In the clear light of day, she forced herself to go back over her list of all the reasons Jake was bad for her. He’d never love her the way she loved him. And after their one night together, when he’d touched her like she mattered—then disappeared—she knew better than to ever give weight to that hope again. If she hadn’t gotten pregnant and come to tell him the news, she knew with absolute certainty that he never would have come after her. Rather, he would have avoided her completely, just the way he’d avoided numerous Sullivan family events in the past two and a half months that she knew he would otherwise have attended.
Only, their lovemaking this morning had seemed different from their first night together. She hadn’t had as many orgasms, but it had still been better. Because Jake really seemed to want her, not just that fantasy bridesmaid she’d had the makeup artist and hairstylist put together for him.
This morning, she’d felt like he was touching her because he couldn’t bear not to.
Of course, he’d gone and ruined that theory right away when he jumped off her and shoved those pillows under her knees. Jake was the last person on earth she would have thought would go nuts over pregnant women, but it only confirmed the main fact she needed to remember at all times: he clearly wanted her for the baby, not for herself. And if some great sex was thrown in along the way to having that kid, who was he to say no?
She opened the fridge to see if there was anything in there that could settle her slightly nauseous stomach, but the smell of last night’s leftovers had her slamming it shut a few seconds later, muttering, “I could probably be any pregnant woman and he’d be losing it over me. The big jerk probably has some kind of weird pregnant-woman fetish.”
“What’s that about fetishes?”
She spun around, hand over her heart. “I didn’t know you were here.” Not wanting to have to explain herself, she picked up her bag and headed for the door. That was when she suddenly realized something strange. There were no books anywhere. Not on the coffee table or the counter, and especially not sitting around in piles on the floor like at her place, tripping her every time she went out to get a midnight snack.
But when he put his hand on her lower back, her questions about his lack of reading material fled as she focused her thoughts on ignoring how good his touch felt…and how nice his manners were.
It’s because of the baby
, she reminded herself.
They drove in silence to her apartment. He drove the way he made love, his big hands controlling the wheel of his expensive car gently, but firmly. Her body heated up and she squirmed in the passenger seat, pressing her thighs together to try and stop the ache.
“I’m only human, Sophie.” His eyes flicked to her face, then her breasts and legs, naked beneath his shirt. “Keep looking at me like that and I’m going to pull over so we can take care of the problem.”
“There’s no problem,” she assured him, but her voice was ragged enough that she knew it was clear she was lying.
How could she reconcile the
Nice
Sophie she’d been her whole life with the wanton woman in Jake’s car who wanted to spread her legs wide for him and let him do whatever he wanted to her in the middle of downtown San Francisco traffic?
Thank God they pulled up in front of her apartment thirty seconds later. “I’ll be back in a couple of minutes. You can wait in the car.”
She shoved the door open and nearly fell out onto the sidewalk in her hurry to get away from temptation. She could only imagine how small her apartment would feel if Jake were in there with her...and how hard it would be to keep her clothes on around him so that they actually had a chance of making it to her doctor’s appointment on time.
* * *
Jake knew he should be feeling guilty about the dirty thoughts running in circles in his head, about the fact that he’d been ten seconds from making good on his threat to pull over and put his hands and mouth all over Sophie.
But, damn if she wasn’t the hottest thing he’d ever come across...and so transparent that she couldn’t possibly keep her lustful thoughts from passing over her face one after the other as she sat next to him in the small interior of his sports car.
Two and a half months ago, she’d given herself to him without a second thought. Now, even though she clearly wanted him as much as he wanted her, he could see her intent was to withhold every part of herself that she could. Yes, she’d agreed to be in his bed, but even though that should have been more than enough for him, it wasn’t. Not anymore. Not after having had all of her once before.
What, he wondered, would it take for Sophie to open up to him again? To trust him the way she’d trusted him in Napa?
