Dahlia was checking to some numbers in her office when she heard the door click open and shut. She figured it was another nurse, so didn’t lift her head since she was counting.

“Dahlia we need to talk.”

Shit. Well, now she lost her place. She turned to see Jared standing against the door. He looked tired, his usually neat hair was a little messy and he had bags under his eyes. “About?”

“Us.”

“There is nothing to talk about. We have to complete the allotted time of this marriage and then it’ll be over.” She answered calmly as she went back to her paperwork. “We’ll be free to do whatever we want… Even though, we’re not restricted right now as it is.”

“Dammit, Dahlia!” He ran a hand through his hair angrily, scowling at her. “I want to apologize for that…day. That woman is insane. You’re right, she has been trying to get into my pants.”

“It looks like she was succeeding. AH!”

Jared had walked around the desk and pulled her up to stand in front of him. Her eyes widened with the anger he saw on his face. “Nothing has happened between me and that woman. She was trying to come on to me that day you walked into the office. I didn’t do anything.”

“Why are you explaining all this to me?” Dahlia tried to pull herself away from him, but he wouldn’t budge. “I don’t care. You can do whatever you want. This marriage isn’t real anyways!”

“What if I wanted it to be real? What then?”

“Why? You only married for your grandfather!” She huffed, looking away. If he didn’t stop shaking her, he would vomit.

“Dahlia, we can make this work. Look at my mother! I figure she probably wasn’t that into my dad if she got herself pregnant by my grandfather, but they made it work!”

That was not the best comparison, Dahlia thought with a face. “Your mother is very unhappy. I understand what she told me that one night. After all this is over, I’m going to be hurt. We shouldn’t have slept together. I’d rather not get attached to you in any way whatsoever to prevent my heart from breaking. I can’t deal with this. I was in a 3-year long relationship before you. I don’t think my heart could take another ache.”

“My mother got herself tangled with the wrong person. I still don’t know if my father came before my grandfather or if they were together when she was with Gerard. Either way, we make a great team. I enjoy spending time with you and you’re not scared of me, so that’s good.” Jared squeezed her shoulders, eyes searching her face to see if there would be any hope for him.

She swallowed hard, trying to get her bearings. Not once had he said that he cared for her. “I don’t think that making a good team and the lack of fear are good foundations for marriage.” She retorted with a head shake. He dropped his hands to his side. He felt more confused than ever because he knew that he cared for her, but she clearly didn’t want anything to do with him.

The ringing of her desk phone interrupted the silence.

“This is Dahlia… Uh huh. Okay. Okay. Uh, let me see. I can be there in about an hour or so. I have to talk to one of the other leads. Okay. That’s no problem. I’ll be there. Thank you.” She hung up and looked at him. He was frowning, a confused look on his face. The only thing missing was a pout on his face. “There was an impromptu meeting called up regarding next month.” With a sigh, she pulled her bag out from her desk. “I have to go, Jared. I’ll see you at home.”

He grunted. “Yeah. I’ll see you.” And walked out the room.

….

She couldn’t focus on the meeting, her mind wandering to the disgruntled look on Jared’s face when she told him that they wouldn’t work out.

Camille’s words still rang in her mind and she wondered if the reason for Camille’s actions were a consequence of Gerard breaking her heart. Had she been in love with the man at some point? It was crazy to think about it, but she had considered that the only reason she married Jared’s “dad” was because she wanted to get back at Gerard. It was a mess and she couldn’t help but wonder if she’d end up the same way. Pregnant by a man who didn’t care about her and alone.

Ugh.

She was driving back home when her phone started ringing, she answered the call through the car speaker seeing it was Anthony. He wanted to invite her out to lunch the next day and she agreed. She may be married to Jared, but not for long and Anthony appeared to genuinely care for her. She would tread lightly and figure out the whole deal with the baby eventually.

Jared didn’t speak to her that night at home. Nor the next day at work.

