“Fine,” she says, stabbing another piece of egg more violently. She puts it in her mouth and chews like she needs a minute to gather enough gumption, then she looks up at me a little rebelliously and says, “We decided to date. We were going to sneak around for a while since the stakes are so high for you, to make sure we worked before we made any kind of commitment. Then, if things didn’t go the way we thought they would and we didn’t think we’d work out, we’d go our separate ways, both of us knowing it didn’t work out for the right reasons.”
I put my fork down and look at her across the table. If it didn’t work out was never the problem; that’s easy. If I only wanted to fuck around with her for a while, I know I could. She’s made that clear enough. The problem is, I can’t use her that way knowing she wants more and I’ll never find myself in a position to give it to her.
Since she doesn’t seem to be freely offering the magical plan she and whiskey-soaked Brantley cooked up to solve this problem I can’t solve sober, I go ahead and ask. “And was there a plan for if it did work out? ’Cause so far, I’m not hearing anything I haven’t already thought of, but it’s just an excuse to lead you on for a little longer, not a solution to our problem.”
She takes a drink of her orange juice, then another bite of egg. At first I think she’s just stalling while she musters the courage to say it, but after a couple more bites, I start to think she’s not going to answer me at all.
“Alyssa?”
Her cheeks are pink and she shakes her head. “Forget it. I can’t say it now. It sounded crazy last night, but it sounds crazier today and I just… I’m not going to do that to myself. You’re not going to go for it now, anyway.”
“Did I think it was crazy last night, or did I agree with you?”
“You agreed with it and built upon it. I only suggested one crazy thing. You took it and ran with it.”
Fantastic. I take a sip of my coffee. Then, as I’m putting it back on the table, I tell her, “Well, go on and tell me.”
“I can’t. You’ll laugh or ridicule me or do something awful to hurt my feelings, and then I’ll stab you with this fork.”
“Alyssa,” I say firmly, keeping my gaze locked on her. “I won’t do any of that. Tell me what we said.”
She’s quiet for so long I don’t think she’s going to speak again, but then she suddenly bursts out with, “You basically said it’s not the fact that I was with Theo that’s the unsurpassable problem, it was more because I’m pregnant. You said Bri might start to get suspicious once she finds out, since she knew I didn’t have a boyfriend or anyone in the picture who could have feasibly impregnated me. Since I was babysitting for her when it happened, you thought in that scenario, she might eventually figure out about me and Theo.”
She pauses to breathe, so I nod for her to continue.
“And then I told you, if you were to introduce me to Bri and the rest of your family as yours, they would see someone in the picture who could have impregnated me. No one else would cross Bri’s mind, because…she would think my baby is yours.”
It’s a damn good thing I’m not taking a drink when she says that, because I think I’d probably choke. I’m aware of her watching me like a hawk, waiting for me to react the way she said I would so she can jump all over my ass and tell me this is why she didn’t want to say anything. So, even though it surprises the hell out of me that she’d even suggest that, I keep my expression schooled and nod my head again.
“All right,” I say slowly. “And what did I say to that?”
Sighing with regret, she throws her napkin down on the table. “A lot of stupid sexy things, but… mainly you said everyone in your family knows if you knocked a woman up, stranger or not, you’d marry her.” She darts another look in my direction. “And then you started talking about how if we decided to rewrite history that way, we would have to really be committed to it, how we would be committed to each other, and…how the next baby I had would be yours.”
I do pretty well keeping my face impassive until she drops that last bomb, then my jaw drops open a couple inches and my eyebrows rise.
I close my mouth as fast as I can, but I’m trying to mull over what she’s telling me. “Are you saying I essentially offered to be the father of your baby, lie to my sister about it, and marry you?”