Sean glanced over at Sabrina as he made his way toward the penthouse. He’d deliberately not told her where he lived. He’d not said house or apartment or anything other than his place. He wanted to see her reaction when he pulled up in front of the building and handed the truck over to the valet. He mostly believed that she didn’t know about his business, but was she expecting the kind of money he had? The kind of lifestyle he lived? His only hope was that she didn’t lie well, and her reaction would be written across her face for him, and anyone else, to see. She seemed absorbed in checking out the city as they passed, and he refrained from asking too many questions. They would have time for that later.

Thirty minutes after they left the courthouse annex, Sean pulled the pickup into the valet area at One Park Place and put it in park. He looked over at his bride to be and found her staring at him with wide eyes.

“Here?”

He couldn’t help but smile. “Here.” He opened his door while the valet opened hers. Sean grabbed her bags from the rear of the truck and turned them over to the doorman. “Have these delivered upstairs for me, please.”

“Yes, sir.”

Sean turned back to find Sabrina looking around, her eyes wide, as if she’d never seen anything like this.

“Come on.” He waited until she realized he was talking to her then led her through the ground floor to the elevators. He waited during the ride up, expecting her to say something, but she never did. The elevator doors opened on the 39th floor and they walked down the short hall with only five doors. He unlocked his and stood aside to let her in. She stood in the small hallway that was the entrance, watching him. “This way.”

Sean showed her through the apartment, well, penthouse, not just the main living space, but the whole thing, all three thousand square feet.

“Wow. This is more room than I grew up in, and there were six of us.”

“Six?”

“Yeah, I have a sister and three brothers.”

Sean blinked then looked at her. “Was one of your parents absent?”

“My dad left when I was eight. Mom worked her ass off to make it work.” She shook her head. “I got to see first-hand what it was like without someone home. I want better for my kids.” Her eyes were wide as she looked around.

“My mom was home with us. I know it’s not the in thing now, but it’s what I want for my kids as well. I’m glad you’re on the same page.” He went to one large window in the living room. The blinds and curtains were open, overlooking the large pool area and downtown Houston far below them. “Come see this.” He waited until she came to stand beside him then pointed to a building about a block away. It was tall, almost as tall as the one they were in and not square and without personality like most of the buildings on the street. “See that one? The kind of rounded one?”

“Yes.”

“That’s where my office is.”

She looked at him a moment, her mouth hanging open. He wanted to lean over and kiss her, but was afraid of how she might react, at least so soon.

“Is your office really that close?”

“It is. Unfortunately, I don’t spend as much time there as Harriet and some others would like.”

Sabrina frowned. “If you’re not at the office, where are you?”

Sean turned away from the window and walked the length of the room before turning and looking at her again. “I admit. I’m bad about the office. I grew up swinging a hammer and my first love is being on the job site.”

“There’s nothing wrong with that,” she said with a shrug. “Learning to delegate and who is best at what job is part of doing it right. As long as you make sure the work gets done, you don’t have to do it all yourself.” She looked back out the window toward the building with his office. “Besides, I can’t imagine being stuck behind a desk all day. It would be immensely boring.”

“See, that’s how I feel.” He watched her for a few minutes, tilting his head to one side. “I get wanting to be here to raise your kids, but you don’t have them yet. What do you do to fill your days?”

Sabrina shook her head and looked at the floor.

“I’m a blogger,” she said in a soft voice.

“A blogger?” Sean wasn’t sure he’d heard her right.

She nodded.

“What do you write about?” He hoped it wasn’t politics, not that that would be a deal breaker, but it could make life a little more incendiary.

“Books and movies.”

“I guess the movies and books would keep you busy.”

“They do and it’s flexible. I can do it pretty much anywhere. I can travel or work around pretty much anything.”

“Does that make much money?”

“Enough to get by, but nothing to brag about.”

He thought about it for a few seconds, he’d insisted on someone who didn’t want a career, but this wasn’t a career, it was more like a hobby, at least in his mind. Like cooking, reading or knitting. “If you want to continue, I don’t see why you shouldn’t, but you don’t have to. I don’t know how much time you’ll have once we start having children.”

She looked down then met his gaze. “That’s something I wanted to ask you about.”

“What?” He wondered what seemed to be bothering her now.

“What if we get married and all that, then I can’t get pregnant. What if I can’t have kids?”

“Do you have some reason to think that? Some illness that might prevent you having babies?” Sean frowned. He didn’t like the idea that she might not be able to have his children, or that she could be ill in any way.

“No, I just don’t want to leave the possibility uncovered. I like to know where things are going and be able to plan and feel confident in what’s going to happen.” She shook her head slowly. “I don’t like when things don’t work the way I planned, but if I have alternatives figured in advance, it’s not so difficult.”

Sean sighed and sat on the sofa beside her. He hadn’t really thought about the possibility that they couldn’t have children, but now that she’d brought it up, he realized that it was a possibility, not just with her, but him as well. No man liked to think they might be infertile, but it happened all too often. He watched her for a moment.

“I don’t know. I hadn’t even thought about it.” He let the idea roll around in his head for several seconds. He could divorce her and try again with a second wife, but what if it wasn’t her issue? “I’d like to ask you the same thing. If for some reason, we can’t have kids, what would you like to do?”

She turned and looked at the glass window, her lips pressed thin. “I’ve thought about it a lot. It’s one of the hazards of being the kind of over-thinker I am. There are a lot of options. We could do the specialist thing, maybe in vitro, and all the infertility treatments, but what if none of it works? What if no matter what we try, I can’t get pregnant? Or if something happens once I do?” Sabrina sighed and turned back to look at him. “I realize I’m being silly. I’m worrying over things that are only a possibility and slim ones at that. I can’t help it.”

“No, you’re right. It’s a good idea to discuss it, to know where we each stand before we get married.” He took a deep breath and thought about what she was saying for a moment. Infertility was something that had never crossed his mind that Sabrina had thought about it, and considered all the options, made him realize how serious she was about this. “I suppose, if you’re open to it, we could look into adoption.”

Her eyes went wide. “You would consider that? You aren’t insisting on children of your own?”

“Well, I’d like them to be mine, to be related by blood, but if we end up adopting, that doesn’t make them any less mine. If I raise them, then they’re mine.”

Sabrina’s shoulders dropped, she instantly became more comfortable and Sean realized she’d been holding herself tense, as if waiting for him to say the wrong thing. Somehow, he knew he hadn’t. He’d said what she was hoping to hear. That sent a rush of heat through him and again, he wanted to lean in and kiss her. Her soft heart made him want to kiss away her worry.

The ringing of his cell phone saved him from doing something stupid. He pulled it out and found the call was Harriet. “I’ve got to take this.”

Sabrina nodded. Sean stood and answered the call, and when it was over turned back to his fiancée.

“That was Harriet. I’ve got a few meetings this afternoon that couldn’t be postponed. Why don’t you make yourself at home? Unpack and help yourself to anything you’d like in the place. I’ll be back as soon as I can. Will you be all right here?”

“I don’t need a babysitter. Go, handle your business, I’ll be fine.”

He thought about kissing her goodbye, but decided she might not yet be ready for that and left, walking the block to his office building like he usually did. What wasn’t normal was that his thoughts kept drifting back to her.