Mistletoe Magic (Paradise Place #6) - Natalie Ann Page 0,63

other thing Alex said was that he thought I was easy pickings and that you just wanted me for my money. It’d be hard to say that to you.”

“He said the same to me. I was quick to put him in his place. And you shouldn’t feel like you can’t say that to me. Or that you need to run it by your brother over me either.”

“He wanted to give me some dirt on you and I hung up on him. I don’t believe anything he has to say about anyone or anything. Even Rick defended you, saying that he might have thought you were looking at my wealth before he met you. Very few are aware of it.”

He snorted. “I’m glad Rick defended me, but I’m still hurt you didn’t feel you could come to me about this. And I’m sure the dirt he wanted to say was that I’ve dated clients before.”

“But I approached you. You didn’t approach me,” she argued. She wasn’t letting her mind fall into any rabbit hole here.

“Alex didn’t like to hear that. And the truth is, that is normally how it went down. I’ve never asked a client or ex-client out. They always asked me. We’ve had this talk.”

He’d brought it up once before, months ago. That he’d sworn off of dating clients, or ex-clients and yet somehow ended up with her and he couldn’t be happier. “We did. You’re a great catch and many want you.”

He laughed. “Yet I always get thrown back into the water. Or maybe I throw them back. Not sure. I don’t plan on tossing you anywhere.”

“You can’t get rid of me,” she said, moving over to sit on his lap. “Are we good? I mean I know this wasn’t a fight, but it felt like one. I should have told you he called me, but I just wanted to put it behind me.”

“I believe that. We’re good. And for full transparency, because I don’t like secrets, Alex made a comment to me about you doing anything to have a child. I put him in his place and said we’ve talked about kids and both want them. I don’t think he wanted to hear that either.”

“Probably not. He always changed the subject when I talked about wanting a family. I was on the pill, but the minute I said I wanted to start thinking about kids, he put a condom on again. Kept saying he didn’t want to take any chances.”

She’d never told anyone how devastating that was to her. That her husband didn’t trust her or didn’t want a kid so badly that he was going to make sure it didn’t happen. She wondered if he would have blamed her if she ever got pregnant by mistake.

“Be glad there wasn’t a child between you two and you can truly move on from him.”

“I am. You know that.”

Even though the last year of their marriage they didn’t have sex often, Alex always protected himself. She was grateful for that after she found out about his affair. He’d told her he’d gotten tested before he stopped wearing one because he had a reputation. He volunteered to do it and show her the results. She’d never asked and thought it was sweet of him to do that.

But since he wasn’t always covered while they were together she got tested right away. Then a few more times after. She’d even told Brian one day in his office she was terrified of catching a disease and went for the test again.

“I’m glad I stopped over and we talked about this,” he said, giving her a kiss on the forehead and hugging her. “Don’t be afraid to come to me with things. Hiding or having secrets isn’t the type of relationship I want.”

“Me neither,” she said.

27

Be Free

Except two weeks later she realized she was still holding onto one big whopping secret.

She was pregnant.

How the hell had this happened?

Brian was wearing a condom. He always did.

She’d gone off the pill a few months after she left Alex. There was no reason to be on it and she hated to put any kind of hormone in her body if she didn’t need to.

She was pretty regular and it’d never been an issue.

But last week she noticed she was more than two weeks late with her period and hadn’t realized it at all. She wasn’t paying attention and time got away from her.

Maybe it was just the emotions of Alex reaching out to Brian and then