I stuffed myself full and then hid away in my basement lair. Mike had said he was filming until work regulations forced the stop, but that he’d call me when he got home. I still had half an hour—probably more, because as long as the last take started before the clock ran out, they could keep shooting. It happened more often than I’d realized, but Mike had just laughed and said that it was worth it to get the scene in the can and move on to something new the next day.

The phone rang just before the half-hour was up. I raced to grab it, flopping onto the bed as I accepted the call. Mike’s face filled the screen—tired, happy, and a little anxious-looking. “Hey,” he said. “How are you?”

“Good. Full. I think I ate too much tonight.” I rolled over onto my back and squirmed until I could prop my head up on a pillow. “You okay about the news this morning?”

“I always knew you wanted kids. It wasn’t a huge surprise.”

He didn’t say whether he was happy about it, I noticed. Well, this was too important to dance around that. “But how do you feel?”

“How do you feel? You’re the one who’s pregnant.”

Damn it, still dancing around the important question. “I’m fine. Just felt different the other day and thought I’d better check. Mike, do you want this baby? Because if you don’t, we have to make a decision pretty soon.” I wondered if he’d realize the decision was about our relationship—I was having this child, and if he didn’t want it, then he could go back to Hollywood and its blondes.

A little bitter still, are we? Apparently.

He looked shocked. “What? No! Of course I want this baby! What the hell—? Lew!”

I breathed a quiet sigh of relief. That shock had seemed genuine. “I mean, we didn’t talk about this before, and I know it’s pretty quick.”

“Not like I didn’t know we were going to be trying at some point. Probably sooner than later. If I hadn’t been an idiot when I first moved out here, we’d probably already have two. The question is, do you want to get married before the baby comes? We’re almost done here, I’ll have some post production to do but that’s all Monday to Friday stuff—we could take a weekend and run off to Vegas. Or how long would it take us to get the license back home?”

“I don’t know.” I hadn’t even thought about that yet. “Probably not long. But Mike, we need to talk about this.”

“Isn’t that what we’re doing?” He sounded sincerely baffled and I wasn’t quick enough to keep my eye-roll to myself. “What did I do this time?” he demanded. “Lew, you’re going to send me to the funny farm!”

I laughed and rolled over again, propping his image up against the headboard. “You’d be bored if I didn’t.”

He laughed at me, but then added, “I don’t know what you mean.”

I’d thought it would be relatively easy to explain. Just straight out tell him. But now I found myself fumbling for words, trying to pick the ones that would explain my feelings the most clearly. Especially after he’d just spent so much on my ring. I ran my thumb over it, feeling the slick surface of the vinework and the roughness of the stones. “I know alphas don’t think about these things, but I don’t want a… a wedding…” I stumbled to a halt, because this was going in the wrong direction.

“You don’t want anyone to think we’re ashamed,” Mike said in a quiet voice.

It was a reasonable assumption, but not the right one. I shook my head and played with my ring some more. “No, not that. But I always wanted a big family wedding.”

“I remember. You used to talk about it before. You still want that?”

I nodded.

“That’s not going to be quick.”

“I know. And I don’t want to be all baby belly when we get married.”

The jerk laughed at me again. “So you want to wait until after the baby comes?”

“Yeah. Is that going to be a problem for work?” If it was, I could just stay here until after the baby and then move to California. Or… no, that wouldn’t work. It was still his baby.

“No, it’s not going to be a problem.” He paused and looked a little sheepish. “To be honest, I had a meeting with my agent today and we talked a little about this. She suggested we wait so it didn’t look like I was treating you or the baby like a dirty secret. I told her we’d talk about it and I’d let her know what we decided.”

I liked that emphasis on the ‘we’ in his sentence. “So if I’d said I wanted to get married right away, we’d just have gone and done it?”

“Yep.”

“And you’re sure you don’t mind?”

“Nope. You wouldn’t be happy with a drive-through wedding anyway. I know you.”

“Probably not.” A happy glow settled in around my heart. “Do you still want me to move back to L.A. when you find a new place?”

“Absolutely. I miss you!”

“Good. Next question.”

“Uh huh.” He grinned. “I love you.”

“I love you too. But back to the questions.”

“You know, I didn’t call you expecting an interrogation.”

“Tough, that’s what you’re getting.” I pursed my lips and blew him a kiss. “Do you want to get married here or in L.A.? I kind of need to know if I’m going to start planning this thing. And when? Do we want a summer wedding or a winter one?”

He started to laugh. “Lew, you’re a total nutcase. Pick a day, I’ll make it work. Actually, I’ll send you my agent’s phone number and you two can coordinate between you. Just tell me where to be.”

“Okay, fine, but which do you want?”

“I want whatever makes you happy.” He paused and frowned slightly. “If you can fit it into my schedule, that would be better. Except I don’t know what I’m going to be doing next year.”

“We’ll figure it out. We can decide on flowers and decorations and stuff until then.” I propped my chin on my hands and smiled at him. “So, tell me about your day.”