The Plan (The Hillers of Barratt County #4)

Chapter 7

7

He’d kissed her completely senseless. That was what had done it. How she had ended up like this. Here. And well… probably in this interesting condition, in the first place. He had kissed her senseless that night, too.

It had taken Ronnie a good ten minutes to realize that. By the time she had, he had her in his truck—and they were driving along the long, dark highway toward his parents’. She had never been to his parents’ before. She had met them, once or twice, but… the only one of his relatives she knew at all was his younger sister, Giavonna, who was headed to law school in a few years, and was currently a student at FCU forty miles away.

Giavonna came by to pester him ever so often. And help file and answer the phone, and other things, whenever Ronnie and George would get too swamped.

Ronnie liked his family well enough, but… “This is technically kidnapping, you know.”

“No. This is me taking my woman home to my parents.”

“I am not your woman. I am your former one-night-stand who accidentally got pregnant with your child. And now you have to face the consequences. How exactly are you going to explain me to your mother?”

“As my woman—who is pregnant with my parents’ first grandchild. After that… I’m not too concerned. They’ll do just fine.”

Them? What about Ronnie? She was starting to have a bit of a panic attack here. Her own mother barely acknowledged her existence—why would Mrs. Hiller look at her like things were okay? She’d practically trapped the woman’s oldest son here. George was wealthy, older—and here she was, a normal everyday nobody, claiming to be carrying an heir to the Hiller fortune! His mother was going to hate her on sight! “You really don’t make much sense.”

His hand wrapped around hers. Scorching her. “We’ll figure this out, Veronica. I promise. For you, me, and the sprout. When…? Mom will want to know when and I’m not sure how many days…”

“Probably around April Fools’ Day, I think.” How ironic.

“Will you want to know what we’re having before, or do you want to go old-fashioned?”

We.

Well… “You plan to be a part of the baby’s life, don’t you?”

“Every damned day.” His fingers tightened on hers. Holding her captive and everything. “This is my baby, too. But I know… you probably are wishing you hadn’t told me right now, aren’t you?”

“Something like that.” She would never trust him to want her. And not just because of the baby. That wasn’t too hard to figure out, right? “We’ll have to work out a visitation schedule, then.”

“There won’t be a visitation schedule. By the time the baby is born, you’re going to be in my house. In my bed. Where the mother of my child—and their future siblings—belongs.”

“Wait a minute, pal. I am not about to hook up with a man that archaic and anachronistic. We really are from different generations, aren’t we? Maybe I have plans of my own? Did you stop to consider that? I’m already making plans to move. Probably out of Value forever.” She had to. Her car had refused to start on the way over here. She had no guarantee it would ever start again.

It was how the man had lured her into his truck to begin with. With a promise of a ride home. It was June, in Texas. It was hot out there. She hadn’t wanted to walk. She never should have trusted Georgie—she’d seen the look in his eyes.

“That’s just not going to happen. You are mine, Veronica Dawn Lake. You might as well get used to it. Where do you think you’re moving to?”

“Well, that is the part I haven’t yet figured out.” No sense lying about it. He would find out eventually. It was his baby, too, after all. Why couldn’t he have been the kind of guy to deny and head for the hills? It would have made things so much simpler.

Then again… that wasn’t the kind of guy she’d fall for anyway.

Hard to forget that.

She had so put her foot in it this time.