Chapter Text
Her man has either made himself scarce or he's truly occupied with some work assignment; either way, Emily can't
locate her man...hours later, she finally ran across him near the coffee klatch in the lobby: she pasted a shaky smile on,
approaching him on his blind side."Hey, you! What, um...where did you disappear to?"
"Baby," he ree replied, greeting her with a light kiss. "LAW LIBRARY for most of the morning; Janice springs a last-second
case on us out of 'deep left'." Her heart beating faster, Emily inquires, "Us?"
"Sam and me."
"Hmmm...right; yeah...cool."
Luke gathers his coffee cup, pastry, and legal file, and heads for a nearby table. "JANICE assigned us, Baby - all it is is work."
"Of course. Yeah. Sure." His woman doesn't sound convinced. "I just, um...since I said I don't have a burning desire to be a mother,
you've been..NO SDE ...distant?"
Luke passed her half of his pastry, murmuring, "Em...I admit that I needed a minute to adjust after you voiced your decision: father-
hood has been important to me since...since FOREVER. I needed space to be able to let go of that dream." Clarity bloomed in Emily's
eyes, along with a sense of shame at her earlier selfishness - particularly when she'd been ready to have a baby with her previous
husband...."I should never have said, Amor, and I'm sorry. I disregarded your feelings; I'm sorry. And before you say there's no need,
I don't agree."
"I love you, Lopez. Nothing you can do will change that. I'll accept your apology, though it's not needed. Can we drop it, please?"
Emily leaned closer to say, "Now that I realize how much it means to you, I understand how much it means to ME. I'm stopping
my birth control at the end of this month. Is that OK?"
"More than OK."
////////
Robin Taylor read the last of dozens of texts his wife has sent since he and their baby boarded the flight to Baltimore the
the day prior (which he'd also ignored without responding (LO: 'Baby, I know that you are still angry with me; I'm just verifying
that you and Bailey are home and dry. I love you.')
Draining his cut-crystal cocktail glass, the FBI Special Agent poured two more fingers of Macallan 18@, sat back, and pondered
hard before retrieving his cell phone: he typed a brief, terse response and pressed SEND.
(TBC)