Free Finding Chris Evans: The Hollywood Edition by Lizzie Shane

“Hey,” he said, defensive against the anger in her voice. “Give me a break, okay? You’ve had a few weeks to think about this. I’ve had a few minutes. I’m going to say the wrong thing—that doesn’t mean I don’t want you. Either of you.”
    He heard her take a slow breath. “Sorry. The pregnancy hormones have been doing a number on my moods.”
    “Understandable.” He’d had more than one client with a baby on the way and he knew that overreactions tended to go with the territory—but it was different when it was his territory. “Would you like to keep it?” He tried to keep his own emotions out of his voice—not even sure what he was feeling.
    “I want to,” Trina said hesitantly.
    And suddenly he knew exactly what he was feeling. Relief. He wanted her to want the baby. He wanted the baby. He almost said Thank God aloud, but she was already going on.
    “But I’m in the middle of my first semester of medical school and I’m barely keeping my head above water as it is. I never regretted dropping out to take care of my mother, but I always knew I would get back on track. This time I feel like if I drop out again, I’ll never go back. It’s like I’m weighing being someone’s mother against saving hundreds of lives over the course of my career.”
    “I could help you—with finances or child-care. Even if you take some time off school, I’d do whatever I could to make sure you were able to go back. If that’s what you want.”
    “What do you want?” she asked softly.
    He cleared his throat, excruciatingly uncomfortable. Moment of truth. So much of his life was about what he should do or what he needed to do to maintain the goals he’d already set in place that he rarely thought about what he wanted in any given moment.
    Trina had been the exception to that. He’d wanted her . But there was none of the easy chemistry he remembered from that first night in the car with them today. They were both so awkward. So uncomfortable. So nervous. Two people who barely knew each other trying to decide something so big it would change the course of both their lives.
    “I want to be part of my child’s life. And I know it’s your body, but I’d like there to be a child.”
    “Me too,” she murmured, so soft he barely heard her.
    “Good. So we’ll co-parent, if that works for you,” he offered, calmly solving the problem—one thing he’d always been good at. “I have a house in San Diego, but I can get a place in Chicago if you want to stay in school.”
    “I think I’ll want to be home with the baby when it comes, but maybe I won’t leave school until the semester break—that will put me into my second trimester when there’s less risk of miscarriage. I can come to San Diego then.”
    He nodded, more than a little proud of how logical they were being. “That will give us time to get to know one another before the baby arrives. Give us a chance to work out a plan. You can stay with me—the house is plenty big enough for all of us. I’ll talk to Marty about scheduling, make sure we won’t have any issues with builds scheduled in other cities close to your due date.”
    “Great.”
    He smiled to himself. “Great.”

    Trina glared at the man in the driver’s seat, so smugly proud of himself she wanted to deck him as he neatly arranged their futures to his liking.
    Here she was thinking about how the universe seemed to smite her every time she got cocky about having her life in order and he was busy planning his filming schedule around her gestation. Or rather, having Marty plan it.
    She had a feeling she was going to get very sick of the words I’ll talk to Marty about… It seemed like the manager handled everything—his schedule, dealing with security and the mall people. It was a minor miracle Chris hadn’t just asked his manager to handle her .
    More than anything else Marty seemed to be the biggest difference between Chicago Chris and Hollywood Chris. She wasn’t sure she knew