“I’ve never been around babies.”
“You want kids?”
“I used to.”
With Divina, I suppose.
“Do you?” he asks.
“Londyn is perfect for me, but maybe someday . . .”
“Even though you don’t plan on marriage?”
I shrug. “Single ladies can have children.”
“Oh.”
She cries harder, and I leave him there and go to her room. She’s standing, hanging on to the crib rail as she whimpers. Her little face is red, and the top of her sleeper is wet with drool.
“Poor darling,” I murmur as I pick her up and cuddle, patting her bottom. I change her into a fresh diaper and sleeping outfit. So she doesn’t get more drool on it, I put a bib on as I murmur soothing words. When I turn, Graham is at the door, watching me with an odd expression.
He blinks, seeming to come out from wherever he was. “I put the washcloth in the freezer.”
Londyn quiets as she looks at him with big eyes. She sniffles and babbles something that I think is probably Why are you here?
I head to the den.
“What now?” he asks as if he’s taking notes.
“You can bring me the washcloth,” I say as I sit in a blue swivel rocking chair next to a window that overlooks the city. I prop her on my lap, and Graham hands me the washcloth.
“I, um, washed my hands first, you know, after . . .”
I giggle. “Okay. She appreciates it.”
Londyn reaches for the cloth and promptly sticks it in her mouth and chews. Her back rests against my chest as I rock with her. Slowly, she stops her whimpering.
“Wow, that was easy. She really is adorable.”
I laugh under my breath at his surprised tone. He saw her in the kitchen at the bookstore, but there was so much else going on that he probably barely noticed her. “Now we have to get her back to sleep.”
“We?”
“You’re here, and we just had relations, and you can’t run off. It would be ungentlemanly.”
He rolls his eyes.
“What?”
“‘Relations’ and ‘ungentlemanly.’ Your words crack me up.”
I shrug delicately so as not to disturb Londyn, who seems wide awake as she darts her eyes between me and Graham.
“I don’t want to say ‘s-e-x’ in front of you-know-who.”
“Hmm. I saw the scars on your rib cage. What’s that from? Did Kian . . .”
“No, no. I have A-fib. It’s a heart condition where I have irregular heartbeats. Too fast. I took meds for a while, but they quit working. I had an incident at the store where I passed out, and my doctors decided I needed a cardiac ablation.” I go into detail, explaining how I assumed it was panic attacks at first but realized later that it was a medical condition.
He’s suddenly sitting at attention and walks over to me. “Let me see it again?”
Londyn pulls out her washcloth and watches Graham as he lifts my tank top and peers at the scar on my rib cage. He frowns as his fingers lightly trace over it. “Did surgery fix it forever?”
“Are you worried for me?” I ask, surprise in my voice.
“You’re going to be my wife.”
I shift the focus from me to him. “My heart issue is minor compared to what happened to you on the football field. Want to hear something crazy?”
He nods.
“I had my surgery the night of the Super Bowl. You and I were in the same hospital on the same night, Mount Sinai.”
He studies my face searchingly, his gaze lingering on my mouth. “And then we met in the desert. Life is weird.” His hands trail over the line of my cheek, tenderly, making my breath quicken.
“Yes.”
“I think I’m going to stretch out,” he says as he pulls away from me and settles back on the couch, adjusting the pillows as he lies back. It’s not quite long enough to fit his frame, so he removes his shoes and props his feet up on the end of the sofa.
He taps his fingers against his chest, the only indication that he isn’t completely relaxed. “Are you free Friday?”
“I can be. Jane and Andrew are helping out at the store.”
He shuts his eyes, almost as if he doesn’t want me to read his expression. “Good. Can you meet me in the afternoon. I can text you the exact time when I know for sure.”
“Where?”
He’s so quiet that for a moment I think he’s gone to sleep. “Clerk’s office at the courthouse, if that works for you? I can send a car to pick you up.”