Free Under His Care by Kelly Favor Page B

working for me. And I’m not proud of most of it. But I am proud of one thing.”
    “And what’s that?” she said, curious now.
    He smiled gently. “I’m so proud that you—you could’ve chosen any man to give yourself to. And yet you gave yourself to me, and I cherish that, Kennedy. I really do.”
    Her heart was filling with joy, but she couldn’t trust it. And despite all of Easton’s wonderful, caring words, she knew something that he didn’t. She knew the possibility existed that she was pregnant, and that would change everything.
    “Oh, Easton,” she said, her voice filled with sadness. “Thank you for being so kind, but—“
    “No,” he declared. “No buts, Kennedy. No excuses, no worries, no more crap from the past is going to stop me from giving you everything you deserve.”
    “Easton, it’s not that simple,” she began.
    “Maybe it is really that simple,” he insisted, and suddenly he was doing the unthinkable.
    Kennedy felt faint as she watched him drop down to one knee, right in the middle of her tiny, New York City apartment, and produce a small black box, which he held aloft.
    Kennedy’s hand fluttered to her throat. “Oh my God,” she gasped.
    “Open it,” he told her.
    “I can’t.” She shook her head. “I—I can’t. Please. Please stand up. You can’t do this right now.”
    His eyes clouded. “Why can’t I? Why can’t we just let ourselves be happy?”
    “Oh God!” she yelled. “You don’t get it.”
    “What don’t I get?”
    Kennedy turned on her heel, walked to the counter and grabbed the pregnancy test kit in hand and then walked back to where Easton was now standing, the small box now covered by his clenched fist.
    “This is what you don’t understand,” Kennedy told him, holding out her own box toward him.
    “Are you serious?” he asked, his jaw dropping open almost comically, as he scanned the label.
    “I haven’t taken the test yet,” she whispered. “But I’ve been getting nauseous—Nicole thought it might be morning sickness.”
    Easton blinked a couple of times, and then put the ring box back in his pocket and stepped forward, taking Kennedy by the arms. “Do you really think that’s going to make me change my mind, change the way I feel about you?”
    She started to cry, despite herself. “Of course it will. You wanted to have fun, you wanted me to please you—not give you some baby that you never asked for.”
    Easton leaned his head close to hers, so that his forehead rested against Kennedy’s forehead. She couldn’t look at him, though. Tears were streaming down her cheeks and falling from her chin.
    “I love you no matter what happens,” he said. “Don’t you get that? I didn’t come here to say I wanted to take you out on another date, Kennedy. I wasn’t asking you to spend a little time together—I was here to ask you if you’d do me the honor of spending the rest of your life with me.”
    “But you couldn’t have—you wouldn’t have done it if you’d thought I might…be…pregnant,” she said, having difficulty even saying it aloud.
    “I could have and I would have,” he said. “There’s nothing that would make me happier than to bring a life into this world that is part of you and part of me. I know that sounds crazy,” he said, “but there’s not even a little bit of doubt left in me. I love you so much,” he said, and then he was kissing her again.
    Kennedy wrapped her arms around him as he drew her closer still, and they kissed for a long time. She’d never felt so relieved, so incredibly loved, and warm, and cared for, and listened to.
    When his miraculous kiss finally stopped, Easton looked at her with a mischievous little grin. “Should we open the box?”
    “Which one?” she said, laughing nervously.
    “Let’s do your box first,” he said, taking it from her hands and opening it up. “You want me to come with you?”
    “I think I can handle this part,” Kennedy said, although she wasn’t