It had been the first sign something wasn’t perfect. It had stung. A lot. More than she’d cared to admit at the time, actually. Later, she’d told herself that was who Xavier Rivera really was, and the man she’d had sex with had been nothing more than a pickup artist looking for another conquest.

She pushed away. She needed distance while she processed his words. She needed to figure out what was real. Was she merely seeing what she desperately wanted to see because she wanted to like the father of her child? Or was he the sincerely apologetic and intensely appealing man who’d protected her since this nightmare began?

Who is Xavier Rivera?

“Please, can I hold you? You’re still cold, and I…I need to give you comfort after giving you so much pain.”

“You’re hoping to hug your way into forgiveness.”

“If I thought that was possible, sure, but no. What I did was unforgivable. I’ve said that already. I’ll never seek your forgiveness because I don’t deserve it. I just…you could have died tonight, and that—along with every other awful thing you’ve had to deal with—was my fault. Please, will you let me hold you as I absorb the fact that the woman who bowled me over the night we met is going to be the mother of my child?”

She relaxed against him. “Well, when you put it that way…”

He let out a small laugh. “It was hands down the best sex I’ve ever had.”

“Same,” she admitted. “And potent too, apparently.”

He let out a bark of laughter. “How did that happen? As far as I know, none of the condoms broke, and I was careful when I wasn’t wrapped.”

“The condom box in my kit expired more than two years ago. Apparently, those expiration dates matter.”

“Don’t condoms have a shelf life of like…five years?”

“Yes. I didn’t realize how long it had been since I switched them out. I was in a long-term/long-distance relationship that ended a year ago, and I was on the pill the entire time we were together. I’d bought the condoms and tucked them in my emergency overnight field kit before my ex and I were a couple. I don’t cheat, so they went unused. After the breakup, I stopped taking the pill and bought a new box, but I forgot to swap them out with the ones in my overnight field kit I always keep in my car. It wasn’t exactly at the forefront of my mind since I don’t fool around with subordinates in the field and don’t go out to meet people much.”