LITMIR.BIZ

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about the hug she’d given him when he’d first arrived. He remembered the steadiness of her gaze, despite the news he’d told her. He could hear the concern in her voice, and, beneath it, a strength he desperately needed.

      That was why he was here. He’d known she’d offer comfort, steadiness, strength. Because she was his friend. She cared about him. Even though he’d broken her heart by being unable to say yes to the family she wanted. Even though he’d seen some of the light in her eyes go out that day.

      It had been part of what had spurred him to the bar the next night.

      Her casual talks of a future and a family had forced him to face memories he’d been running from. Of him curling up to Janie as their parents argued in loud whispers outside Janie’s door. Of distracting her when the arguments turned louder. Of almost being relieved that she hadn’t been there any more when the arguments graduated into shouting.

      And then, of the silence.

      He couldn’t imagine putting a kid through it. Through what Janie had suffered with her illness. Through what he’d suffered with his parents’ marriage. Through what it felt like to have the possibility of carrying the cystic fibrosis gene hover like a noose around their necks. Or through having to make the hardest decision in his life about having a family because of it.

      Now he was being forced to imagine it. He was being forced to face the fears.

      He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck, over his face.

      ‘I need you there,’ he rasped, shame straining his voice. ‘I don’t know if I can do it.’

      ‘Of course you can,’ she said. ‘You took care of Janie.’

      The feeling he couldn’t explain swelled, compelling him to beg.

      ‘Please.’

      The skin around her eyes crinkled in tension. She gave a curt nod. ‘Fine. If it’s that important to you, I’ll go.’

      ‘Thank you.’

      He wanted to tell her she shouldn’t have agreed. That she was being too nice to him; that he didn’t deserve it. Neither did she. She deserved more than her ex-boyfriend and pseudo-friend asking this from her.

      He left it at thank you.

      ‘She obviously knew your name if she knew how to find you,’ Autumn noted slowly, almost carefully after a bit. ‘Or did you...?’ She cleared her throat. ‘Did you go back to your place?’

      Heat curled around his neck. ‘We, er, introduced ourselves when we met.’ He didn’t answer her question.

      ‘So she knows your surname, too?’

      He angled his head, trying to remember. The entire event was a little hazy. Another great example he’d set for his son.

       His son.

      ‘I think so.’

      ‘Okay, then. So she looked you up on the Internet—’

      ‘How do you know that?’

      She gave him a look. ‘If some guy I had a one-night stand with knocked me up and I knew his name, you can be sure I’d do an Internet search on him before finding him.’

      His mug stopped halfway to his mouth and he just stared at her, his mind playing her words over and over again.

       ‘If some guy I had a one-night stand with knocked me up...’

      Purposefully, and much too violently, he brought the coffee to his lips, swallowing down the hiss when the still-hot liquid burnt his throat. But he relished the pain, since he deserved it for the criminal thoughts he’d had at Autumn falling pregnant with someone else’s baby.

       Selfish, selfish, selfish.

      ‘Hunter?’ she asked with a frown. ‘Did you hear anything I said?’

      ‘About the Internet search?’

      She nodded.

      ‘Yes. I probably should have thought about that.’

      She studied him over her mug. ‘I imagine you were...too surprised to think.’

      ‘An understatement.’

      ‘That bad?’

      ‘It was fine,’ he denied. Her eyebrow lifted. ‘Shocking. It was shocking.’

      ‘Enough for you to want to avoid the gene issue.’

      He gritted his teeth, guilt flaring in his gut.

      ‘Yes.’

      ‘Enough for you not to realise what comes up when you do an Internet search for Hunter Lee.’

      He didn’t get what she was talking about for the longest moment, and then he shook his head.

      ‘You don’t mean—’

      She wrinkled her nose. ‘Afraid so.’

      And he thought the situation couldn’t get worse.

      ‘Oh, no,’ he groaned. ‘She’s seen me...’ He couldn’t finish the words.

      ‘It wasn’t that bad,’ she said kindly.

      ‘You have to say that,’ he said, his jaw tightening, ‘because you’re the reason it’s there.’

      ‘Maybe,’ she allowed. ‘Or maybe it’s there because you were having fun—’

      ‘And you filmed it.’

      ‘It was a social media challenge. I was supposed to film it.’

      ‘I did it for you.’

      ‘I appreciated it.’

      ‘You utilised it.’

      ‘A self-made billionaire doing a ridiculous dance for a social media challenge in my bakery?’ She snorted. ‘Damn right I filmed it. And look how amazingly it turned out.’

      ‘For you,’ he muttered darkly.

      ‘I only used it to promote the bakery. I didn’t sell your body parts on the black market.’

      ‘It went viral.’

      ‘Technically,’ she continued, as if he hadn’t spoken, ‘I didn’t film it. Mandy did.’

      ‘Yeah. We’re no longer friends.’’

      Autumn snorted again. ‘Yeah, you two looked real enemy-like when you were bribing her to make you some cupcakes last month.’

      He lifted a shoulder now, refusing to be taunted any further.

      ‘And besides the ridiculous dance, you actually did something sweet, too.’ Her eyes were happy. ‘You took me into your arms, spun me around, dipped me right under a wedding cake and laughed.’

      ‘You used that on your social media as part of a #BakeryBoyfriend campaign,’ he accused.

      ‘An icon was born.’

      She grinned at him, and—damn it—his lips twitched. How could he resist that smile? The way it softened her eyes, lit up her face. The way it widened her full pink lips, and made her look years younger than she was.

      It was enough to distract him from the fact that he was smiling. It felt like a feat. Hell, it was a feat. He didn’t think he could feel anything other than the pure panic that had fuelled his actions until he’d started speaking with her. He shouldn’t have been surprised. It had always been part of what had drawn him to Autumn, the way she made him feel. The way she made him forget.

      When he’d met her at the wedding of one of his employees—which Ted had forced him to attend—he’d carried an anchor around with him. That anchor had tied itself to his ankle when he’d been six and his sister

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