effect, maybe? I wondered how much that had cost. I didn’t realize the Cove had that big a budget.
“Baby, are you okay?”
Halfheartedly, I tried to tug my dress into place as Jared’s worried face swam into my vision from above. And aww, he was holding the cutest little reindeer with big blue eyes.
My baby. No, no, she was his.
But I yearned.
“Hey there.” I tried to lean up and slumped back down. The cold was seeping into my bones and I felt ice in inappropriate places, but I’d just stay right here. I was so tired all of a sudden.
“Bee.” Jared crouched beside my head, wrangling the dog who had nearly killed me with one arm while he held his adorable reindeer with the other. “Look at me, sweetheart.”
“Looking. Boy, are you pretty. Were your eyes always so blue?”
I swore I heard laughter. Maybe my ears were ringing. But this was a good time to come clean.
“I was going to split the money with you, I swear. But I may need a picture of your naked butt.”
And I fainted.
Fifteen
The smell of woods and lake water filtered into my senses. I tucked my nose into a hard, muscled chest dusted with the perfect amount of hair and snuggled in.
“You saved me.” I couldn’t seem to lift my eyelids, but I didn’t need to see him to know who held me. It was as if we were bouncing in the water, floating along without a care.
Well, other than hypothermia, since I was cold and wet and not in a fun way.
But his arms were so strong and supportive. He would never let me fall. Not for long. Not anymore.
He turned his face against my temple and warmth tickled my cheek, making me smile. Then my eyes popped open and focused on his damp, shattered eyes, zeroed in on my face as if he couldn’t bear to look anywhere else.
I reached up to touch his cheek and drew my wet fingers away to look at them.
“You probably won’t remember this.” His voice was so thick. “But I love you, Bee. Please don’t leave me.”
We weren’t in the lake. He crouched at my side and I was on the couch in his cheerfully decorated living room, a blanket wrapped securely around my legs. There was no baby in sight. No Sadie.
Over and over, his words played in my head in a dizzy, disbelieving loop.
“I didn’t get the money yet,” I said weakly. “Since that requires, you know, penetration.”
He laughed so hard that his knee gave out on him. He pressed his damp face to my cleavage, on the verge of exploding out of the top of my dress.
My muddy dress, now covered with giant paw prints.
I started laughing too while I stroked his hair, shocked by the tears that burst out of my eyes like they’d lurked there all along. I couldn’t even speak as they soaked my face.
Immediately, he moved to sit behind me on the sofa, tugging me into his arms as if I weighed nothing. I turned into his chest again, the safest place in the world.
The one place I wanted to never leave.
“It’s okay. You’re okay.”
When he said it, I believed him. He wouldn’t lie to me. He might break my heart, but he’d do it honestly.
He tipped his forehead to mine. “I’ve got you, Bee,” he whispered.
We sat there for the longest time. The heat kicked on and I shivered, so he brought the blanket from my legs up to drape around my shoulders. I settled against him, so tired.
He cupped the back of my head, rubbing gently when I moaned. “Just a little knot. You’ll be just fine. I had you checked out.”
“By who?”
“You don’t remember the EMTs?”
Vague snapshots flashed in my head. Nothing I could capture for long. I had a feeling I could if I strained, but I didn’t want to yet.
“You woke while they were looking at you. I wanted you to go to the hospital, but you said no quite clearly. They said you were probably just exhausted and jarred from hitting the sidewalk. I’m to watch you in case of concussion.”
I was already drifting just from the welcome rumble of his voice.
“Just rest, baby.”
I rested. I couldn’t do anything else.
The next time I woke, he was at the other end of the couch, sleeping on the fist he’d braced on the arm of the sofa. He was still wearing his suit sans jacket. His tie was loosened and he’d undone the first couple buttons