That Wild Night. Aimee Carson
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getting off him, but the intensity was like a palpable thing. “I spoke to your doctor already and hyperemesis gravidarum can be dangerous and severe. You are not fine, Darcy.”
Guilt washed over her in a wave. She’d thought it was just morning sickness in an all-day, extended package, which she’d heard was normal, too. Though she’d planned to speak to her doctor at her next checkup about the extremity of it, she’d had no idea her body had begun turning against her, threatening what she’d been struggling to protect.
“I didn’t know it had gotten so bad. I don’t own a scale so I didn’t know how much weight I’d lost. My clothes fit a little differently, loose, but I’d heard lots of people lose weight early on.” She felt a burning pressure at the backs of her eyes and blinked to defend against the emotions trying to slip free.
She was supposed to be the one who took her responsibilities seriously and made the right decisions. She was supposed to be able to count on herself. Her child’s life depended on it.
She swallowed and looked up at Jeff.
The man who was all laughter and easy good times hadn’t shown up at her bedside. This Jeff was serious. No-nonsense. And he was here because the woman responsible for protecting his child hadn’t even realized she was at risk of failing.
This Jeff had every reason for making an appearance. If the tables were turned, she’d be looking at him the same way.
“Jeff, I’m sorry.”
He nodded, but the look in his eyes was hard. “Here’s the deal, Darcy. I know you’re tough and I know you’re independent. But I’m uncomfortable with you alone like this. From what I understand, it was a fluke your boss happened to be walking by when you passed out. You work in isolation for hours at a stretch. Take public transportation home alone to the apartment you don’t share with anyone else. You don’t have anyone here looking out for you, so what I’m asking, is does it really make sense for you to still be up here?”
She looked down at her hands, at the plastic tube snaking its way up her arm, feeling more alone in that moment than she could ever remember feeling before.
“I’ve got a job here, Jeff.”
He stepped closer to the bed, and after a pause, dropped into the chair beside her. His hand moved to her belly and rested there for a beat. “You’ve got our baby in here. And he’s kicking your butt. Come back with me and I’ll take care of you. We’ll get through this together. You don’t have to be on your own.”
Darcy couldn’t take her eyes off the sight of his hand against her stomach, couldn’t think about anything but the heat radiating from his touch and how good it felt, when nothing had felt good, since the last time—the first time—he’d put his hands on her.
Which she couldn’t think about. Not like this. Not with him touching her in a way that was so totally not about her at all, but about the child they shared together. About his concern.
Jeff cleared his throat. “We could get married.”
Darcy stiffened. “We don’t even know each other.”
“I don’t mean permanently. Just until the baby is born, so he’d be legitimate.”
The breath leaked from her lungs, as she shook her head, trying to ignore that pinch of disappointment there was no justification for. “Legitimacy isn’t any reason to get married, Jeff.”
“I know. Forget it.” Jeff let out an impatient growl, pulled his hand away and then ran it through the mess of his hair going on as if he hadn’t dropped that bomb. “You’re determined to work?”
He couldn’t understand, but he needed to accept it. “Yes.”
“Fine.” He stood, stared down at the spot where his hand had been and nodded.
Then heading for the door, he looked back with a frown. “I actually know of a position that might be the perfect fit.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“YOU LOW-DOWN, DIRTY liar,” Darcy accused, her color looking better than Jeff had seen it since Vegas.
Catching the finger she was jabbing into his chest with a gentle hand, he eased her back into the deep leather seat of the limo and clarified. “I never lied.”
Omitted, evaded and manipulated? Yes.
Definitely.
But he’d taken one look at her lying in that hospital bed, and decided the moral hit was one he’d gladly take to ensure he got Darcy out of San Francisco and down to L.A. where he could make certain she was getting what she needed.
“False pretenses, Jeff,” she hissed, her head working like a spindle as she shot nervous looks out one window after another as they rolled through the immaculately manicured upscale neighborhood of Beverly Hills.
“I told you, it was a part-time position as a personal assistant—”
“Oh, you told me all right,” she snapped. “Flexible hours, excellent benefits including room and board, assisting an elderly widow with her social and charitable obligations—”
Her words cut off with a squeak as they turned into a private community where security waved them through.
“Hey, I never said elderly. I said older. Which is true.” That’s all he needed. The wrath of both his pregnant non-girlfriend combined with the wrath of his—
“Your mother, Jeff!”
The key here was to remain calm. Not to reach over and haul Darcy into his lap and yell into her face about all the things he didn’t like about their situation. About his lack of say. And her stubborn mule streak and the fact that she wasn’t going to need a damn job for the rest of her damned life and why the hell wouldn’t she just take one of the damn checks he kept trying to give her.
So instead, he blew out a controlled breath and met her enraged stare. Turned up his palms and shrugged. “She needed an assistant.”
Okay, so his mother hadn’t actually needed the assistant until Jeff called her and told her she did. But then, she’d rather desperately started needing one. Had been downright giddy about it, truth be told.
“Oh, does she? Your mother is so very busy, so lonely and desperate for help, she needs a woman she doesn’t know moving into her home with her. A high school dropout, Jeff, who grew up in a beat-down trailer on the wrong side of the park. A Vegas cocktail waitress who went home with a virtual stranger, got knocked up and then—surprise!—showed up three months later. You think that’s the woman your mother needs assisting her with her charitable endeavors?”
Jeff stared, wondering who was in this car with him. Because the woman he’d met in Vegas, the one who’d shown up at his office, and he’d been talking to every few nights for the past few weeks knew her own worth and would never in a million years let anyone undervalue her the way she’d just undervalued herself.
He understood pregnancy hadn’t been a part of her plan, and he expected the loss of control for a woman who’d been all about the ironclad of it, had been a tough pill to swallow. He was certain it had shaken her confidence. But the words that had just come out of her mouth angered him.
“I don’t know who to be offended for first, my mother, myself, my kid or you. Look, I don’t come from a family of snobs. Yeah, we’ve got money and have had for a long time. But it doesn’t mean we don’t know the value of hard work, or respect people who’ve had to overcome challenges different than the ones we’ve faced. And here’s something else. My mother respects me. That I took you home the night I met you will tell her something about you, too.”
Darcy let out bitter laugh. “My measurements?”
“What the hell is wrong with you, Darcy? If it was just about your