Chapter 22~ I Want You To Think About It

Nina stared at Lucas, her mind still reeling from his last sentence.

"None of them intrigue me the way you do."

The words hung in the quiet room, refusing to dissipate. She shook her head slightly, trying to gather her scattered thoughts. Her pulse hammered in her ears.

"How would you even know that?" she asked, her voice barely above a whisper.

Lucas didn't hesitate.

"The fact that I'm here is answer enough," he said calmly, his eyes never leaving hers.

Nina blinked, momentarily stunned.

That… was annoyingly difficult to argue with. She wanted to protest, to find some logical flaw in his reasoning, but the words wouldn't come.

Lucas shifted slightly on the couch, and his tone softened, becoming more thoughtful. The guardedness in his expression eased just a fraction.

"Ethan likes you."

Nina looked at him, caught off guard by the sudden shift in conversation.

"I've never seen him get that close to anyone before," Lucas continued, a hint of wonder creeping into his voice. "Not relatives. Not teachers. Not even me."

His gaze drifted briefly toward the hallway that led to Nina's bedroom, where Ethan had fallen asleep earlier. Something vulnerable flickered across his features… pride mixed with an emotion she couldn't quite name.

"I don't know how it happened," he admitted quietly, running a hand through his hair. "But when he's around you… he's different."

Nina listened carefully, her heart squeezing at the raw honesty in his words.

"He's more expressive," Lucas added, his voice gaining warmth. "More… alive. Like he's finally found someone who sees him for who he really is."

A warmth bloomed in Nina's chest at his words. She hesitated, turning over her next question carefully before voicing it. "I've actually been meaning to ask you something."

Lucas turned back to her, his expression open and attentive.

"What's wrong with him?" The question came out more bluntly than she'd intended.

Her hands flew up quickly, palms out. "I mean… not wrong wrong." She fumbled for the right words, her brow furrowing with the effort. "He's not shy." She shook her head, frustrated with herself. "No… that's not it."

She softened her tone, choosing her words with care. "He just doesn't speak. At all."

The room fell quiet. The only sound was the distant hum of traffic outside and the soft tick of a clock somewhere down the hall.

Lucas studied her face, his gaze searching hers as if weighing how much to reveal. When he finally spoke, his voice carried a calm certainty. "When you become his mother, you'll understand."

Nina's brain stuttered to a halt. Her thoughts scattered like dropped papers.

"His… what?"

Lucas didn't seem the least bit confused by her reaction. If anything, he looked faintly puzzled by her surprise.

"His mother." He stated it as though explaining that water was wet or the sky was blue. "It's simple." He leaned back slightly, settling into his chair with an ease that suggested he'd already worked through this logic long ago. "When you marry me, you become Ethan's mother."

The way he delivered the statement… matter-of-fact, almost clinical… made it sound less like a romantic confession and more like a perfectly reasonable business arrangement. As if they were discussing the terms of a contract rather than the reshaping of their entire lives.

Nina sat there in stunned silence, her hands frozen in her lap. But then, something unexpected happened. Her heart clenched. Hard. The word mother echoed inside her mind, reverberating through chambers she'd kept carefully locked.

And suddenly, her thoughts drifted somewhere she tried very hard never to go.

Five years ago.

The hospital with its sterile white walls and antiseptic smell. The pregnancy she had didn't now whom it father was, carrying that secret like a stone in her chest.

The baby she never even got to see, never got to hold.

Her chest tightened painfully, as if an invisible hand had wrapped around her ribs and squeezed. She could feel the familiar ache spreading through her body—the grief she'd learned to bury but never quite escaped.

Lucas's voice pulled her back to the present, cutting through the fog of memory.

"You look scared."

Nina blinked rapidly, forcing herself to focus on his face rather than the ghosts haunting her peripheral vision.

"I'm not scared," she said quickly, though her voice came out thinner than she'd intended.

She forced a small smile, one she'd perfected over years of hiding what she really felt. "Just… thinking."

She took a breath, steadying herself before asking carefully, "What about his biological mother?"

Lucas didn't respond immediately. His expression remained unreadable, giving nothing away. Nina continued, needing to fill the silence, "I mean… Ethan didn't just appear out of thin air. There must be someone—"

Lucas's answer came calmly, almost too calmly. "I don't know his mother."

Nina stared at him, certain she must have misunderstood.

"You… don't know?"

For a moment she genuinely wondered if she had misheard him, if her mind was still too tangled in the past to process the present correctly.

"How can you not know the woman who gave birth to your child?" The question emerged sharper than she'd meant it to, edged with disbelief.

Her mind struggled to process it, turning the statement over and over like a puzzle piece that didn't fit anywhere.

What kind of world is this?

But she let the thought go, pushing aside the strangeness of this entire situation.

Instead, she leaned forward slightly, her hands clasped in her lap. The weight of what they were discussing demanded her full attention.

"About Ethan's attachment to me…" She chose her words with care, aware that she was treading on delicate ground. "What if it's temporary?"

The question hung between them for a moment before she continued. "That kind of bonding happens frequently with children. They latch onto someone who made them feel safe in a moment of crisis." She paused, watching his expression. "It fades once their emotions settle and they feel secure again."

She met Lucas's eyes, searching for understanding. "And honestly… that doesn't feel like enough reason to base a marriage on."

Her voice softened slightly, though she maintained her resolve. "So what exactly do you want from me, Mr. Grant?"

Lucas didn't answer right away. He simply studied her, his gaze thoughtful and measuring, as if he were trying to see past her words to something deeper. The silence stretched between them, filling the space with unspoken questions.

"I know it might be temporary," he said at last, his tone calm and measured.

Nina blinked, caught off guard by the admission. She had expected him to argue, to insist on Ethan's unwavering need.

"But Ethan has never reacted like this with anyone before," Lucas continued, a note of something—wonder, perhaps, or concern, creeping into his voice. "Not once in all the years."

His voice remained steady, but she detected an undercurrent of emotion beneath the controlled surface. "You're the first person to break through to him."

He paused, letting the significance of that statement settle. "And that says a lot about you, about who you are as a person."

The room fell quiet again, the only sound the distant hum of the city beyond the windows. Nina felt the weight of his words, the responsibility they implied.

Finally, Lucas looked at her directly, and his voice softened with something that might have been understanding. "I'm not asking you to decide tonight."

"I want you to think about it," he said, his eyes never leaving hers. "Take whatever time you need."