all leave this bathroom and head to the bar.”
Georgia shook her head. “I can’t. You need to be the one to see it.”
“You guys are being ridiculous.” I groaned and strode to their side of the counter and snatched the pee stick off the towel. My eyes met the result window, and I laughed.
One pink line straight down the middle. Not pregnant.
I held the test up in the air. “See? Not pregnant. I told you guys.”
Winnie’s eyes went wide while Georgia’s eyes filled with tears.
I honestly felt a little bad about the whole thing. I hadn’t realized she wanted me to be pregnant that badly. “I’m sorry, Georgie,” I said. “I promise one day I’ll get pregnant and you’ll be the godmother just like we talked about.”
God, my best friend was so fucking sweet I could hardly stand it.
“Uh, Cassie,” Winnie said as she reached forward and wrapped her hand around my hand that was still holding the test. “You’re looking at the control window. You need to move your thumb to see the actual results.”
I glanced down at the test and watched as her index finger slid my thumb away from the result screen. The test window doubled in size, and the pink lines had multiplied.
One.
Two.
Wait. What?
I counted them again.
One.
Two.
What?
I’m pregnant?!
I stared down at that test for who knows how long.
I was stunned.
Speechless.
I was motherfucking knocked up.
“That giant bastard got me pregnant!” I shouted when verbal function returned, and I strode straight out of the bathroom, piss-stained test in hand. My feet smacked across the tile floor of Duane Reade, and within seconds, I was striding through the automatic doors toward the parking lot.
Thatch leaned against the bumper of his Range Rover, arms crossed over his chest and face relaxed, while he chatted with Kline and Wes.
I took four stomping steps out of the entrance of the store and then chucked the pregnancy test across the parking lot. It nailed Thatch square in his forehead.
“Ow, what the fuck?” He glanced up to find me practically shooting laser beams from my eyes aimed in his and only his direction. “Cass? Honey?”
I didn’t say a word. I just pointed down at the pregnancy test sitting on the pavement beside his feet.
He titled his head to the side before bending down and picking it up.
He held the test in the air. “Did you take it already?”
“Oh, yeah,” I confirmed. “I took it all right.”
I heard the automatic doors open behind me and knew that Winnie and Georgia had followed me out. Kline and Wes glanced at the girls, but Thatch’s eyes stared down at the test.
I swear he didn’t move for a full minute.
And then, his mouth morphed into the biggest smile I had ever seen.
He looked at me, then he looked at my belly, then he looked at the test.
“We’re pregnant?” he asked when his eyes met mine again.
“No,” I snapped. “We’re not pregnant.” I pointed at myself. “I’m pregnant. I’m the one who’s going to get a big fat ass, and my boobs are going to be bigger than your giant fucking head. Goddammit, Thatcher. You knocked me up!”
I didn’t think it was possible, but his smile got even bigger.
I didn’t even pause, one step, two, I charged right at her until she had to look straight up to see me.
“Thatch,” she whispered when she saw the look on my face. I knew it was all there, everything I was feeling—wonder, love, excitement, and a whole lot of this is the best moment of my life.
The asphalt scraped at the denim over my knees as I dropped to them in front of her and put my forehead to her stomach.
There was a life in there made up of half of her and half of me.
Hands to her hips, I pushed the loose fabric of her shirt up until a couple inches of skin were exposed above the waist of her skirt.
My lips had a mind of their own, and my eyes closed at the feel of her warm, thrumming skin beneath them. When her small hands sank into my hair, tears threatened at the corners of my eyes.
“Thatcher,” she whispered again. I opened my eyes to look up at her, but my lips never left her skin.
“We made a baby, Cassie.” Her throat bobbed, and she nodded.
God, I am so in love with her.
“Are you happy?” I asked, even though part of me was scared to know the answer.
I hadn’t planned on getting her pregnant, and I certainly hadn’t been trying, but here, with my mouth a few inches away from our baby, I’d never wanted anything more.
“It’s soon,” she said gently, but her eyes were soft. Love and happiness were the only two things that could ever make her look that soft.
I shook my head. “Everything. You. Me. This tiny, surely out of its motherfucking mind combination of us. The timing. It’s all so right.”
“We’re going to need a new set of rules,” she said with a smile.
I laughed but shook my head. “I only have one.”
“Just one? I’m knocked up, the two of us are going to have to figure out how to be parents, and you only have one fucking rule?”