Nine Months to Bear By Nicole Fox - 58

58

Stefan’s hand rests on my stomach. My hand rests on his. Together— God, what a word, together— we sit and breathe in this moment, this impossible, unthinkable, how-could-it-be-happening-to-me moment where everything I thought I knew just shifted.

“So how does this work?” I whisper. “Us sharing a baby?” I hide my face from him, needing space to think. “Do I… do I live here? In your fortress? Or do we shuttle the baby back and forth? Do I become your live-in nanny who also happens to be the biological mother, or do I…? I mean, what the hell Stefan, what are we gonna do?”

“Jesus, Olivia.” He runs his hand through his hair. “You’re not going to be a fucking nanny.”

“Then what am I?”

“The mother. Our child’s mother.”

“But what does that mean to you?”

He looks genuinely confused. “It means you’re the mother.”

“Stefan—”

“A child needs their mother.” His jaw works. “I won’t take that away. Not from the baby. Not from you.”

The certainty in his voice makes my chest tight. “You really mean that.”

“I told you already: I don’t say things I don’t mean.”

“But the logistics⁠—”

“We’ll work them out.” He touches my face again, thumb painting over my cheekbone. “One day at a time.”

It’s not enough. Not nearly enough. But right now, with his hand on my face and our baby growing inside me, it’s all I’ve got.

My stomach growls, breaking the moment.

“When did you last eat?” he asks.

“Um. Lunch, maybe? I don’t remember.”

“Come on.” He takes my hand. “Babushka said you cooked.”

“That’s generous of her. I’d say I helped. Actually, I’d say I mostly just chopped things badly and tried not to throw up.”

“Well, that’s not nothing,” he says with a small smile. “Let’s go.”

He keeps hold of my hand as we go downstairs. With every step, the smell of beef stroganoff fills the air more and more. Less nauseating now, more like… comfort. Home.

Stefan stops in the kitchen doorway. The table’s set for two, candles and everything. Babushka’s nowhere to be seen.

“She’s not subtle,” he mutters.

“She’s sweet.”

“She’s meddling.”

“Same thing, in grandmother language.”

He pulls out my chair. I sit, watching him move around the kitchen like he belongs there. Which he does, I guess. It’s his house.

Our house?

No. Too soon for that thought.

He brings two plates to the table. The stroganoff looks perfect, creamy sauce over egg noodles, tender beef that falls apart at the touch of a fork.

“This was my favorite,” he says quietly. “When I was a kid. Babushka made it every Sunday.”

“She told me.”

His eyebrows rise. “She did?”

“While we were cooking. She said you’d refuse to eat anything else. Kept up the hunger strike for a whole month once.”

“I was a stubborn boy.” But he’s smiling. Actually smiling . Not smirking or leering. Just… smiling. “Drove her crazy.”

“She loves you.”

“Yeah.” He takes a bite, closes his eyes. “Goddamn. It tastes exactly right.”

“She did most of the work.”

“But you helped.” He looks at me across the candles. “You cooked for me.”

“I… Well, yeah, I guess I did.”

“Why?”

I push noodles around my plate. “I wanted to thank you.”

“For what?”

“For—” God, where do I start? “For everything. For the investment meeting. For defending me to Jonathan Madison. For… for the article.”

“Ah. That article.”

“You didn’t have to do that.”

“Yes, I did.”

“Why?”

He sets down his fork. “Because she hurt you. She tried to destroy something you built and if there’s one thing I don’t tolerate, it’s a fucking bully. She deserved to burn for it—all I did was light a match.”

I don’t know whether to shiver at the casual violence or smile at the overprotectiveness. “Still. Thank you.”

Stefan shakes his head. “You don’t need to thank me for doing what’s right.” After a tense pause, he clears his throat and looks away. “The article serves a purpose anyway. It puts our situation in context.”

“Our ‘situation’?”

“The pregnancy. Us.” He gestures between us. “When people find out the full scope, they’ll need a story. Something that makes sense.”

“And what’s our story?”

“Simple. I was an investor interested in your clinic. We met, worked together, and…” He pauses. “Fell for each other.”

Another pause. A longer one. A more confusing one.

“Fell for each other,” I repeat numbly.

“It’s believable.”

“Is it?”

“I think so.” His eyes meet mine across the candles. “Do you?”

My heart pounds so hard I’m sure he can hear it. “I think people will believe whatever we tell them.”

But that’s a cop-out answer and he knows it. “That’s not what I asked.”

I’m fully aware of what he’s really asking. But I just can’t. Not yet. Not when everything’s so fragile and new and terrifying.

“I think the stroganoff’s getting cold,” I say instead.

