“Can I hold her? Please?”
“Of course.” He transferred the baby’s weight into her arms and Adara nearly dissolved into a puddle of maternal love. “Her name’s Evie. Adara, I wasn’t—”
She shook her head.
His hand came up to the side of her neck, trapping her hair against her nape as he forced her to look at him and said in a fierce whisper. “I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
“I know. It’s okay,” she assured him, rubbing her cheek on the hardness of his wrist. “I just wasn’t expecting it, that’s all. I’m not mad.”
He cupped the side of her face and leaned across to kiss her once, hard. “You scared me. I thought I was going to lose you.”
She had to consciously remember to hold on to the baby while her limbs softened and her heart shifted in her chest. Every time she thought they didn’t have a hope in the world of making something of their marriage, he said something like that and completely enchanted her.
Voices made them break their intense stare into each other’s eyes.
“I’m not being a grouch,” her brother growled as he emerged from the house carrying his wife in the cradle of his arms. “But you were discharged early because you promised to keep it elevated, so I think you should do that, don’t you?”
Gideon moved to pull out a chair so Rowan could slide down onto it, then he offered a hand to Nico. “Gideon.”
“Nic,” her brother said, completely pulled together after his tearful reassurances to her a few minutes ago. He’d never stopped caring or worrying about her all this time, just as she had for him. She was loved, was worth loving. It was a startling adjustment, like learning she wasn’t an ugly duckling but a full-fledged swan.
Could Gideon see the change in her?
He wore a mask of subtle tension as he took his seat. No one else seemed to notice. Nic opened wine and Rowan stole the empty bottle of milk from her baby and handed Adara a burping towel.
When Nic set a glass of sparkling white before her, he smiled indulgently at Adara’s attempt to pat a belch out of his daughter. “Looks like you know what you’re doing. Do you have children?”
The canyon of inadequacy yawned before her, but Gideon squeezed her thigh and spoke with a neutrality she couldn’t manage. “We’ve tried,” he said simply. “It hasn’t worked out.”
“I’m sorry,” Nic said with a grimace that spoke of a man wanting to kick himself for saying the wrong thing, but he couldn’t have known.
“Not being able to get pregnant seemed like a horrible tragedy for me at first,” Rowan said conversationally. “But we wouldn’t have Evie otherwise and we can’t imagine life without her. We’re so smitten, we’re like the only two people to ever have a baby, aren’t we, Nic?”
“It’s true,” he admitted unabashedly while he settled into his own chair and absently eased Rowan’s bandaged leg to balance across his thigh. His hand caressed her ankle, their body language speaking of utter relaxation and familiarity with each other. “I don’t know what I did to deserve such good fortune.”
The fierce look of deep love he gave his wife and the tender way she returned it was almost too intimate to witness, but Adara found herself holding her breath as yearning filled her. I want that, she thought, but even though she felt Gideon’s fingers circle tenderly on the inside of her knee, she didn’t imagine for a minute she’d get it.
* * *
The penthouse seemed cavernous and chilly when they returned from Greece. It was after midnight when they arrived after what had been a long, quiet flight.
They’d been through a lot since meeting up at the end of her brother’s driveway, so she supposed it was natural they’d both withdraw a bit to digest it all, but the hint of tension and reserve Gideon was wearing bothered her.
They’d made love in the middle of the night and again first thing this morning. It had been wonderful as ever, but afterward, as they’d soaped each other in the shower, things had taken this turn into a brick wall.
Unable to get Gideon’s look of paternal tenderness toward Evie out of her mind, she’d pointed out how her brother and his wife made adoption look like the most natural thing in the world.
“They do,” he had agreed without inflection.
“It’s something to think about,” she had pressed ever so lightly. “Isn’t it?”
“Perhaps.”
So noncommittal.
Adara chewed her lip, completely open to the idea herself, but that meant staying married. Forever. To a man who didn’t appear as enthused by the idea of children as she was.