Vegas Pregnancy Surprise. Shirley Jump

arm. “You had a one-night stand? You?”

      “It wasn’t just a one-night stand. It was…” Lincoln searched for the words to describe that night two months ago. The intoxicating magic of the woman he had met, how she had brought out a side of him he had thought he’d lost three years ago, how she had made him forget—

      Forget who he was. Forget the burdens he’d carried for so long. Forget his guilt, his regrets. Forget the Curtis empire, and its expectations. For one night, he could just…be.

      “It was so much more,” Lincoln finished. “At least until I got back to reality.”

      In the two months since he’d seen Molly, he had tried to forget her by pouring himself into his work. By tightening an already tight schedule, filling already full days. Developing expanded product lines, pushing his team to create newer and more improved systems than the company already had.

      Yet a part of him kept going back to that night, to those questions neither of them had asked, because they’d agreed never to know the answers. Was that all this was? A puzzle he needed to solve?

      “Either way, it doesn’t matter. The night’s over. In the past.” As he said the words, he cemented his resolve to keep the memory there. He had no room for a relationship right now.

      He, of all people, could not afford a distraction like that. He had only to look at the empty office beside his own to remember why.

      “If it’s so ‘in the past,’” Conner said, using air quotes, “then why is she still on your mind?”

      “She’s not.” Linc scowled.

      Conner looked at Linc. And chuckled. “Uhhuh.”

      Lincoln gazed out over the city, at the miles and miles of brightly lit buildings, stucco-coated homes, and beyond that, the vast, empty desert. Vegas stuck out among all the nothingness like a wild rose in a field of plain, practical wheat. How apropos, really, of the way he lived his personal life. That one night had been an aberration—and that was the way it would stay.

      Lincoln Curtis lived his life in straight lines. It was the only way he knew to maintain control. To keep himself from thinking of the promises he’d made so many years ago. Promises he had broken.

      Linc pivoted away from the window and faced Conner. “The past is over, Conner. I’m all about focusing on the future. And my future is contained inside this business.”