“I can’t spend the next fifty years proving it to you over and over again, just to have you mistrust me. You know me well enough that I don’t do anything that I don’t want to do.”
I smile and nod softly, hope burning brightly in my chest.
“I’m sorry I said that. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I don’t say things to deliberately hurt people, and I’d never try to hurt you.”
“You’re sad, and you’re angry. And, please don’t throw something at me again, but your hormones are probably all over the place.”
My lips twitch, and I simply nod again. I’m just relieved that he didn’t actually leave when I told him to.
Thank God.
“I told you before, and I’ll say it again, I didn’t propose to you because of the baby. Cami, I’ve wanted you for as long as I can remember. I want you to be my wife, with or without the baby. You are mine, do you understand me?”
“Yes,” I murmur, and take a long, deep breath. “I’m a pain in the ass.”
“Oh, for sure,” he says, finally smiling. “But you’re a pain in my ass, and I wouldn’t have it any other way. We’re going to get through this, the same way that we’ll get through every other difficult time that crosses our path: as a team.”
“I don’t deserve you.”
“Yes, you do. You deserve every wonderful thing that life has to offer. You deserve better than me, but this is what you’re stuck with.”
“Thank God.”
He tips his forehead against mine.
“I love you so much.”
“I love you too, you beautiful pain in the ass.”
“IF THE DAIRY guy is late with my cheese one more time, I’m going to fire his ass and look for someone else.”
“Organic dairy isn’t easy to find,” I remind Mia the next morning. “Especially not at the prices he gives us. Everyone else charges an arm and a leg, and I’m not going to approve the funds for a more expensive dairy just because you and this guy don’t get along. Did you sleep with him or something?”
She just shrugs, not looking up from her phone.
“You slept with the dairy guy?” I demand, my voice a little shrill.
“He’s good-looking,” she says defensively. “And he’s not an idiot.”
“But apparently he’s late all of the time,” Landon says, crossing his arms over his chest. “Do I have to beat him up?”
“No,” Mia replies, rolling her eyes. “I know you don’t like to hear this, but I’m not a virgin. I do have sex. Not as often as I’d like, but it does happen.”
“I’m not going to pay more for dairy just because you boned the dairy guy and don’t want to deal with him,” I say firmly. “You’re an adult. You can deal with it.”
“He’s the one being difficult,” she says. “He wasn’t late before.”
“Maybe he’s trying to get your attention,” Landon suggests. “If you have to talk to him about his tardiness, you have to deal with him.”
“I don’t have to deal with him,” she says, just as stubborn as I am. “I can just send him an e-mail telling him I’m firing him.”
“No firing him until we find someone else for the same price.” I sigh and shift in the bed. “When is the doctor coming in?”
“What’s your doctor’s name again?” Mia asks. We are waiting, impatiently, for him to come in and discharge me so I can go home. I’m still sore, but I will be for a while. I just want to get home and recover there.
“I keep forgetting,” I reply, and look over at Landon, who is boxing up flowers that arrived this morning. “What’s his name?”
“Dr. Holmes,” the man himself says when he walks in the room and smiles. “You look better this morning.”
“I feel a little better.” He pulls my chart up on his laptop and sits next to me. In the light of day, without powerful pain meds to fog up my brain, I can see that Dr. Holmes is a hottie. I glance up at Mia and wiggle my eyebrows.
“Your blood pressure is great. All of your labs came back normal this morning, and your hormone levels are decreasing like they should.” He glances up at me and offers me a smile, and if I wasn’t already engaged to the hottest man in the universe, I might melt just a little. “So I hear you want to go home.”
Suddenly the flash on Mia’s phone goes off, blinding all of us.
“What the hell is wrong with this shitty phone?” she says, but she’s blushing. She was trying to get an incognito photo of Dr. Hottie.
Landon just glares at her, and I have to cover my giggle with a cough. Dr. Hottie just keeps talking, like this happens to him every day.
Because it probably does. If any doctor were to get selfie requests, it would be this one.
“I think we can let you go home, but I want you to follow up with your primary doctor in a couple of days.”
“I can do that.”
“Okay, I’ll get your paperwork finished up and a nurse will be in shortly with your prescriptions and some instructions, and we’ll get you out of here.”
“Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He nods, shakes Landon’s hand, and winks at Mia on his way out.
“What in the hell was that?” Landon demands as Mia and I bust out in laughter.