The Forever Girl (Wildstone, #6)(62)

Walker snagged the chips from her. He poured half the bag onto his plate and handed the rest to his partner in crime, who also dug in. When Caitlin gave Maze a pointed glare, she swallowed her mouthful and sighed. “Look, I don’t want you to worry about this, okay? It’s not a thing. I wasn’t even going to tell you because you’ve got a lot on your plate, and also the attention and focus should be on you this week. Not me. Not him.” She hitched a thumb in Walker’s direction. “This isn’t a big deal. It was a one-time thing, and it’s over and done.”

Caitlin eyed Walker.

He just kept eating, and something tightened in her gut. Worry. These were two of her very favorite people on the planet. They meant everything to her. But God bless them, neither of them would recognize true love or a real relationship if it smacked them in the face right between their eyes. So whether this was really just “a one-time thing” or not, odds were that at least one of them was going to get hurt.

Not that either of them seemed to care.

“You know what?” she said, tossing up her hands. “You’re both adults.”

Maze blinked. “That’s it? That’s all you’re going to say?”

Caitlin stood. “Yep. I’m going to try to get some sleep.” She headed to the door, but then paused. “Okay, so maybe there’s one more thing.”

“There it is,” Maze muttered.

“I love you both,” Caitlin said softly. “I don’t want to see either of you get hurt. So I really hope that you know what you’re doing.”

“Not doing,” Maze said. “You mean what we’re not doing.”

Walker still didn’t say a word, which had Caitlin’s bad feeling intensifying. She looked at him, but he was doing a great impression of an impenetrable rock, the stupid man. “Just . . . be careful,” she said.

“Too late for that,” Maze mumbled.

CAITLIN GOT A whole four hours of sleep before she was up again. She went into the bathroom to begin her morning routine, extremely aware that it was day five of an MIA period. She pulled open her bottom drawer and stared at the pregnancy test. Then she shook her head and got into the shower. Just as she was getting out, Dillon slipped into the bathroom.

“Hey,” he said with a smile. “I tried to wait up for you last night, but I didn’t make it. Where were you?”

So he’d noticed she was gone but hadn’t come looking for her. Didn’t seem like a good sign.

He watched with interest as she wrapped her wet self up in a towel. “Maybe we should get back in bed to discuss this further,” he murmured, reaching for her.

She put a hand to his chest. “We don’t have time. We’re supposed to meet your mom at the florist this morning, remember? My mom and I already got everything all picked out and paid for, but your mom is insisting on going over everything one last time, like she did at the bakery—which I still don’t even want to know about.”

“She likes to be thorough and wants to feel involved.”

“I get that,” she said. “But this is an unnecessary meeting away from my houseguests on a day I don’t need one more thing to do.”

“I’m happy to do this meeting without you,” he said. “But either way, I’m sure your houseguests understand.”

He really didn’t get it, and she was starting to think he never would. “For the thousandth time, Dillon, they’re my family. I don’t get enough time with them. I didn’t want to do this today, but I am. Now I’ve got ten minutes before I need to be downstairs.”

He slid his hands down her body, pulling her to him. “I can make do with ten minutes.”

Ducking out of his arms, she headed toward the door. “Well, I need at least twenty, and besides, I can’t concentrate on that right now.”

“Wait, you have to concentrate?”

Shaking her head, she headed out of the bathroom to go get dressed. She chose a loose, flowy tea-length sundress because she’d shaved only to her kneecaps instead of all the way up. Hell, at this point, Dillon would be lucky to see all the way up ever again. When she headed out of their room and into the hallway, Dillon had left the bathroom. She went back in there and once again opened the bottom drawer, reaching past her lotions and makeup to the pregnancy test.

It was time.

Ten minutes later she was downstairs, a little numb. But she was also stunned when she found Heather and Maze waiting for her in the kitchen, a lovely breakfast already spread across the table.

“Surprise!” Heather said. “A little birdie told me you might appreciate some help this morning.”

Caitlin looked at Maze, who smiled her real smile, and it warmed Caitlin’s heart. “You did this?”

“Well, with a lot of help,” Maze said.

Heather nodded. “She woke me up early and here we are. Sit. You’ve still got five minutes before you’ve got to leave.”

Jace came into the kitchen from the back door, ducking beneath the door frame so that Sammie, sitting on his shoulders and holding gleefully on to his hair, didn’t hit her head. “Smells amazing. And here’re the doughnuts.” He dropped a bag onto the counter.

Caitlin’s mouth watered. She hadn’t allowed herself a doughnut since her disastrous dress fitting. “You went to the bakery?”