Beyond the Breaking Point (43 page)

Cassidy hooked her cell phone up to the car’s blue tooth for the drive home. Once she hit the expressway, she voice-commanded her phone to call Erika.

“Great timing,” Erika said as she answered. “Today’s the day, isn’t it? I was just getting ready to call you.”

“The results are in,” Cassidy confirmed.

“And? Don’t keep me in suspense. What did they say?”

“The baby is Phillip’s,” she said in a flat voice.

“Damn! What did Max say? Have you told him yet?” Erika asked, concern audible in her tone.

“Yeah, I called him immediately.” Cassidy laughed a little. “I was so scared and you know what he said?” She deepened her voice. “‘The next one will be ours.’ Then he asked me what I wanted for dinner. Talk about anticlimactic.”

“See! I told you. You were worried for nothing. The next one, hmm? That sounds like a man who’s in it for the long haul.”

“I know,” Cassidy agreed, conflicting bubbles of giddy delight and paralyzing fear battling it out inside of her.

Erika lowered her voice. “Have you told Phillip?”

“No.”

“You plan to?”

Cassidy nibbled on her lower lip as she considered. “Dr. Manning’s office is mailing me a copy of the results. I think I’ll wait until I received them, then make a copy and mail it to him.”

Erika laughed. “After all he’s done, I don’t blame you for making him wait.”

Her conscience niggling at her, Cassidy protested, “It’s not that. I just don’t want to talk to him. He’s been silent—no phone calls, no voicemail messages, no texts. I’d like to enjoy it for a little while longer.”

No longer amused, Erika asked, “Do you think he’s up to something?”

Cassidy sighed in resignation. “I hope not, but if he is, I’ll know soon enough.”

“True. Don’t forget Macey’s birthday is next week. We’re having a small party at home for her, just family and a few close friends. She wants Aunt Cassidy and Aunt Cassidy’s friend Max to be there. I’m sending cupcakes and treats to school with her so she can celebrate her birthday with her classmates.”

“And so you don’t have to clean up the mess,” Cassidy said wryly, remembering last year’s fiasco and Erika’s vow of “Never again.”

“You got it,” she said cheerfully with not a hint of remorse. “I’ll let you know tomorrow what day and time. Dave and I haven’t decided whether to have it on her birthday or wait until the weekend.”

“Just let me know and we’ll be there, bearing gifts,” Cassidy promised.

“Remember the rule,” Erika said, her tone taking on an ominous quality.

“I know, I know. Nothing that makes a mess or lots of noise,” she said, laughing as she remembered the year she’d innocently bought Macey a super-sized Play-Doh set. Erika had gone ballistic and vowed revenge when Cassidy had children. How was she to know the stuff, once it got ground in carpet, was difficult to get out?

“Books,” Erika said decisively. “Books are great presents.”

Boring, Cassidy thought, but all she said was, “We’ll see.”

As she hung up, she murmured, “I wonder how much the super-sized box of Legos cost?”

Chapter Twenty-Three

Cassidy rushed into her apartment, complaining and apologizing at the same time. “I can’t believe it took me an hour and a half to get home. Traffic is crazy. Why do people forget how to drive when it rains?” She locked the door and dumped her things into a nearby armchair. “I’ll be ready in fifteen minutes tops, I promise.”

On her way by, she swooped down to brush a “hello” kiss on Max’s cheek. Max hooked her by the waist and reeled her in so she landed on his lap with an “Umph.”

“The restaurant will still be there if you take your time,” he said dryly.

“Maybe,” she said, sounding doubtful, “but I’ll
starve
if I don’t get some food in me soon.” Sadly, if didn’t feel like much of an exaggeration. 

He narrowed his gaze at her and rested one hand on her baby bump. “Did you eat lunch?”

Cassidy kissed him. She couldn’t help herself. He was so sweet. As usual, despite her intentions it morphed from light and playful to deep and intense in a matter of moments. She could feel him lengthen and harden under her hip in readiness. Her core softened and moistened in response.

Max tugged on her hair, pulling her head up to break the embrace. “Stop trying to distract me,” he scolded.

“Was that what I was doing?” she teased. When he continued to stare at her with his serious face, she grinned and said, “Yes, I ate. I had a good lunch: chef salad, fresh fruit—”

“Rabbit food,” he scoffed. “No wonder you’re hungry.”

“Healthy food,” she corrected, tapping him on the tip of his nose with her finger. “The kinds of things I advise my patients to eat when they express worry about pregnancy weight gain.”

He arched one eyebrow, his expression wry. “And what do you tell them to eat when they’re underweight?” The
“like you”
went unsaid, but she heard it anyway.

She laughed. “Anything they want, as long as it’s healthy, which is what I plan to do tonight.”