He did mention she looked better one day and she’d panicked because she had gained her weight back after the morning sickness subsided. She was going into her third month and still hadn’t told him. Sometimes at home she’d notice him studying her while she worked on something. They ate dinner together on the nights that they were home at the same time, and she’d meet up with Karinne on occasion for brunch some weekends since she liked the woman’s company.

        One night, she had gone with Anthony to a rep discussion, and was having fun until Jared wandered into the building for the discussion as well. He gazed over at where she was sitting, doing a double take when he noticed redheaded Anthony lean over and whisper something into her ear. His gaze became stony, jaw clenching as he took a seat across the room from her, and she knew he wouldn’t pay attention to the discussion at all. She felt a tiny spark of anger ignite as she thought about the various discussions he’d attended for that Sherry woman and other reps. Annoyed, she ignored him for the rest of the evening.

When it was over, she said goodnight to Anthony who’d walked her to her car, and left. She was the first one to arrive home, with Jared pulling up on the driveway just as she was making her way up the stairs. She could tell he was upset from the way he slammed the front door shut.

“Dahlia?” He called out loud, making her stopped halfway up the stairs, anxiety rising.

“Yeah?” She called back and he popped up at the bottom of the staircase, tie undone.

“Did you go to the discussion because you were invited or did Anthony invite you to accompany him?” His face was one big dark look and she hugged herself. He didn’t try to go after her. Just waited.

“He invited me to go with him.” She watched his jaw clench. “As friends.” She added the last even though she knew it shouldn’t matter. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to meet someone early for breakfast tomorrow.”

He frowned. “Who?”

“If you must know, your sister.”

“How come I didn’t know she was going to be in town?” He questioned with a scowl on his face. “You talk to her often?”

“Yeah. We usually meet on weekends when neither one of us works.”

“Sounds like a normal occurrence.”

“At least twice a month.”

“She hasn’t invited me...” he started and Dahlia shrugged.

“You’ve been working most weekends. We get along fine.”

“Hmm.”

Dahlia nodded at him. “Goodnight.”

He didn’t reply, simply turned and walked into the kitchen.

...

Dahlia knew that she was getting herself into trouble when Anthony invited her to lunch one day and the conversation turned to herself.

“Excuse me, what?” she blinked up at him, paling a little.

He scratched his neck nervously turning as red as his hair. “I said that I think you’re a great person. I have fun hanging out with you, so I was wondering if we could maybe hang out on the weekend? We can go somewhere nice, somewhere besides rep dinners.”

She sighed, “I… I think you’re a great guy, but I don’t think that we should hang out beyond work related situations.” He nodded and gave a shaky laugh.

“I figured you’d say no, but it was worth a try! I noticed that you’ve been a little distant lately and distracted. I simply figured someone else had beat me to it.”

“Uh no. I just have a little situation that I’m dealing with at the moment.” Ha. “But I was I was a 3-year relationship, so I’m still a little meh about it.”

“Oh. I didn’t know that. Well, how about when you get out of your meh state, we can catch up?”

……December 22nd, Saturday, Christmas Party...

“YOU do realize that everyone is starting to stare at you, don’t you?” Dahlia whispered angrily, as she sided up to Jared at the bar. He shrugged, not looking at her. “You're making a fool of yourself.”

He downed another shot.

“Are you even listening to me?”

He finally looked at her, all of 5'1", which meant that even if he sat while she stood, he was still taller than her. “Didn’t you hear? Miss Henderson has an admirer.” He took a shot. “I didn’t know you liked red heads.”

She scoffed and leaned over to take away the other shot glass he had in front of him. “Miss Henderson has an admirer. Good thing, Mrs. Dale has a husband and no time to cheat on him,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Could've fooled me.”

“Don’t be stupid.” She hoisted herself on to the bar stool next to him. “And I don’t like redheads. I seem to like hanging around dirty blondes lately.” She noticed his eyes darted to her feet where she wore black pump heels.

“I thought you hated heels.”

“It's a special occasion.”