He lets me have the deflection. We eat in silence, but it’s not uncomfortable. It’s just quiet. Peaceful, even.

But something in me refuses to accept that this easy peace could be mine. It rebels, mentally at first in the form of this wriggling uncertainty, and then physically. When I bend down to take another bite of my food, the smell hits, stronger than before. My stomach recoils.

“Shit.” I push the plate away, pressing my hand to my mouth.

Stefan’s on his feet instantly. “Bathroom?”

“No, I just… I need it gone. The smell.”

He doesn’t hesitate. Grabs both plates and disappears into the kitchen. I hear the disposal running, then water. When he comes back, he’s carrying a loaf of sourdough and butter.

“This should be easier on your stomach.”

“You don’t have to⁠—”

“I want to.” He tears off a piece of bread. “Here.”

I take it, nibble the edge. It’s good—yeasty and mild, nothing that triggers the nausea.

“Better?” he asks, eyeing me carefully.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

He sits back down, but not in his chair. He takes the one next to me instead, close enough that our knees touch under the table. “What would be enough?” he asks.

I blink at him. “‘Enough’? I mean… Like, for me? For us? I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

“Stefan—”

“What would be enough, Olivia?”

His thumb traces circles on my hand. Such a small touch, but it feels like everything.

It takes me a while, but eventually, I find my answer. “More than just co-parenting,” I say tentatively. “More than just sharing custody and comparing schedules and pretending we’re nothing to each other except two people who made a baby.”

“Is that what you think will happen?”

“Isn’t it?” I pull my hand away. “Once the baby’s here, once you have what you wanted, why would you need me around? Why would you want⁠—”

“Stop.”

“No, I need to say this. I need you to understand that I can’t… I can’t do casual with you. Not anymore. Not with your baby growing inside me. Not with you looking at me like⁠—”

“Like what?”

“Like you actually give a damn.”

“I do give a damn.”

“About the baby, yeah, of course.”

“No—about you.” He catches my face between his hands. “Christ, Olivia. About you .”

I shake my head. “I know you don’t say things you don’t mean. But this is different. You can’t mean what you’re saying right now. This is hormones and proximity and the excitement of the baby. Once that wears off⁠—”

“It won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“All I know is that the thought of you leaving makes me want to go fucking feral.” His forehead drops to mine. “I know that when you’re not here, nothing works right. I’ve broken every rule I’ve ever made for myself because of you—and I can’t bring myself to regret a single goddamn second of it.”

“Stefan…”

“Nine months…” His breath ghosts across my lips. “Fucking hell, Olivia, you think in nine months I’ll be done with you? I haven’t been able to get you out of my head since that first night at the gala. You think a baby changes that? You think time changes that? You think ANYTHING will?”

My heart pounds so hard it hurts. “I don’t know what to think anymore.”

“Then stop thinking.” His nose touches mine. “Just… stop, and let me take care of you.”

His mouth is so close to mine. Too close. Close enough that I can taste his breath, feel the heat radiating off his skin. My whole body trembles with the effort of not closing that tiny distance between us.

“I can’t stop thinking,” I whisper. “It’s what I do. It’s who I am.”

“Then tell me what you’re thinking.”

“You don’t want to know.”

“I do.” His hands tighten on my face. “Tell me.”

I close my eyes. I can’t look at him when I say this. If I see any sign of his face changing when he realizes what a fool I’ve been, I’ll never have the courage to finish the thought.

“I’m thinking that I’ve fallen for you,” I rasp. “I’m thinking that somewhere between that first night at the gala and right now, I went from hating you, to needing you, to wanting things I have no right to want.”

“What things?”

“Stefan, please⁠—”

“What things, Olivia?”

His voice is rough and his face is drawn. He looks desperate, almost. Like he needs to hear this as much as I need to say it.

So I tell him. I tell him everything.

“I want to wake up next to you every morning, not just because of some contract or safety concern, but because that’s where I belong. I want to fight with you about stupid things like whose turn it is to change diapers or wash the dirty dishes. I want to watch you teach our kid how to play chess. I want Sunday dinners with your grandmother and late nights in your office and early mornings where you make me coffee exactly how I like it even though you pretend not to pay attention to things like that.”

I’m crying now, can’t help it, hormones and exhaustion and fear all mixing together into this awful, wonderful confession.

“I want to be more than just the woman carrying your baby. I want to be more than a business arrangement or a convenient solution to your legacy problem. I want…”

I open my eyes. He’s staring at me like I’ve just pulled his heart out of his chest and laid it on the table between us.

“I want more ,” I say, and those three little words contain everything I’ve never dared to ask for before, not from anybody. “I want you. I want all of you. And I want it to be real.”