Chapter 30
Chapter Thirty
Ben
I feel Paige relax in my arms, and just as sleep is about to take me, her stomach growls so loudly it startles us both.
We stare at each other for half a beat—the quiet after everything, the hum of the AC, the slow blink of the alarm clock—and then we both crack up, laughter spilling out into the quiet night. She buries her face in my shoulder with a muffled groan that sounds a lot like embarrassment.
“Traitor,” Paige mumbles at her own belly.
“I can fix traitors,” I say, pressing a kiss to her hairline. “I’m very handy with leftovers.”
She tips her head back to look at me, eyes still bright, cheeks warm. “You have leftovers?”
“I always have leftovers.” I push up on an elbow, hunting the floor with my other hand until I find my boxers. “There’s soup in the car from the kitchen. And I can make a sandwich with… optimism and whatever else I have.”
She snorts. “Optimism pairs well with pickles.”
“You’re in luck. I always have pickles.”
“Good. Because I’m ravenous.” She sits up, sheet falling away from her shoulders, and then catches my look and smiles softly. “What?”
“Nothing.” Everything. The way she looks right now could stop traffic.
She swings her legs over the side of the bed and scans the messy chair in the corner. “Can I—?”
“Top drawer,” I say, already grinning. “Steal whatever you want.”
She finds a soft navy T-shirt that’s been washed more times than I can count. When she pulls it over her head, something in my chest actually stutters. It’s big on her, falling to mid-thigh, swallowing her hands at the sleeves until she shakes them free.
She catches me staring and lifts an eyebrow. “What.”
“It’s not fair,” I say.
“What’s not?”
“That you look better in my shirt than I do.”
She glances down, tugs at the hem. “It’s very… architecturally sound,” she deadpans. “Classic lines, generous drape.”
“You trying out for a home reno show?”
“Yes,” she says solemnly. “It’s called Shirt Fixers.”
I bark a laugh, give up on finding dignity, and get off the bed. My legs feel pleasantly loose; my head feels like it’s been cleared with a good rain. I hand her a pair of socks from the same drawer because the floors downstairs are always cool.
She pulls the socks on, wriggles her toes, and we pad out to the hall after I pull a pair of sweatpants on. The house creaks the way it always does, settling around us. I don’t turn on many lights—just the light over the kitchen sink.
“I’ll grab the soup,” I say, catching the keys from the hook.
“Are you sure?” she asks, already heading for the fridge like she lives here. The longing pools in my belly. “I can do it.”
“Looking like that?” I say with a lifted brow. “Not a chance, baby. You’ll start a riot.”
She flushes.
“Plus, you’ve been on your feet since like 4:00 this morning. Sit.”
“3:30,” she says, yawning. “But who’s counting.”
“I am,” I say, and step out onto the porch.
The night is still and quiet—river air and crickets and the distant, constant hush that’s become the sound of my neighborhood.
The truck has cooled, which is good news for the soup I forgot was in there. I pop the back and find the lidded quart from the Pint—chicken dumpling that we ran as a lunch special.
When I come through the door, she’s on the other side of the island, hair scooped onto the top of her head with a tie she must’ve dug out of her bag, and her bare legs crossed at the ankle as she leans into my fridge.
The way the T-shirt is rising a little too high, showing me peeks of her ass, almost makes me toss the soup to the ground and throw her over my shoulder to go back to bed.
But she’s carrying my child, and I have to feed her.
I know there isn’t much in my fridge, but there should be enough to throw something together.
“Permission to… forage?” she asks without looking up.
“Granted. Pull out whatever you find.” I pull out a small pot and dump the chicken and dumplings into it before setting it on the stove. “Everything I have is pregnancy safe. Pasteurized everything; no deli meat. I am a safe sandwich zone.”
Her mouth curves, and it does something to me that I can’t explain. “Sexy.”
“Nothing gets me going like the phrase ‘Listeria monocytogenes,’” I say, reaching past her and pulling out the chicken and cheese. “Do you want a soup or should I throw together an omelet. Or both. Or—”
“How about a grilled cheese?”
“I can do that.”
“Plus a pickle on the side.”
My lips curve. “Plus a pickle on the side,” I repeat.
She laughs, low and warm, and slides onto the stool.
