A grunt was about all I could manage in his direction. Some warning that they’d arrived might’ve been nice. But that was Oliver. He just handled things, which was sometimes nice and sometimes worthy of a smack.

I smiled weakly at my parents. My mom was already rising from her chair, a big smile wreathing her face. Maybe she hadn’t noticed my lack of pants?

Then I glanced at my dad. His dark brows were beetled together and he was shaking his head.

That was definitely a no for his side.

“Hi Mom. Hi Dad. How was your trip in?” Under normal circumstances, I would’ve gone over to greet them, but my lack of underwear was skeeving me out.

My mom rushed toward me and wrapped me in a giant hug. I supposed the lack-of-panties thing didn’t bother her as much, considering where I’d come from. “Hi honey. Oh, how we’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too. So much. It’s so good to have you here.” I hugged my mom longer than I usually did, because it gave me an opportunity to keep my eyes closed and pray for this whole scene to vanish. “So, tell me how your trip was. Did you meet up with any rough weather on the way in from Sedona?”

“Oh, some rain here and there, a little snow.” My mom moved back and waved a hand. “Nothing we couldn’t handle.”

“A little snow? There was two feet in Ohio.” My dad stood and came over to join us, giving me a hug as well. His was much shorter, and he had a message to relay in an undertone near my ear before he stepped back. “You have some ’splaining to do, Lucy.”

“That’s true, but we’re hardy New Yorkers. To us, wasn’t barely more than a dusting.” My mom smiled and glanced swiftly at Oliver’s still turned back before raising her brows at me. Her version of my dad’s sentiments.

If I was going to get through this day, I needed bacon. Stat.

“Hungry?” Oliver asked mildly as I picked up three slices of bacon. They singed my fingers and dripped grease on Oliver’s pristine shirt, but whatever. That was what the dry cleaner was for and this was probably all his fault.

Okay, it wasn’t, but I was hungry and embarrassed and…bacon.

“Oh my God, this is good,” I said between mouthfuls.

My mom exchanged a glance with my father. “It is good, honey, but you seem especially ravenous.”

“I am.” My tone was one hundred percent cheerful.

They didn’t know about the baby. They couldn’t know, because I hadn’t told them yet and Oliver would not go there. He wouldn’t.

Would he?

“Juice.” He turned to pour a glass from the pitcher on the table and handed it to me, which I drank as fast as I’d consumed my bacon.

Stress drinking was a thing now too, apparently. At least I’d never developed much of a taste for alcohol. Orange juice was much less dangerous, especially in my condition.

“Have a seat, sweet pea.” My mom pulled out a chair, but I was too busy grabbing a plate and stacking it with bacon and eggs.

I leaned closer to Oliver. “I thought you had no food but aphrodisiacs.” Yeah, I could’ve lowered my voice for that comment, but where would be the fun in that?

It would also require my brain engaging, and that had not yet occurred this morning.

Oliver cleared his throat. “I had Seth’s nanny pick up a few things on her way over last evening. She’s highly efficient.”

“Oh. Okay, good. You’re a really good cook. These bacon and eggs are incredible.” I gave him a thumbs-up and turned back to the table with all the exuberance of a woman about to be led off in shackles.

It wasn’t that I wasn’t happy to see my parents. On the contrary, I’d missed them desperately. But this situation was beyond awkward. Normally, someone got to break the news they were dating someone to their parents when they had pants on. And here I was, so hungry I’d just filled my plate and was about to sit down without remembering I was inconveniently pantsless.

I set down my plate and gave the bacon one last longing glance before I stole one for the road. Oh man, so good. “Be right back,” I said. “Talk amongst yourselves.”

After hurrying back upstairs, I went into the bathroom and screeched at my sex hair. Like seriously, if there was a picture beside the phrase in the dictionary, this would be it. And I had scruff burn all over my chin and half my neck. Yeah, because that wasn’t obvious.

Here I’d thought my bare ass—and personal area—was the worst of it. Nope. I might as well have taken out a billboard that said I just got fucked, yo!

Rather than dwell, I took care of business and dressed in my clothes from the day before. Luckily, I’d worn a turtleneck sweater that hid some of the scruff burn. The chain for my new necklace was long enough for me to be able to show it off. I tamed my hair, pinched my cheeks, and walked into the kitchen with a smile, prepared to make quick work of my breakfast. I’d earned it.

I strolled in just in time to hear the words “wedding” and “don’t have long to choose a venue.”

