“We need to talk.”

Curtis had only a second to experience the joy that seeing Hannah already back at his door brought when he registered the distraught look on her face. It wasn’t raining out and she wasn’t soaking wet, but somehow she looked like a drowned rat. Knowing that the plan for the day was to confront Nina, he should’ve expected the reaction.

“Come here,” he said as he wrapped his arms around her and dragged her into the house. “I take it things went a little more like I thought they would than you’d hoped.”

He hated being right in that instance, but there really hadn’t been a chance Nina would be supportive. Curtis had no delusions that he’d ever understand why Hannah considered Nina her closest friend, but he wanted to do everything he could to protect her from the ugliness said friend could cause.

“I might be pregnant.”

Hannah was crushed into his chest, so the words were mumbled, but Curtis made them out. He momentarily was so confused that he didn’t fight to hold her close when she pushed away and started pacing around his living room.

“I mean, I don’t know for sure, but apparently my appointment was rescheduled without me knowing and I’m a couple months behind on the shot. It may be nothing. I did some searches in the car before I came over here and the general consensus seemed to be that it takes months, sometimes a year for people to get pregnant after they stop taking the shot. I’ve been getting them for, what, eight years now, so I figure the chances have to be really low, but I thought you should know.”

She barely breathed as she spat all the words out. Curtis was amazed she could keep walking around without losing consciousness.

“Hold on,” Curtis said, walking towards Hannah.

She didn’t stop moving, making his task of getting her back in his arms a little difficult. Her arms waved in the air and her lips moved as if she was having a heated conversation, but words weren’t coming out. He was finally able to corral the swinging arms without getting hit and pulled her over to the couch.

Curtis wished he had some water, or something maybe a little harder, to offer her, but he wasn’t about to leave her alone to go fetch something from the kitchen. He needed to figure out exactly where her thoughts were. The pregnancy issue didn’t worry him. He had no problem with them having a kid, as crazy as that would sound to most people.

What did worry him was the idea that there was something fishy going on with her doctor. Aside from being friends with Nina, Hannah had always seemed to have a level head on her shoulders. A rescheduled appointment wasn’t something that just happened.

“Tell me what’s going on with your doctor. You said the appointment was rescheduled.”

Hannah finally took a deep breath and nodded. Curtis had seated them so they were facing each other. He could see that even after getting her ramble out, she was still totally discombobulated. He didn’t mind seeing the dazed look after he’d fucked her into it, but knowing it wasn’t brought on by pleasure led to other feelings. More than anything, he wanted to take all her problems and just deal with them so she wouldn’t have to.

“Yeah. Nina, as always, was only thinking of herself when she decided my doctor’s appointment got in the way of something she was planning. Unlike a normal person, who would’ve talked to me about it, she just called up my doctor, presumably pretending to be me, and rescheduled. She even got into my calendar and moved the date. I should’ve noticed. I live by that calendar, so I should have noticed she moved the date.”

“Stop right there.”

Hannah had taken a breath, but it was clear she was going to continue on her rant and Curtis couldn’t allow that. She was blaming herself for something her bitch of a friend had caused.

“I need you to take a big breath and calm down a little. If we’re having a baby, we don’t need him or her getting all anxious this early on in the cell dividing stage.”

Curtis was aware that kind of thing more than likely didn’t matter, but he hoped it at least gave Hannah a second to clear her head of the things they couldn’t change. He wanted to strangle Nina, but it wouldn’t solve anything right that second.

They needed to sit and have a conversation about what the possibility of her being pregnant meant and whether she was ready to be a parent. He was torn how he should drive the conversation. The first thing he needed to do was to get her to calm down. Curtis wanted her to be thinking as clearly as she could as they discussed options.

“We might be having a baby,” Hannah whispered.

She’d gone into her statue stance and her eyes were glassy as they looked off in the distance. Maybe strangling Nina would help.

“The key word there is might. There’s no reason to worry about something we don’t know is a sure thing. It’s just been a couple days. If you don’t want to risk it, the morning after pill could still be an option.”

It wasn’t an option Curtis would choose, but without making previous plans, it was totally her choice. He tried not to cringe as he made the suggestion, to keep from swaying her.

“No,” Hannah said as her arms clutched her stomach. “I know I take the shots, but I don’t want to kill it if we did make something. I don’t expect you to necessarily be on board with that decision, but I’m firm that if there’s a baby, I’m keeping it.”

Curtis reached over and placed his hand on top of her arms. He’d already pictured her pregnant, so it was easy to imagine her holding onto a small baby bump.

“Good. How soon will we know for sure? I’m guessing there isn’t a test advanced enough to tell us today.”

He’d done all he could to fill her full of his semen, but he was fairly certain the amount didn’t make it any easier to know sooner whether it collided with one of her eggs. It was bad that Curtis was thinking about if he’d only known she was off her shots, he would’ve tried harder. Knowing how frantic things had been, he wasn’t sure that was possible, but he could’ve tried.

Hannah shook her head and focused her eyes on where his hand touched her. Curtis figured if there was a test out there, she would’ve already found a way to get it done before she told him. It didn’t slip his notice that she had actually told him, when most women would’ve probably waited until they knew for sure. If it was any other woman, chances were he would’ve never known there was a chance.

“There’s the pee-on-a-stick tests you can get from the store or a doctor can do a blood test. In both cases, it’s probably best to wait two weeks. I guess you can do the blood test a little sooner, but it might be a false negative.”

