Hitched (Hitched #1)(24)

I feel a twinge of grief for Celene, until I find out she cheated on Sebastian. He lost not only his child, but also the woman he loved. My heart swells with sadness for the man sitting before me. "I'm so sorry."

"It was a girl. We named her Hope." I feel his fingers dig into my back, his muscles flexing in remembered pain. "I blame myself. I'm a pediatric heart surgeon. My job is to save the lives of the children who can’t be saved. And I couldn't save my own daughter."

There are no words that can bring him comfort right now, so instead I hold him and feel the warmth of his tears as he grieves.

***

The next morning the smell of coffee and bacon wakes me, and my stomach growls as I roll out of the now-empty bed and plod to the bathroom to freshen up.

When I come downstairs, now wearing my own clothes from the night before, I see Sebastian in the kitchen, wearing nothing but boxers, cooking.

The kitchen is filled with light from large windows, and his tanned skin is warm as I place a hand on his back. I just want to feel him. The brightness of the morning seems to push away any lingering darkness from last night.

He turns to me, smiling, all shadows gone from his eyes as he kisses me deeply, before directing his focus back to breakfast. He has two pans going, one with bacon and one with omelets filled with peppers and onions and cheese. My stomach grumbles again, and he laughs. "Hungry?"

"Last night did work up an appetite," I admit, helping myself to a cup of coffee. I inhale the scent before adding sugar and cream, then sit on a barstool and watch him cook. "I'd offer to help, but you look really sexy doing this all by yourself. I don't want to ruin the experience."

He puts a plate in front of me and piles bacon and an omelet onto it. "I wouldn't let you anyways. I enjoy cooking, especially for a beautiful woman."

Every time he calls me beautiful, my heart does a happy dance. I'm absurd, I know.

He takes a seat next to me, and we eat in silence for a moment. The breakfast is perfect, and I finish the plate, not even a little bit self-conscious of eating so much in front of him. Fuck that, I worked off this and more last night in bed and in the pool. The memory makes me smile, until I get to the part where the Wicked Witch of Las Vegas interrupted us. Maybe I should feel more kindly about her, given what I learned last night, but she's still a bitch.

"We know very little about each other," I tell him as I sip my coffee.

He looks at me, his eyes clear and beautiful. "There are many kinds of knowing, Kacie. There's the knowledge of random facts. I'll admit that we're short on those, but that's actually the easiest kind of knowledge to come by. Consider how much most Americans know about popular celebrities, without really knowing them at all. But there's also another kind of knowing. A recognition of the heart. That's what we have. My heart knows you. Your heart knows me. This summer is just a chance to get our minds caught up."

He places a hand on my thigh, caressing me. "And obviously our bodies are quite intimate with each other already."

His words stir something deep in me, but I shut it down, not ready to examine those feelings too closely. "Do you want to have a family? Children?"

His hand falls away, and I miss the warmth, but I don't say anything, waiting for him to answer me.

"I don't know. I'm scared to feel that kind of loss again. When Hope died, a part of me died too. And every day I'm reminded of her death as I try to save children too sick to walk, children with horrible illnesses who often don’t make it. I don't know if I can go through that again with my own child."

I'm not sure how I feel about that. I haven't decided if I ever want kids, though I always assumed I'd have a few eventually. But do I really want them, or do I just think that because it's still the expected trajectory for a woman's life in our society? I haven't figured that out.

He stands and takes our plates to the sink to wash.

"Do you ever miss Celene?" I'm not sure I want to know the answer to this, but I ask it anyways.

"It was a long time ago. That relationship is dead and buried."

"It didn't seem very dead last night. At least not for her." I go to him, taking a hand towel from the counter, and dry as he washes. It's so domestic and feels so right.

"That may be true, but it's definitely over for me." His voice is hard when he says that.

"What about you?" he asks as we take our coffee to the backyard to enjoy the sun. "Anyone serious? Besides me, of course." He grins, and I melt a little.

"I had a boyfriend in college," I say. "It didn't go very far. I broke up with him before it could. Since then I've kept it casual. Tate and I knew we were meant for a life elsewhere. Out of Ohio. And even in college and grad school, I knew I wouldn't stay in those areas after graduation, and I didn't want the hassle of falling in love and having to negotiate where we would live. We knew we'd come to Las Vegas, as unorthodox as that choice was. Staying single made all of that easier."

He nods as if he understands, but I wonder if he really does. Men have long believed they could do anything, be anything, live anywhere, whereas women are often expected to sacrifice for their families, their husbands, their children. Men have a freedom of thought, a freedom of expectation to life that women have never had. Women have to constantly negotiate—with themselves, with others—for a semblance of those choices, those inalienable rights that men take for granted.