“Who’s getting married?” I snatched another piece of bacon, biting it just as my mother answered.

“Why, you are. Aren’t you?”

That was when I started to choke.

Handily, there was a sip or two left in my glass of juice. When I drained them, Oliver was considerately there to pour some more.

“Says who?” I sputtered, throwing a glance at him before he returned to the stove. He seemed to be avoiding actually sitting down, and now I knew why.

Good God, what had he said to them while I was blissfully asleep?

My dad folded and refolded the newspaper he’d had his face hidden behind for most of the time since I’d originally come into the kitchen. “We wondered why you wouldn’t contact us to tell us you were planning on getting married, but Oliver reminded me we’d been out of touch a lot since leaving town.”

“Oh, did he now?” I shot mental daggers at his back, my mind whirling. What the hell was he thinking? Why would he lie to them that we were getting married? Unless…unless…

“Did he tell you about the baby? Is that what this is all about?”

Silence reigned, making me think that nope, that was the wrong guess.

Perhaps he’d taken a proactive position, wanting to assure them we would get married before I told them about the kid on the way? But that was also insane, considering we hadn’t discussed marriage. We had not even discussed actual commitment. The word girlfriend had been tossed about—mostly in my own head—but that was not enough to marriage make.

“Baby?” My mother leaped up from the table and jogged around it to physically grab my flat—well, mostly flat-ish, at least pre-bacon gorging—stomach. “You have a baby in there? His baby?”

“Unless all those dreams about Ian Somerhalder paid off in ways I never imagined.”

Oliver grunted and shifted to lean against the stove, lifting a mug of coffee to his lips. “I didn’t tell them. I figured you wanted to.”

“Kind of you.” I shook my head as my mother finally stopped groping my stomach for signs of life and backed off. “Maybe you could have held off on the wedding talk too? I mean, wedding, seriously? What’s gotten into you?”

“You told me what you wanted last night. Spelled it out quite clearly.” He lifted a shoulder and sipped as if he was making all the sense in the world and I was just being silly. Much as he’d done for the entirety of our relationship up until Vegas—which explained why I had wanted to off him in bloody and inventive ways most of the time. “I just assumed you were serious.”

“You assumed an awful lot it sounds like.”

“Okay, rewind some of this for us.” My mother sagged into the seat opposite me and reached out to grab my father’s hand for support. He had seemingly gone mute. Traumatized beyond speech, perhaps. “You quite obviously spent the night here with him and were wearing his clothes, indicating you’re involved at the very least.” Her ears went pink. “And you’re pregnant?”

I nodded and poked at my cooling eggs. I’d lost all will to eat. Dang shame. “Yes. I just found out last night before Ally had her baby.”

“Oh, she did! Is he adorable beyond belief?”

“He was in the picture I saw. I was supposed to go back this morning, but it’s actually getting late.” I glanced at my watch. For the first time in history, I was actually excited to go to work. Anything to escape this hot mess of a breakfast. “I have a shift at the diner soon.”

“You don’t need to worry about that any longer.”

Oliver’s dismissive tone made me frown. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You truly have forgotten everything you said last night.”

“I didn’t say anything about my job.” Had I been sleep-talking or something? Or could be he’d just started reading minds.

Except he was wrong. I’d rather deal with Greta’s grumpiness than spend more time trying to figure out how we’d gone from incredible, slightly kinky sex and beautiful rose gold necklaces to picking venues for our wedding when he hadn’t even proposed to me. Forget that, he hadn’t even mentioned us moving in together. Or even having a standing date at the Sherman Inn for Monday Night Football and the wing special. Nothing.

“You most certainly did. I asked you your preferred scenario for having this baby, and you said you wanted to be married and a housewife. In a manner of speaking,” he added as I tugged at my turtleneck sweater. My face might as well have been on fire. “And if we’re going to do the whole traditional deal, we should do it now before you start to show.”

“Oh, should we now? Because God forbid the blessed Hamilton name be tarnished by an out-of-wedlock baby.”

“It’s a small town,” he said tightly. “I didn’t want people to speculate. Just easier all the way around. But if it’s not what you want—”

“Oh, what I want matters now? I also didn’t say I wanted to be married to you.”

Ugh, I so didn’t mean that the way it sounded. I just meant we’d been talking hypotheticals last night, and he’d gotten way specific without doing the usual things that led to that point.

Like saying “I love you” and “Will you marry me, Sage?”

