Well Suited (Red Lipstick Coalition #4)(4)

The only sound was her breath and mine in a matched rhythm.

Neither of us moved. The details of her face were obscured in shadows but for her eyes, which caught the ambient moonlight and reflected it back at me.

With a breath deemed to fortify her, she said, “Kiss m—”

She was in my arms, her body soft and supple. And my lips took a taste they would regret.

Because within a single heartbeat, I was addicted.

My universe shrank to the point where our lips melded, exploding in a bang to rival the big one, contained at the tips of our searching tongues. A million nerves fired like starbursts across our lips. And on the fringes in nebulous tendrils were hands, breaths, bodies, heartbeats—all in autonomous sync.

Beyond all reasoning, beyond all sense, some event had come to pass, leaving a deep, thrumming word in my chest. And I wrote that word on her body with fingertips and tongue.

Mine.

The urge was instinct, an impulse, primal in origin and execution. It was, as she’d so studiously pointed out, a matter of science. Of chemicals set in motion by our brains, pumped through our bodies by thundering hearts. But whatever cocktail had been created by the mix of her chemistry and mine was potent and potentially lethal in intensity. And I felt the beginnings of what would become an undeniable fact.

The girl in my arms was no Katherine-with-a-K-not-Katie.

This girl was Kate.

This sighing, soft creature, whatever she was, was not who she’d appeared on first glance. She was so much more.

The way I undressed her undid me. The way she tasted consumed me. The way she felt beneath me, around me, stroked the pulse of my very self.

And I didn’t care why because she was mine.

It didn’t even cross my mind that I might not be hers.





Part I





First Trimester





1





Decisions, Decisions





Katherine

5 weeks, 1 day

I wish I could say that disbelief was the emotion I felt as I held the small plastic stick in fingers I knew to be mine but were utterly unrecognizable. My gaze was fixed on the tiny window where a blue plus sign stared back at me with unflinching clarity.

There was no disbelief, seeing as how I knew exactly when, how, and with whom it’d happened.

When: approximately five weeks ago.

Who: one-night stand.

How: prophylactic malfunction.

If birth control didn’t make me an irrational, blubbering mess, my uterus would not be occupied by a zygote.

No, I corrected myself—not a zygote. At this stage, it was an embryo and would have a heartbeat, tail, and tiny nubs that would become arms and legs. My photographic memory recalled an image I’d seen in sex ed during junior high of something that looked closer to an extraterrestrial than a baby.

My stomach rolled at the thought. Or at the realization. Or because the surge of hormones was giving me morning sickness. Or, in this instance, afternoon sickness.

I swallowed back my lunch, forcing it down my esophagus where it belonged before shifting my train of thought. If I didn’t, I really would vomit.

I inventoried my feelings with the clinical detachment with which I approached everything. Shock was at the top of the list, indicated by my rapid breaths, clammy hands, racing pulse, and the uncommon dizziness that rose and fell in waves. The reason, I quickly deduced, was that an occupied uterus had no place in my current plan, life or otherwise. My dinner plans for sushi were out the window for sure.

I lowered myself to sit on the closed toilet, holding the pregnancy test in dead, foreign hands. My back was ramrod straight, my shoulder blades pulled back, nose in the air sucking oxygen like it would stop me from vomiting. Resisting was beginning to seem futile. I wondered absently how long I could iron-stomach it before I lost my lunch.

The thought made me gag again.

I gripped the reins on my galloping thoughts, pulling them to a halt so I could find the road again.

Because I needed to decide what I was going to do.

I’d always wanted to procreate, assumed that I would. Allotted my future self a single child to appease the instinct to continue my genetics, a sentimental instinct driven by the desire for immortality more than a desire for love. Humans were complex, fascinating creatures, and creating was something I considered an honor. Taking a human life in any form was unfathomable. And I found the thought of giving away a child I’d created beyond comprehension.

The upside to my unforeseen path was that I didn’t have to wait to find a suitable mate.

I’d already found one.

Genetically, he was the cream of the crop. As a physical specimen, he was ideal—his musculature a study in symmetry and strength, his height imposing, dominant. He was perfectly masculine, a man who thrived on control and command, and beyond that, he was highly intelligent and resourceful.

Really, I couldn’t have handpicked a better genetic pool.

Of course, there was one slight issue.

For the last four-plus weeks, I’d been avoiding him at all costs.

It wasn’t because I didn’t like him, nor was it because I didn’t want to see him again. It was quite the opposite. I liked him so much, I’d immediately distanced myself.

It was better this way, for all of us. That he’d spent one night with me was a fluke. Any more than that, and I’d be pressing my luck. I was built for a lot of things—organization, research, mathematics, pragmatism, to name a few—but relationships was not one of them.