She’d been a virgin, so he knew she couldn’t have a kid stashed away somewhere.

Dianna rubbed a hand over her eyes. “It’s a long story.”

“I’m not going anywhere.”

It was an off-the-cuff response, but somehow, in that moment, they both knew he meant far more than he’d originally intended. In the far back of Sam’s mind, a warning light began blinking, pictures of his parents’ crap-ass marriage flashing before his eyes. But it was easy to shut that door, to tell himself that he and Dianna were merely having a good time together, that they were miles away from ever getting married.

“I have a sister,” she finally said, explaining that her younger sister, April, had been sent away at four. “I won’t stop until I get April out of the foster system and home with me.”

Sam knew firsthand how important siblings were. The more your parents dropped the ball, the more you needed a brother or sister to hold things together. Connor was his real family. So he got that even though she hadn’t seen her sister in six years, April meant just as much to Dianna.

He joined the battle that night, wanting to help her try to push through the reams of bureaucratic red tape that stood in her way. And when all she heard from the state was, “You don’t have enough money or a job or a real home for your sister,” when they claimed April was better off in the foster system living with a “stable” family, he held Dianna as she cried. But it was never long until her tears dried and she was back at it, chipping away at the system with more focus than ever.

Since becoming a hotshot, people had said again and again how tough he was. But for the first time in twenty years he knew what real strength was; he saw it every time he looked at his girlfriend filling out paperwork or arguing on the phone with a caseworker. She continually surprised him with her resiliency. He hadn’t expected such a pretty package to be filled with steely determination.

All the while, every time they made love again, he pushed the broken condom to the back of his mind. After a few weeks passed, he figured they were out of the danger zone and pretty much forgot about it.

Until the day she walked into the station with red, puffy eyes. He’d just come in from a wildfire and the adrenaline was still pumping through him when he saw her. His stomach twisted with dread as he instantly guessed what she was going to tell him.

The secret that he’d been keeping had just come back to bite him in the ass.

His first thought was that he needed a stiff drink.

His second that he wasn’t ready to be a father.

He was a twenty-year-old firefighter. He was supposed to be banging everything that moved. And even though he liked being with Dianna, he sure as hell didn’t believe in happy families.

“I need to talk to you, Sam.”

“You’re pregnant,” he said, his words coming out harder than he’d intended.

Her eyes widened in surprise and she covered her stomach with both hands. “How’d you know?”

He knew telling her about the condom wouldn’t have made any difference for whether or not she got pregnant, but at least she wouldn’t have been totally caught off guard.

He was used to being the hero. Not the villain who took the heroine’s virginity and knocked her up all at the same time.

Tamping down on the urge to cut bait and run back into the hills to fight a fire, any fire he could find, he met her gaze.

“The condom broke.”

She inhaled sharply, her eyes round with disbelief. “When?”

“The first time.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

Jesus, he didn’t know what to say to her. Didn’t know what to do. Especially since neither of them were ready to get married.

As it was, they hadn’t even officially moved in together. She’d been careful not to leave clothes at his apartment, and he hadn’t exactly offered up one of his dresser drawers.

The truth was, he was more than a little freaked out by how much he enjoyed being with her. By how important she was becoming to him. By the number of times he’d wanted to tell her that he loved her and barely managed to catch himself.

“I know I should have told you,” he admitted, hating how guilty he felt, “but I just didn’t think anything was going to come of it.”

She almost looked angry now, the fiercest he’d ever seen her outside of her fight for April.

“You mean like a baby? You didn’t think for one second that I might get pregnant? You didn’t think I’d want to know that?”

He let her rail at him. Sure, it had taken two to tango, and getting pregnant wasn’t entirely his fault, but he hadn’t exactly played the aftermath well.

And that was when it hit him: She was going to have a baby.

He was going to be a father.

Sam looked at her again, for the first time seeing her as more than the hot woman he was falling for.

She was going to be the mother of his child.

In an instant, everything shifted. He knew exactly what he had to do. There was only one option.

“We’re going to get married.”

She took a step away from him, dropping her head so that her blond hair covered her face. But before she could hide her expression from him, he saw pain move across her striking features.

Shit. He was screwing everything up. Again.

Instead of showing her that he wasn’t going to leave her in a lurch, that he was going to support her and the baby from here on out, he’d just proposed to her in the worst possible way. Like some sort of half-brained caveman.

Wanting to do it right, he dropped onto one knee on the gravel lot and reached for her hand.

She shook her head in dismay. “No, Sam, don’t.”

“Dianna, I want to marry you. I want to take care of you and our baby. Please let me be there for you.”

She closed her eyes, tried to pull her hand away. “You don’t need to do this. I can take care of—”

“No!”

The word boomed from his chest before she could finish her sentence. He wasn’t going to let her bring up a baby alone in a trailer park, or, God forbid, have an abortion.

“Listen to me, Dianna. I know this is happening sooner than either of us planned, but,” he had to stop and clear his throat, “will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?”

“We can’t get married just because I’m pregnant. It won’t work out. It never does.”