A heavy weight settled in Jake’s gut as he silently acknowledged her valid reasons for not trusting him. She would never believe him if he told her he wasn’t the kind of guy who slept with a girl and then left her hanging for months. He’d always been clear with his lovers about expectations, about the fact that they couldn’t have any. And he’d never slunk away in the middle of the night like a coward.
Until Sophie.
And he had no idea how to make it up to her.
No question, the sexual connection he and Sophie shared was as good as it got. Their desire for each other wasn’t going anywhere, no matter how hard she tried to slam the brakes on it.
But that wasn’t enough. He’d always liked Sophie, but now that he was seeing the different sides to her—the smart and the sexy, the complicated emotions and the simple pleasures she took from beauty and food, the spark that sprang from the serene—he realized he wanted her to like him, too.
And that, he already knew, was going to be the biggest hurdle of all, considering he’d be hard-pressed to come up with reasons why she should.
Sophie came back to the car wearing a soft, long-sleeved sweater dress in gray that did more for her curves than he figured she knew. She’d put on a little makeup and brushed her hair until it shone. She buckled her seatbelt and sat with her hands primly clasped on her lap before telling him the address of her doctor’s office in a tight voice.
He couldn’t help but smile at the way she was trying so hard to rein in all that passion she’d been losing the battle to just minutes before. His lovely, foolish girl. Didn’t she realize she should just give in already?
“We’re about to be late,” she snapped when he didn’t start the car. But when she finally turned to him, whatever she’d been about to say fell away, confusion taking its place. “Why are you looking at me like that? What are you smiling about?”
She was so easy to rile up. He could already see he’d never get tired of putting sparks into her pretty eyes.
“Whatever you have up your sleeve,” she muttered, “you’d better just forget it.”
The truth was, he didn’t have anything much up his sleeve for the time being. He wanted to get through this doctor’s appointment first before he moved on to his next step in convincing her to marry him. But Sophie didn’t need to know that. Especially not when he found he liked having her on her toes, anticipating what he was going to do next.
Whether she’d ever admit it or not, she liked it, too.
“Don’t you wish you knew?” he said in as sensual tone as he could muster around his grin, then sped off into traffic before she could say another word.
Chapter Fourteen
Sophie checked in with the receptionist, then sat on one of the padded leather seats in the waiting room and picked up a magazine. She was determined to ignore Jake. Of course, that was nearly impossible, with all the other women in the room staring at him in wonder.
These women were all pregnant, for God’s sake! What were they doing looking at a stranger like that?
It wasn’t that she was possessive about him, she told herself, just that they were behaving inappropriately. Their husbands wouldn’t be pleased if they knew the way their wives were practically bowing down prostrate before Jake’s male beauty.
“So,” he asked one of the women, “how’s your pregnancy going?”
Of course, he couldn’t just leave it alone, could he? The woman beamed at him as though he were the Second Coming.
“Really great.” The woman leaned in close as if she were telling him a secret. “I’m having a boy.”
Jake leaned closer and grinned at the woman. “That’s great.”
“I’m having a girl!” another woman from across the room piped in.
Jake smiled at her, too. “Congratulations.” He nodded at the women. “There really is nothing prettier than a pregnant woman.”
Sophie had never seen people look as happy as these women did after he made his proclamation. What was wrong with them?
And why did she feel so pathetically jealous?
“I knew it,” she muttered into her magazine and the woman closest to her raised an eyebrow.
“What do you know?” he asked, putting his hand on her knee.
Why did he have to be so warm? And why did she have to love being touched by him so much? Way too much.
She purposefully uncrossed and recrossed her legs so that he’d have to slide his hand away.
I knew you were one of those pregnancy fetish creeps
was what she was thinking, but she simply said, “Nothing.”
He leaned in close and she could feel his breath on her earlobe. “I’ll find a way to convince you to tell me later, you know.” His tongue flicked out against her earlobe before he pulled away and she barely swallowed a lust-filled moan before it escaped her lips.
