Chapter 12

Twelve

Gabriella

T he front door opened and slammed shut before I came up with an answer.

"Gabriella? Are you home?"

God, God. I dropped my face into my hands as my heart cracked wide open inside my chest. Leaving was the right choice. But knowing this was the last time I'd hear Mac walk through the front door and call out to me that way almost broke my resolve.

His feet pounded up the stairs. "Gabriella, Trinity said you weren't feeling well. Are you okay?"

I did the best I could to clean my face with my hands and looked up just as Mac burst into the bedroom.

He moved toward me. "Are you alright? What…?"

I stopped breathing the moment his gaze landed on my suitcase.

"What's that doing out?"

I stood up and faced him. "I need to go, Mac. This just isn't going to work."

"Go where? What's going on, Gabriella? When I left you at the office, everything was fine. What happened?"

"My happy little bubble burst today," I said inanely.

"Come again? Your what?" He shook his head and closed the distance between us, curling his hands gently around my shoulders. "You know what. I don't care. Whatever's going on in your head, get it out of there. You're not going anywhere."

I shook my head. "Mac, I can't stay here. I've figured some things out over the last week, and I realized that I can't do this to you."

"Do what to me, beautiful?" His voice was so gentle and soft it caused tears to sting my eyes.

"Damn it. Don't be nice to me. I won't be able to get through this without crying if you're nice to me."

He smiled. "Then don't get through this. Tell me what's bothering you, we'll fix it, and then I'll help you unpack before dinner."

"I have to go, Mac. This isn't just one of my crazy pregnancy hormone things."

"Is it a crazy-had-a-throw-down-in-the-ladies'-room kind of thing?"

My mouth dropped open and then my eyes narrowed. "Trinity ratted on me."

He laughed and pulled me into a hug. "Trinity was worried about you. She told Sawyer what happened and he told me."

He rocked me in his arms and I couldn't help myself, I hugged him back and let him rock me some more. I told myself I was just taking comfort one last time.

He pressed a kiss into the top of my head. "Now why don't you tell me what they said to you that made you run home and pack your bags?"

I pushed back from him. "That's just it. This isn't my home. This is your home. It's the place you built to bring the woman you love when you found her."

"Uh, yeah. That's why you're here."

I shook my head. "Not me, Mac. Your soulmate. I know you're dedicated to this baby and you're going to be a great father. And I won't take that away from you, I promise."

As I said the words, a plan solidified in my mind. I needed to make sure Mac and his family were around to give my baby a real family. That meant I needed to stay in Hardwood.

I sighed and bowed my head. Staying here, seeing Mac all the time, would suck. But if it meant keeping my promise to Slugger then I'd stay.

"I'm not going to leave Hardwood," I said softly. "I'll find an apartment in town and keep my job. We'll be able to work something out where you're a big part of the baby's life."

I sank my teeth into my bottom lip as I worried that maybe Mac would push to have the baby live here with him. Would he fight me for custody?

"Yeah, I know I'll be a big part of our baby's life. He'll be sleeping across the hall from me every night. Just like you'll be sleeping by my side…" Mac dipped his knees so his face was level with mine, "…every fucking night I'm on this earth. You're not going where."

"But what about when you meet the woman you are supposed to love? Not the woman you're forced to be with? You need to take me to a hotel in town for the night. Tomorrow I'll sort out an apartment, and we can figure out the rest as we go along."

"You are my soulmate," Mac bit out on a growl.

"No. I know that's not true, Mac. I know you'll do anything for your child and I know you care about me a lot. But please." My voice broke and tears flooded my eyes as I begged him. "Please don't lie to me."

He turned away from me with a snarl. I could see him fighting for control of his temper. I didn't wait to find out.

I swiped at the tears sliding down my cheeks and grabbed for the handle of my suitcase. "Please don't make this any harder than it is."

Mac whirled around and seeing my hand on the suitcase, his control snapped. In two big steps, he was next to me. He snatched the suitcase from my hand and tossed it across the room.

I gasped, but before I could react any more than that, Mac had me in his arms and spread me across the bed.

"Mac! Let me up!"

"I'm not letting you go anywhere until you make some sense. You're mine, beautiful, and I'm not letting you walk out of here over some half-baked idea some jealous bitch handed you in the ladies' room."

