Millionaire Hero (Freeman Brothers 4)

After a long stretch, she took a sip of her juice, set the glass down, and looked at me.

“Do you remember the first time I asked you to come to my house?” she asked.

I nodded. “Yeah. You weren’t feeling well, so you wanted me to come over and talk about everything.”

“Right. At that point, I had a stomach virus. It had been going on for a few days, and it was awful. I went to my doctor, and she said that particular virus was really bad this year and I had a nasty case of it. She told me to go home, get rest, drink fluids, the usual spiel. And I did, and I felt better. But then I started feeling sick and exhausted all the time again.”

“After our night together,” I said.

She pressed her lips together and gave a single sharp nod. “Right. The nurse I talked to said it could be that I caught the virus again, or that I wasn’t fully recovered to begin with, or that it was just stress. Only, it didn’t get better. The day I came to your office to give you the check for my seed money, I had an appointment with the doctor.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.

“Because I didn’t think this was what it was going to be. I thought the nurse was right and I was experiencing too much stress. It didn’t even cross my mind I could be pregnant. We only had that one night together, and I was on birth control. But—” She held out her hands to her sides, then let them drop to her lap. “—here we are.”

“How are you feeling?”

She shrugged. “Better. Still really tired, and there are mornings when I wake up really sick. But it’s almost like since I know what it is now, it’s not as bad. Like my brain was making me feel worse so I would go find out what was wrong.”

“That’s not so crazy.”

We fell into silence, and I didn’t push it. There was a lot more we needed to talk about, but it didn’t have to be now. I let the quiet calm us both and soon noticed Bryn’s eyes drifting closed. I didn’t even realize I had fallen asleep, too, until I opened my eyes. The clock on the wall read three in the morning, and Bryn was sound asleep, curled up in a ball with her head rested on the arm of the couch.

I got up carefully and took a folded blanket out of the basket sitting at the end of the couch, a housewarming gift from my mother when I first bought the house. Apparently, no living room is complete without a basket of blankets. And they should definitely be changed out seasonally to match the rest of the decor. For me that meant no decor at all, so it saved me a lot of blanket-changing time.

That night, I unfolded a soft white chenille throw and draped it carefully over Bryn. She sighed slightly in her sleep and snuggled down deeper into the couch. I watched her for a few seconds before going to my room and climbing in bed.27BrynI might have gotten used to waking up not feeling one hundred percent. Whether it was feeling a little bit queasy and dizzy, or having to make a full-on sprint for the bathroom, being sick first thing when I opened my eyes had gotten to be pretty much the norm. But somehow that made it even stranger when what I woke up dealing with was sore, tight muscles down along the sides of my neck.

The pain came before I opened my eyes. I also felt warm and cozy, and I wanted to just snuggle back down deep, pull the blanket up over my head, and keep sleeping. But something didn’t feel right. I didn’t have a blanket with that texture, and this definitely wasn’t my bed. Confused, I opened my eyes and looked around.

Just as I was remembering I had come to Nick’s house the day before and realizing I must have fallen asleep after our conversation, I heard a noise in the next room. Seconds later, he appeared, carrying a tray. Several plates and cups filled every inch of the tray, overhanging the sides. As he walked toward me, I worried it wasn’t all going to make it. But he succeeded in getting all the way across the room and lowering the tray to the table.

Sitting up straighter, I watched him unload the enormous breakfast. Eggs, waffles, home fries, grits, sausage, bacon, fruit, and a bowl of biscuits and gravy sat alongside another glass of juice, a glass of milk, and a mug that smelled like rich, robust coffee. I looked at the mug, then at Nick.

“Decaf,” he said as if he could read my mind. “I went out this morning and got you some.”