“And you think that maybe you wanted to have a baby with me to become part of the family?” Just saying it was bitter.

“No!” She shook her head vigorously. “No. That’s not it. I wouldn’t... I would never do that. But I do think I wanted to use you to try and fix me. To make me normal, and that wasn’t fair. Not to you. Not to any potential baby. It’s just not... I’m done with that. I’m not going to do it anymore. That’s what I wanted to say.”

“So now you don’t want to have a baby?”

“It’s not that I don’t want to have one. I mean, not that I don’t want to ever have one. I do. I just think that I need to sit with this for a while. And deal with myself.”

“You know,” he said, working to talk around the gravel in his chest. “It might be too late.”

“It was just once,” she said.

But her words were thin, and he had a feeling that she knew as well as he did they didn’t mean anything. It was just once. Once and it had changed everything. It had changed the way his skin felt. Changed the way the world was. It was just once. It had changed everything.

“So you’re telling me that you’re happy enough to have been in my bed once. And to never be in it again?”

“Ryder...”

“I don’t know that I’m ready to be done, Sammy.”

“I love you,” she said. “So much.”

He felt those words resonate in his body. In the back of his teeth. Like a shock wave. Except that he knew what she meant. There wasn’t even a question.

“I’m so afraid that that might undo what we are. This is the strongest, best relationship I’ve ever had in my life. The closest thing to family. And I just don’t...”

“You came to me,” he said.

“I know.” And he might have been confused before the two of them had actually made love. But he felt a lot less uncertain now. Like he knew exactly where he was supposed to be. Because she might be abandoning her pregnancy plan, but that didn’t mean he was ready to release her so that she was free to be with someone else.

And he knew Sammy. She wasn’t going to be with someone for the long term, not any more than he was.

They were the longest term relationship the other one had had. That was true enough.

Whether or not they were functional was another story. But they were in each other’s lives.

And whatever happened after this...

They had to see it through. That he knew. He was sure of it.

“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “Maybe instead of making pronouncements you see what happens.”

“I don’t think I can do that.”

“You? Spontaneous, bohemian Sammy? I thought thy name was spontaneity.”

She leaned in, a sad smile on her lips. “It’s a lie,” she whispered. “Don’t you know that? I keep everybody around me guessing. But that’s how I make sure I’m never guessing. I do something, you all react. And I stay one step ahead. I’m not spontaneous. I’m a control freak.”