Elle snickers quietly as she releases my arm to dab my eyes again. “This is Archer’s fat-guy-in-a-little-coat moment. Right? This is his rock bottom. And he’sneededa rock bottom. And maybe this feels like yours, too. So that means, for both of you, there’s only one direction to go from here, and that’sup.”
She’s got a solid point. And I’m already irrevocably in love with her, but this is the kindest thing anyone has ever done for me outside of the Reyeses taking me in as a teen, and I can feel the word-vomit of my feelings lurching up my throat. There’s no point in stopping it. I have nothing left to lose. So I let it go.
“Elle… I love you.” I keep my eyes glued on the floor between my shoes, and her hand stills on my back. “I’ve been falling in love with you since that weekend. I’ve wanted you since the first moment I laid eyes on you. The reason I gave you my phone number on that first day was because you were kind to me in the middle of a shitty situation without even knowing it was a shitty situation. That five-minute conversation managed to give me an embarrassing amount of hope that you might become the one good thing in my life.” I drop my head lower because she doesn’t say anything, not that I expect her to. “I’m sorry for the way I reacted to realizing you were my new employee. I’m sorry for throwing you under the bus and humiliating you. I’m sorry for the way I treated you every single day. I’m sorry I never apologized for any of it before now. I can’t even offer a good reason why I acted like that except that I have been so angry for so long. You didn’t deserve any of that. And I don’t deserve to be with you the way I want to.But.” I rub the heel of my palm across my forehead, and there’s no way I’ll be able to look at her after this. “But I’ve never wanted anything as much as I’ve wanted you, up until you told me about this baby, and now you both are all I want in this whole world. And I know I’m not going to get that. I know you have your own damn good reasons, and how I treated you before is a huge part of them. So I just wanted you to know.”
It feels like an eternity passes before Elle starts rubbing my back again. She doesn’t say anything, but she does wrap her hand around my bicep again, and then tilts her head to rest against my shoulder.
“You know…” she eventually says. “You kinda did apologize already. Remember? Right after Mr. Reyes called me whatever name you wouldn’t repeat? You said you shouldn’t have treated me the way you did at work. That was kind of an apology, and I appreciated it.”
“Well.” I heft a quick, self-deprecating laugh. “You’re welcome, I guess.”
Her hand sweeps up my back to the nape of my neck. “Look at me, Colin.”
I drag my gaze up and around to meet her eyes, but I don’t even get the chance to look at her for very long before she captures my lips in a chaste, yet lingering kiss. My chest simultaneously expands and aches. When she separates her mouth from mine, she remains close to my face, and then presses her forehead to mine.
“I don’t know what I’m doing,” she murmurs. “I’m really scared about a lot of things. I feel like I’m about to do the hardest thing I’ve ever done, and it’s one more thing in my life that I’m having to do alone. I don’t want to do it alone. I don’t know what we are to each other, but I do know thatwe arethis baby’s mom and dad. And I think I would honestly feel better if I knew that you were going to be in my corner for this. Kinda like that weekend. Right?” She combs back my hair with her nails. “Remember? There’s only one corner, and we’re both in it.Together.”
It’s not everything I was feebly hoping for, but it’s enough. It’s enoughenoughthat the sense of dashed hope that has crippled me for as long as I can remember suddenly feels likerealizedhope. And that’s never happened.
I want to drown Elle in kisses as deep as the ocean, but I don’t. Even with all the wonderful things she just said, what shedidn’tsay was pretty clear. She still has boundaries, still has good reasons for them, and that still has to be okay. Instead, I settle for wrapping my arm around her shoulders, pulling her close to my side, and kissing her temple.
“Yep,” I say simply.
She reaches across to pat and rub my chest and echoes, “Yep.”
After a second, a totally out-of-place giggle bursts from her and she sits up straight, pushing away from me.
I quirk an eyebrow at her. “What’s funny?”
Elle bites her bottom lip mischievously. “Okay, don’t get weirded out by this. I’ve heard that guys sort of freak out about this, but give it a second and I promise you’ll like it.”
Before I can ask her to clarify, she grabs my hand and presses it to the side of her belly. It’s a lot firmer than I expected, but not at allweird… at least, until itmoves. Something small and bulbous and even more firm pushes against my palm, and it takes everything to not jerk my hand away.
“Holyshit,” I wheeze. “Is that—”
“I’m pretty sure it’s her heel,” Elle says with another giggle as she repositions my hand, clasping my thumb and forefinger to help me grasp the edges of it. “Feel it? It kinda feels like a heel to me.”
Aheelis as good a guess as any as far as I’m concerned, because I’m mostly just completely gobsmacked and mystified. A laugh escapes my throat as I continue to brace my fingertips around the strange protruding spot on her belly, and I draw my opposite hand across my mouth to hide what I know is an idiot-like grin.
“Man,” I utter from behind my fingers. “That’s wild, Elle.”
Her hand is braced on the back of mine, and she smiles. “It is wild.” She pauses and her gaze softens. “You know what else is wild?”
I shake my head.
“This week last year was when I started my job at Platinum.” She smiles again. “So a lot can change in a year. Can’t it?”
A smile creeps across my face as I nod slowly. “It sure can.”
24
“UGH,” I GROAN FOR at least the fifth time during the prenatal yoga video Celia found on YouTube and is currentlyforcing meto do with her. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
“Youneedto, my girl.” She bends with ease and grace at her hips to plant her palms on my living room rug. “You need to make sure you’re keeping your blood flowing so you don’t get all stiff.”
I attempt to mimic the stretch, but my center of gravity is totally off these days, and I lose my balance immediately, toppling onto the floor and landing on my back like a beached whale.
“Elle!” Celia snaps. “Youcan’tfall like that!”