I put a pan on, butter down. I grate the cheddar so it melts fast and even, swipe a clove of garlic around the hot face of the bread just for an extra flourish.
The soup loosens when I stir it, then bubbles in a lazy way that makes the whole kitchen smell like a rainy Sunday in October.
She props her chin on her hand and watches me.
The navy shirt is the soft kind of worn material that falls where it wants to; every time she shifts, I catch a new angle of knee, the hem skirting higher, the curve of one shoulder where the seam slides wide.
I’m trying very hard to be a gentleman about it and only partially succeeding.
“You always cook like this after…” she waves a hand between us, wincing. “After.”
“After the intense neighborhood safety lecture?” I suggest.
Her smile kicks sideways. “Yes. That.”
“It’s not a habit or anything, but if it’s needed, it’s needed,” I say, lifting the edge of one sandwich to check before flipping it. “Plus, your stomach signaled like a foghorn.”
She grabs the lid for the soup and throws it at me. It falls short by three feet.
“Did not.”
As if on cue, her stomach rumbles again. She glares at it, then at me. “Traitor.”
“I didn’t say a word.”
“You are smirking internally.”
“I am a professional,” I say, but I’m failing at not grinning as I ladle soup into two bowls. I slide the steaming bowl toward her and the grilled cheeses onto a board, cutting them in half on the bias because I’m not a monster.
She inhales like the aroma alone might cure her. “Oh my God.”
“Careful,” I say. I push a ramekin of pickles across, then reach for the kettle. “Tea?”
“Ginger?” she asks, small and hopeful.
Pride surges through me that I managed to find something that she likes and is so helpful to her through the pregnancy on the first damn try.
“I’ll make it strong.”
She watches me slice a thumb of fresh ginger into coins. “I had a moment today,” she says, almost conversational, like we’re discussing the weather. “The cardamom rolls came out, and I had the tray right under my nose, and my body was like ‘beautiful idea, absolutely not.’”
I set the kettle on, flick on the burner. “Did you have to do the panic swallow thing?”
She nods. “Behind a smile. In front of a line.”
I stop what I’m doing, lean on my hands, and meet her eyes.
“For what it’s worth, you were… astonishing today.
From my door, it looked like a sea in there.
And you were just—” I search for it—something that fits the sight of her working that espresso machine, her mom at the case, Jason bussing, Don glad-handing every table.
“You were the one who made it all work.”
She ducks her face, but not before I see it—the glow. “It did work,” she admits. “I think it did. I barely had time to think, but every time I looked up, there were more faces.”
I lean back and grab two mugs, drop a spoonful of honey in each. “Your dad made friends with everyone in town, I think.”
“He collected them,” she says, grinning. “Like stamps.”
“And your mom—”
“Queen of the case,” she says proudly. “She cried after, not in a bad way. But she did sneak like a half dozen brownies before they ran out, so I think that balanced it out.”
“And Jason,” I say carefully, hearing how different my voice sounds when I say his name. “He looked… proud.”
“He was.” Her face goes soft all at once, a look that guts me. “He was great today.”
The kettle rattles toward a boil. I pour the water over the ginger, the steam curling between us.
We eat with the ease of people who’ve spent many nights doing just this, people with a lot more familiarity than we have.
“God, that’s good,” she says, eyes closed for a second. When she opens them, she looks brighter, less peaked. “You could sell this.”
“I do sell this,” I say with a laugh. “Do you want another?”
She leans back with a groan. “I'd better not. You’d have to roll me to work tomorrow.”
The shirt slips off one shoulder, and I am only a man with a pulse trying not to drag her back to the bed. She knows. Of course she knows. The smile that flashes across her face is wicked and sweet.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I say.
“Like what?” she asks innocently.
“Like I’m uncivilized. You know exactly what you look like in that shirt.”
She laughs, and it’s bright and unguarded, and suddenly there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to keep that sound.
“I don’t,” she teases. “Tell me.”
She rests her elbow on the table, her chin in her palm, a wicked grin on her face.
“Oh, you really wanna know?” I ask.
“I really do,” she says.
She squeals when I make my move, quickly pulling her out of the chair and into my arms.
I crush my lips to hers as I walk out of the kitchen.
“What about the food?” she says on a moan.
“It’ll be there tomorrow,” I say and head for the stairs.