“Because you were going to see your ginger boyfriend?”

She rolled her eyes, “Please.”

“Hmm.”

Dahlia sighed. Looking around, she noticed a couple people kept glancing over at them. Everybody else was on the dance floor.

“Maybe we should get out of here.”

Jared snickered, “Already? But the party just started. Here, have a drink, love.” He tried to get the shot back and she swatted his hand.

“Let’s get you home before something else happens and you get both of us fired, Jared.”

“Nah. I’m good here. You go.”

She rolled her eyes and jumped down, “Fine, I'll go home. Considering we shared a ride, and you’re blasted, I'll just get Anthony to drive me home instead. Call yourself an Uber when you’re ready.”

Jared turned to her, as she glanced at her nails. She had to be bluffing. She wouldn't just leave him alone and run off with ginger boy, would she? “Why? So you can spend time with that idiot? Yeah, no. You and I are both going home. Let’s go.”

He followed closely behind her towards the exit, uncaring that some people stared as they left. She didn’t care, everyone would know soon that she was pregnant with his child anyways. She really needed to start looking for a new job somewhere else.

“Goodnight Jared. Don’t fall down the stairs.” She kicked her heels off and started for the stairs, but didn’t take more than two steps before he reached out and grabbed her upper arm.

“Come on, so early?”

“Yes, because I'm tired and you’re acting like a fool.” She pulled on her arm, but he only slipped his arms around her.

“Come on. Stay with me.” He murmured, sighing into her hair. “I don’t like being alone on the holidays.”

“Jared, I’m being serious. I’m mad at you.” She felt his lips sliding down to her ear, his mouth warm as he slid down her neck. “Jared…”

“I like how you say my name,” he pressed a hot kiss at her neck. He pulled back and stared down at her. “You didn’t remember your ex-boyfriend the other night...”

She tried to control her breathing as he pulled her tighter to him, arms around her, and pressed a kiss to her forehead. She was having a hard time, keeping her hands to herself, her hormones all over the place because of the pregnancy. She really did just want to jump him.

“I want a repeat.”

Dammit.

“I’ve been wanting it since that first time.” He pressed a closed kiss to her lips. “And then you go and pop out with those heels. All I wanted was to throw you on the nearest flat surface and-"

“Oh my god, Jared!” she gasped, grabbing his elbows. She closed her eyes. If she saw his face right now, it’d be over for her.

“-screw you senseless until you forget everything again.”

“Oh!” she gasped, opening her eyes, she stared up at him. His eyes, dark, looking at her as if to devour her

“Dahlia?” She threw her arms around his neck as his hands dropped to hold her, lifting her up and carrying her over to the couch, where he dropped over her.

Her hands ran over whatever part of him she could reach, his face, his chest, as she continued to kiss him. Dang it. Pregnancy hormones were truly a powerful thing, and she nearly came undone when he ran his hands over her.

“I’m getting this dress off of you,” he said as he sat her up and pulled the red laced dress over her head. He blinked, and her heart froze. “Wow. You look even better in the light,” he said as he stared at her. Thank goodness he was probably not sober enough to notice the subtle rounded difference in her body. She threw her arms around his neck to bring him down for another kiss.

“More action, less talk.” She murmured into his mouth and heard him chuckled.

“Bossy, bossy. Alright.” He grasped her hair and pulled her head back so he could continue kissing her neck, moving downwards. She heard herself mumble stupid things she would never say in broad daylight...

“Sorry.” Kiss. “I can’t wait.”

“Ah… Jared!”

"F**k. It’s good. How do we not do this more often?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know,” she gasped, her breath catching.

“We have to do this more often!”

“We do! Oh my god!” Like the previous time, she felt her body burning, as if she’d been stuck by a hot poker. His body like a furnace, holding her as he kissed her. She hugged him tightly and felt his body shudder. Part of her said this was wrong, but mostly her brain said it was right. She hugged him tighter, and closed her eyes. She was so tired.