Cassidy braced her left hand on Max’s knee and her right on his shoulder and pushed up, using his body as leverage to stand. Max yanked her back down.

“Hey! Hungry woman here,” she laughingly protested.

“Dinner’s on its way. While we wait, you can give me a proper greeting,” he said.

“I kissed you already. I thought we were going out?”

“That’s before it began raining and you got stuck in traffic. I vote we have a nice quiet evening in and simply relax.” He placed a hand on her hip and used it to position her more securely on his lap.

Cassidy sighed in relief and relaxed into his embrace. She twisted her upper body enough to drape her arms around his neck. “Sounds good to me.” After brushing his lips in another kiss, she asked, “So how was your day?”

She hadn’t called during lunch as had become her habit, one of the reasons Max probably thought she’d skipped. Their conversation while she was en route to the apartment had been kept brief for obvious reasons.

“Got two nibbles on my line,” he announced, referring to his job-hunting efforts. “How would you like to move to New Jersey? Or we can move to New York. I had a tug on the line there too.”

Cassidy could do nothing but stare at him. “Move? But…your whole family is here.”

Max made a face. “I know. I was born here, raised here, and even went to college here, all to stay close to them, but maybe it’s time for a change. Other than the occasional vacation trip, I’ve never been out of Philly.”

She made another attempt to move off his lap, but he held her in place. “This isn’t because of me, is it?” She would hate it if their relationship caused Max to distance himself from his family.

Max shook his head. “No, it’s where the offers come from, but I’m not going anywhere without you.”

Cassidy bit her lower lip. “Phillip would never agree to my taking his child out of Philly. He’d really—” She broke off abruptly, realizing what she’d almost revealed. “He’d never agree,” she repeated.

Fortunately, Max didn’t appear to notice her slip. “I’m still going to interview, just to see what they’re offering, but I’ll have the Hunters focus on firms closer to home.”

Cassidy, her mind still reeling at the idea that Max was making life-changing decisions based upon her preferences, was floored when he said, “You should move in with me.”

“What?” she asked blankly, hands falling numbly to her lap. Certainly she’d misheard.

“I want you to move in with me,” he repeated slowly.

“But…” Thoughts flew as though powered by a cyclone. She managed to hold on to one long enough to verbalize it. “My lease…”

“If you get penalized for breaking the lease, I’ll reimburse you,” he said, his intense blue gaze drilling into her uncertain one.

She glanced around dazedly. “My furniture. I just bought it.”

He shrugged. The movement of his shoulders captured her attention. “If you want your stuff, we’ll go through mine and decide what to get rid of. As long as I have a couch, a TV, and a comfortable bed to sleep in, I don’t care about the rest.”

The ease with which he made the suggestion shocked Cassidy into coherency. “Max, we’ve only been together three weeks at the most.”

“And in that time we’ve only spent three nights apart. We’re already living together. I’m suggesting we make it easier on both of us and live in one place.”

She shook her head. “Your family—”

“Can go hang. I love them, but they don’t run my life,” he interrupted firmly.

She studied him closely. “You’re serious about this. You want us to live together, even though I’m still married and pregnant with another man’s child?” she asked, spelling it out for him in case he’d forgotten any of the details of her situation.

Max cupped her face. “I love coming home to you and sharing my day with you. I love going to sleep at night curled around you and waking up in the morning next to you.” His gaze sharpened, seeming to pierce right through her. “I love you.”

Cassidy shut her eyes. Not to block out his words, but to hold them closer. She put her arms around his shoulders and buried her face in his neck. It was too soon, of course. There was no way Max was in love with her after so short a timeframe, but she held the words close to her heart anyway.

He slid a finger under her chin and nudged until she raised her head and looked at him. “Is that a yes?”

She groaned. “No, it’s not a yes, but,” she added, forestalling him when he went to speak, “I’ll think about it. But Max—”

“Good. You keep thinking about it and while you are, I’ll use all of my considerable skills of persuasion to coax you into agreeing.” Then he kissed her. Before things could get too heated, the buzzer sounded. “That’s the food.” He shifted her onto the couch cushion and rose, extracting his wallet from his pant’s pocket.

As he went to the door, Cassidy sighed.
Never argue with a lawyer. You can’t win
.

Max’s family, her family, Phillip—there were so many reasons she couldn’t, shouldn’t move in with Max. But for a while, Cassidy let herself dream of the possibilities. In her dream world, she and Max loved each other and no one had an issue with it. In this alternate reality, the babe she carried in her womb had two dimpled cheeks and Max’s blue eyes, love lasted forever, and fidelity was a foregone conclusion.

Cassidy snorted. Like she’d thought, a dream world.

She rose and joined Max at the dining room table. As worlds went, at the moment, hers wasn’t looking too bad.