Angry with herself for having absolutely zero control over her hormones around him, she hissed, “You’re a pervert, that’s what!”
His laughter at her crazy statement rumbled through the waiting room. “I can’t wait to hear why.”
“You know why.”
He looked at her in confusion for a second and she had to nod her head in the other women’s directions before awareness dawned. His laughter was loud enough this time to ring out through the room. “So that’s what your muttering about fetishes was this morning. You think I’m into—” He broke off, laughing again.
She purposely lifted her magazine closer so that she could pretend to be engrossed in the article she hadn’t even glanced at yet.
A moment later, when he’d finally stopped laughing, he leaned back over and whispered, “Might be easier to read this way.”
His big, strong body was too close to hers in the small waiting room for her brain to figure out what he was talking about until he turned the magazine around in her hands.
Oh my God. How embarrassing. She didn’t normally care what a bunch of strangers thought of her, but then again, she’d always blended into the background, so no one had ever really noticed her.
Being with Jake, she was slowly realizing, was the opposite of being invisible. He had too much presence, was far too charismatic and charming—not to mention gorgeous—for her to stay hidden when she was with him.
It should have been easier to get lost behind him. But he wouldn’t allow that, she realized, as he put his hand back on her thigh and held it there, no matter what she did to try to shake him off. For all his arrogance, he didn’t seem interested in hogging the limelight. Instead, she got the strange sense that he was proud to be sitting there with her.
Even when she was doing dumb things like pretending to read a magazine upside down.
“When are you due?”
Sophie couldn’t believe the woman in the corner asked Jake the question instead of her, like they had some special bond just because he’d smiled at her and said she was pretty.
Of course, it stung even more that Sophie hadn’t needed much more of a reason than his smile to fall in love with him so many years ago.
“In the fall.”
No one could miss the possessive note in his voice, or his clear joy at the prospect of having a baby. Sophie felt her heart soften despite herself.
Darn it, why couldn’t he be more of a jerk all the time? Why did he have to keep having these moments when he seemed like the perfect guy? It would make it so much easier to hate him if he would just behave like a self-absorbed imbecile, rather than a sweetly concerned, uber-sexy father-to-be.
Then again, at least it helped her remember that the only thing he was really interested in was the baby. Not her. After all, he’d walked out on her without a second glance, but as soon as he’d heard about a child, he’d become the most possessive person on the planet.
“Oh, that’s wonderful!” the woman exclaimed. “Congratulations.”
Jake squeezed Sophie’s thigh just above her knee and thrill bumps immediately ran up and down her legs at the intimate touch.
“Thanks,” he replied. “We’re really excited about it.”
Amazingly, it was true. Despite the fact that she’d gotten pregnant by accident
and
the status of their relationship was completely up in the air, amazingly, both of them really were excited about having a child. Even if the whole co-parenting thing was going to be sticky from different households—especially if there was one of his playthings over when she went to pick up her kid at his house.
At some point after she had the baby, they’d have to have a talk about what was and wasn’t appropriate for children to see. Yes, she’d be sure to let him know she expected him to keep all future dates and sexual partners away from their child, simply so he didn’t confuse their son or daughter. If it put a damper on his sex life, he’d just have to deal with that, wouldn’t he?
A nurse popped her head out of the door that led back to the examination rooms. “Sophie Sullivan?”
Sophie stood up and Jake moved with her, his hand on her lower back. The nurse looked between them, a question in her eyes.
How many times, she wondered, would she see those same silent questions?
This is the man you’re with? How did you possibly pull that off? And how can I get one just like him?
At least, she thought with a small measure of gratitude, rather than barging in and taking over absolutely everything, Jake was waiting patiently for her to explain why he was there.
Only, Sophie wasn’t sure she could explain any of it at all, not without using words like
in love with him forever
and
never going to love me back...
and, of course,
crazy accident.