Then waiting for an answer to such before booking the hall. Or judge’s chambers. Because knowing Oliver, expedient would mean the quickest, lowest-frills venue possible.

Christ, we might as well have had Elvis do the deed. It would’ve been more romantic than what Oliver probably had in mind.

No time for love and romance! Bun in the oven. What will people say?

Well, fuck the hell right out of that. As for appearances? Screw them too. I wasn’t making life-changing decisions in case some of the town biddies or buddies might have something to say about my big belly. It was 2018, and a woman could be married or unmarried or heterosexual or bisexual or anything else, and no one had any right to say jack about it.

“Excuse me for assuming.” He crossed his arms, his jaw tightening. “I figured since you spent the night in my bed that the idea probably wasn’t abhorrent.”

“It might not be abhorrent if you weren’t going about this all wrong.” My throat was aching so much it was amazing I could even speak.

“Oh, am I? At least I didn’t tell you I wanted to get married, just not to you.”

“I didn’t say that. Exactly,” I muttered.

“Yes, you did,” my mother put in. “Exactly that. And I have to say, sweet pea, all this has me concerned. You used to tell us everything. Now we’re totally left in the dark and you don’t seem happy.” She laced her fingers with my father’s. “Maybe we never should have left you here alone. We thought the independence would be good for you, but—”

“The independence is good for me. Very good. Which is exactly why I don’t want some man deciding for me that I’m going to get married and quit my job just because I was honest about my someday-in-a-perfect-world dreams. That isn’t my world, Oliver.”

His eyes flashed. “No, but you’re carrying my baby. We can’t just bury our heads in the sand. Decisions have to be made. It’s time to grow up and act like adults.”

“Right. And you’re the guy I had serious doubts could even deal with a child, because for all these years, the only thing you’ve ever held is your dick.”

My mother gasped, but I wasn’t through.

“You were so careful about making sure you had no permanent entanglements, but now I’m supposed to believe you want to be a father and a husband, just like that?”

Oliver gripped the edge of the stove until his knuckles whitened. “People change.”

“They most certainly do. But you need to make someone believe that, not just say it and assume they’ll take it as fact with no corroborating evidence.” I jerked to my feet. “Oh, and FYI? I am acting like an adult. I’m taking care of myself and my child, and it’s up to you if you want to be involved. But I thought I made it very clear last night that I can handle this on my own. I can stand on my own two feet and take care of what has to be done without anyone making decisions for me because I’m too feebleminded to make them myself.”

“For Christ’s sake, woman, I never said you were feebleminded. I was trying to do what I thought you wanted.”

“Oh yeah? How about asking me? How would you like it if I went to your father and told him we were getting married without running it by you first? How would that make you feel?” I covered my face with my hands, unable to believe this was my reality right now. “I know you think you were doing the right thing, but it wasn’t. Not even close.”

“Well, then, for fuck’s sake, tell me. Tell me how I’m supposed to make this right, because it all seems very wrong.”

I dropped my hands. “You can’t,” I said finally. “You know why? Because in all your rational decision making, you forgot one vital ingredient. Do you know why people usually get married, Oliver?” My voice was brutally soft as I stepped forward. “Hint: it’s not because it’s the solution to a problem. It’s because they’re in love and want to spend their lives together.”

He stared at me, his stony jaw set and unyielding.

“I know you don’t love me. That’s okay. But I won’t live a pretend life just so I can try to convince my child of a pretty lie. I told you last night that this isn’t a Seth and Marjorie situation, and it isn’t. You don’t have enough money in the world to make me give up my baby.” I swallowed hard, determined not to cry. One more facet of being an adult. “Nor will you strong-arm me into doing what you think is best for our child.”

“You have no clue what I’m thinking. Or feeling.”

“Maybe I don’t. But now you know what it’s like when someone assumes.”

I turned to face my parents, who looked about as stunned as I felt. “I’m so glad you’re in town. I’ll talk to Ally today and we’ll coordinate when we can all have dinner and you can meet the baby.” I moved forward to give my mom a long hug, then did the same with my dad. “I’m sorry this morning was so weird. We’ll talk more later, I promise.”

“So that’s it?” Oliver asked. “You’re just leaving?”

“I have to get to work.” I reached up to touch the bow necklace he’d given me, oddly drawing strength from the smooth rose gold under my fingers. “We’ll talk soon.”

He glanced at my mostly still full plate. “You barely touched your breakfast.”

“Guess I’m not as hungry as I thought.”