“Okay, then. For the next two weeks, it’s not an issue. There’s nothing we can do about it, so other than making sure we use condoms if you don’t feel like gambling, everything stays the same.”

She’d already been clear that was where her thoughts were going. Curtis shouldn’t have started to think about her having his kid, because all he could think about was whether she’d notice him poking holes in said condoms. He was fairly certain most twenty-eight-year-old males weren’t thinking about getting a woman “accidentally” pregnant. The guys he knew were all running from that kind of responsibility, only looking for a good time.

“I’ve got a little issue with keeping things as they are. I have to go home and get my resume together because I quit my job today.”

Hannah hadn’t looked up since he reached over to try to comfort her, which meant he couldn’t see in her eyes how she was handling that news. It was no wonder she was having trouble keeping it together. She wasn’t crying or anything, but her mind seemed to be a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle that was missing a few pieces.

“I know this is going to sound weird, but I sort of feel like that’s great news. That means you’re getting out from under her thumb, right? She can’t manipulate you anymore and use you when it’s convenient for her.”

A nod seemed like it would be his only answer for almost thirty seconds. He was trying to figure out what question to ask first, like would she reenact the scene so he could get a better idea of how it went down. He wanted a detailed description of Nina’s face when she told her she quit.

She sighed and looked up. A half smile was on her face, but her eyes still seemed distant. A part of her wasn’t sitting on the old tan couch he’d been hauling around with him every time he moved. He had the modern stuff to go with the art collection he sometimes showed off for teammates, but he preferred lounging on something comfortable.

“I told her I quit her. I’ve known she’s a horrible person forever, but it was different when it didn’t directly affect me. She’s always been there for me, in ways it’s hard for other people to understand. Today, when she started talking about how me being pregnant would be her perfect revenge against you, I just couldn’t do it anymore. I told her I don’t want anything to do with her.”

Damn. Hearing Hannah talk about standing up for herself was a turn-on. Curtis had to try to come up with something non-erotic to think of so it didn’t become obvious. He’d forgotten that he was sitting there in nothing but his boxers. It was better than being naked, but it wouldn’t keep an erection a secret.

“I’m sure you can imagine how proud I am to hear you say that, but just in case, you’re a fucking rockstar.”

Curtis leaned forward and let his lips reiterate the sentiment. His tongue was also proud, so it nudged her lips apart and said a quick hello to its counterpart. The kiss was brief, because he was already getting hard and intimate touches wouldn’t help in that department. Hannah wasn’t in any condition to take the touches to the next level. Curtis told himself it’d be a great way to get her mind off things, but he was trying to temper how big of a jerk he could be.

“I’m a rockstar, who may be pregnant and only has about two months’ worth of money in my savings to pay my bills. That gives me some time to get a job, but I really should get home and start the search. Aside from needing to get my income squared away, I’ve got to make sure I’ve got insurance lined up just in case I am pregnant. I’ve heard having babies isn’t cheap.”

So had Curtis, but that was a department he could definitely help with. Maybe not the insurance, because he was pretty sure they had to be married for that, a step he would feel better about bringing up after she knew for sure about the baby. There was no way in the world he was going to bring up the topic with everything up in the air. She’d tell him no faster than he could finish the question.

What he could help with, whether she was pregnant or not, was making sure she didn’t lose her place, if that’s where she wanted to stay, and that her bills kept current. He thought about making the offer to let her move in, but again, he thought she’d answer no before she gave the idea a chance. Any way he looked at it, he figured there was a way for him to help, as long as she was willing to take it.

“Let me know what you need me to do. Any of the resources I have are at your disposal.”

Hannah scooted forward and turned so she could lean back against Curtis’ chest. With his leg curled up on the couch, she was sitting on top of it. It wasn’t too uncomfortable, but Curtis feared his leg would fall asleep, so he lifted her up a little and stretched it out.

When he let her get back in his lap and comfortable, he realized hiding his semi-boner wasn’t going to be possible. She didn’t immediately say something about the appendage poking her in the back, and he wasn’t about to bring it up. She’d already asked him once that day whether it ever went away, so it shouldn’t have come as a surprise.

“I know it’s weird, and I was just talking about slowing things down this morning, but would it be possible if I stay here a few days? Just because I told her I don’t want anything to do with her, doesn’t mean she’ll listen. Since we live in the same building, I’m a little scared to go home and see how’s she’s taking me walking out. I’m pretty sure she won’t light the place on fire, but she does have a key.”

Curtis kissed the top of her head and squeezed her into his chest. Hannah seemed to have calmed down, but he worried that she was over the shock phase of what happened and was ready to start bottling things up. The good news about her suggestion was that she made keeping an eye on her easier.

“I said whatever you need, and I meant it. If you still want to try to slow things down, I’ve got four extra bedrooms. You can pick any one of them and call it your home for as long as you want.”

He had four bedrooms that he instantly wanted to have fumigated. He didn’t’ want to make assumptions, though, so offering seemed like the smart move. It was all about letting Hannah make her own choices. Curtis felt he needed to prove to her she was capable of doing so.

“Maybe we’ll play that by ear. Do you really not have any plans for today?”

Her head rested on his shoulder, so it was easy for her to tilt it and kiss his jaw. It’d been a couple days since he shaved, which meant a nice forest of stubble cropped up.

“My plans for today are to do whatever you want to do.”

The idea was a little scary, but Curtis was up for an adventure. He had two weeks to try to convince Hannah that she wouldn’t mind living with him, because once they found out whether she was pregnant, he was going to ask her to marry him. Okay, maybe not that exact moment, but he was already drafting a speech.