Page 84 of Secrets, Lies and Love

“Why not? It’s something we have to consider.”

“I’m scared. I’d rather not think about the possibility of a baby until it becomes real.”

“Two weeks.”

“What?”

“That is the time it will take before you know whether you are expecting my child.”

“You don’t seem scared.”

“I’m a man, not a boy, Cecily. Children don’t scare me. And they aren’t made by just one person. My active participation was required. I never run away from my responsibilities.”

“I wasn’t implying that you would, but what I was thinking was that when you talk about children and marriage, you believe that you will be getting the mother as a freebie. You weren’t in love with Sue. And you’re not with me, either, because we barely know each other. How can you even consider linking your life to mine forever?”

“I believe in destiny. If it has to happen, it was written that it would be like this. Our meeting was unusual, to say the least.”

“Just like with your first wife.”

I frown, thinking about something that’s never occurred to me.

What the hell was Sue doing near the bank? At the time, when she regained consciousness, she said she had bought the second-hand stroller she was carrying that day, but there are no stores or thrift stores around that area. Commercial buildings only.

I never thought about that before. Maybe the conversation with Odin turned on my distrust.

“No, not like what happened with Sue. With her, I felt protective because she was pregnant. I want you for yourself.”

“Desire,”she repeats.

“Yes. What’s wrong with that? Can you deny that you feel it too?”

“I’m not denying it.”

“I don’t want you to leave. I don’t want another night nanny for my son. Let’s renegotiate your terms.”

“We keep everything secret until we take the pregnancy test. Maybe it will come back negative, and maybe, by then, we’ll see that everything between us was nothing more than a strong attraction, and then we’ll be able to go back to the way we were before we got together.”

I should feel relieved about the proposal. Cecily is offering me two weeks of no-strings-attached sex and telling me that if she’s not pregnant, I’ll be free again.

I don’t feel relieved, but rather pissed. “Why are you so detached?”

“What?”

“How can you be like this? I’m not trying to be an asshole, but I know that women, as a rule, get more attached, and you’re inexperienced, Cecily. But you’re acting as if what happens between us is something you experience every day.”

Her face falls, and she jumps down from the counter.

“Stop trying to run away every time you are confronted.”

“I’m not running away, but I am upset by what you said. You know I’ve never experienced what we did together. I was a virgin. You were my only. My first everything.”

Words hang heavy between us. Their strength hits us simultaneously.

I walk over to her, pick her up, and lean her against the wall. “Say it again.”

“You are my only. My first everything.”

I pull her panties to the side and lower my zipper, entering her pussy completely.

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