"She didn't say anything that wasn't true." I pressed my hands against his chest. He didn't budge. "I can't be yours. You don't even trust me to share the slightest details of your life. You don't feel the same way about me as I do about you and that is okay."

Mac collapsed on top of me, his face going to my neck.

I nudged him. "Mac, you have to let me up."

He pulled himself up, bracing himself over me on his forearm. "That's what this is all about? Shit, I hate admitting Sawyer is right."

I wrinkled my nose at him. This wasn't going at all how I expected. "What are you talking about?"

"Sawyer. He told me not to hide this stuff from you. He knew it would push you away." He stroked my wild curls back from my face. "But sweetheart, I kept that from you because I thought you had enough to deal with without me throwing my past on top of it all. Before I met you it was a decade of military life and everything it comes with. Good and bad. But you've had the pregnancy to deal with, then moving...you've been handling everything so well, but I was afraid if I kept piling stuff on you at some point, it would be too much and you'd run for the hills."

I blinked up at him, trying to let his words sink in. "So you're saying you didn't want to burden me, not because you don't care about me but because you care too much?"

"Fuck, beautiful, care about you? Yeah, I care about you. You're mine. The woman who drives me crazy, makes me feel alive, and makes me happy I didn't die out on some dry battlefield like I wished for on so many occasions. You make me forget the bad." He shook his head and grinned down at me. "Caring is the least of what I feel for you. Possessive and protective come to mind. Loving you beyond reason. Pick any of those. They all fit. You are mine, Gabriella. My soulmate. My love. The woman I want."

Shockwaves jolted through my body. "Your soulmate? You love me?"

It was his turn to be confused. "What the fuck do you think we've been doing here the last couple of months?"

I opened my mouth to tell him, but suddenly images of our time together flooded my mind, and I closed it again.

I saw Mac making me dinner, lighting candles around the room, checking in with me throughout the day to make sure the morning sickness wasn't too bad. So many ways he'd shown me how he felt about me. And only that last one had anything to do with the baby.

But I'd been too tangled up in my past to realize my future was right in front of me.

"I thought you cared about me because of the baby," I whispered.

Mac dropped his forehead to mine. "Good thing I'm crazy about you or you might be more trouble than you're worth."

He softened his words with a grin and a kiss on the tip of my nose. "Beautiful, if I knocked up anyone, I'd do everything I could to make sure my baby was taken care of. But move someone else into my home? Start building a life with them? A family with them?" He shook his head. "That's only for you. The love of my life and I hope to live a long one so I get to show you every single day just how much you mean to me."

I stared up at him in wonder, trying to process what he was saying. I lifted a hand to his jaw. I searched his eyes while I absorbed his words. When they finally sank in, I stiffened. "You really love me. I can't ever remember anyone ever saying those words to me."

He cupped my face in his large palms and kissed me tenderly. "Thank God I got you pregnant and you came back to me. I was a fool to let you go that first night. I should have kidnapped you and brought you home with me."

"I probably would have come willingly."

As soon as I said the words, a laugh escaped me. If someone told me when Amber and Dr. Walker were trying to convince me I was pregnant that in the not too distant future, I'd see it as the biggest blessing of my life, I would have laughed in their face.

But now…I'd already figured out my baby was a blessing, but now it sank in. If it weren't for him, I never would have come looking for Mac. I would have spent my whole life missing… my soulmate .

I reached up and pulled Mac down so I could kiss him with all the feeling I'd had pent up in me for so long. When we finally came up for air, I don't know which of us looked more dazed.

"I love you, Captain Mac Becker."

He grinned down at me. "I love you, too, my crazy, beautiful girl."

I returned his grin with one of my own until one more thought occurred to me.

"You haven't claimed me."

"Claimed you?"

I touched my ring finger.

Understanding dawned in Mac's eyes and his grin grew wicked. "And what do you call this?" He stroked a hand over my round belly, causing me to blush.

"If that's not official I don't know what is, I guess," I said with a laugh.

He leaned down and set about showing me just how connected we were. Heart and Soul. And by the time we finished, nobody would ever doubt my one-time fuck boy was my full-time lover.