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It was on the eleventh day that I knew our time was coming to a close. Juliana had taken another call, this one more serious than the others. She looked actually angry this time, instead of worried. Somehow though, I think I liked the anger better.

“You’re leaving, aren’t you?”

I said the words as I came up behind her, leaning alone over the railing of the upstairs balcony. Juliana was staring out into the desert. The wind sent her hair across her beautiful face.

“Yes,” she answered. “I have to.”

I moved to the railing beside her, leaning out over the horizon as well.

“How’d you know?”

“It’s in your face. It’s in your body language.”

She considered my words for a moment as we stood together in silence. The sun was setting, and the sky was ridiculous. Eventually, she turned toward me.

“It’s not that I don’t want to be here,” she said. “You know I do. These last two weeks have been the most amazing ones of my life, really.”

There was no convincing her, so I didn’t try. Besides, these weren’t excuses, or brush offs, or even exaggerations. She was speaking from the heart.

“It’s just, well… there’s something I have to take care of,” she explained. “Something Aric can’t handle alone.”

“I get it.”

Her brown eyes softened. “You do?”

“Yes,” I nodded. “We all get it, Juliana. Maybe it’s a little different for us, but we’ve been there, too.”

She pursed her beautiful lips, then turned her face back into the light of the dying sun. I was starting to see her as two people, now. The woman we’d somehow fallen madly in love with… and the child she was carrying so proudly inside her.

I’d admired her strength, her ambition, her fearless tenacity. In witnessing first-hand the life she’d carved out for herself, I’d admired everything she’d ever built.

But now, most of all, I admired her courage.

“The others are still going to take it hard, though,” I told her. “And don’t think they won’t.”

“Why?”

I shrugged and smiled. “Well Devyn’s flat out obsessed with you, the same way you once were with his profile.”

She seemed amused by that. “He is, huh?”

“Yes,” I chuckled.

“And what about you?”

The question caught me somewhat off guard. I almost bit my tongue.

“I’m head over fucking heels,” I responded quickly. “Can’t you see that?”

I was joking but not joking. She saw through it all.

“Yes,” she repeated. “I do.”

Her eyes caught mine, and the way she peered into my soul made my heart race. It was crazy that one person could have so much power over me, much less a woman. But on another level, I didn’t mind it at all.

“And then there’s Gage…” I went on, changing the subject. “He’s just as much in love with you as he is with the idea of having a baby with you.”

“Love?” she said, turning again. “You really think so?”