Hey everyone! I am so sorry this took so long. My grandfather passed away and I just lost my muse for a while.

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When she walked up to the First Lady's sitting room and found Abbey already sitting there with a pint of ice cream, she had never more grateful for her friend.

"I thought you might be needing this," Abbey said offering her up a spoon and a seat for the young woman.

"Yeah, well, seeing as wine is unavailable," she moaned gesturing to her stomach before flopping down on the couch beside Abbey. It had been a long and weird morning for her and as much as she knew her stomach would revolt sooner or later chocolate ice cream seemed like it would be the only available cure.

"Want to tell me what's going on?" Abbey prompted. She had been told by one of her White House spies that there had been a blow up in the Senior Staff bullpen and that it had ended with a frazzled C. J. storming out of her office and away from everyone else. She felt honored that the usually closely guarded Press Secretary had come to her when she needed comfort.

"Not really." All she really wanted to do was sit in silence. She didn't want to chat about Leo's disapproval and she really, really didn't want to chat about her and Danny kisses. Their hot, toe curling, soft kisses. The kind of kisses that made her want to say 'fuck it', push him backward on the couch and have her way with him.

"But you will…" Abbey pushed, her voice a special mixture of being gentle and stern that came with motherhood.

"I umm… told everyone that I was pregnant."

"Oh." C. J. defeated tone made it clear how that had gone. As much as Abbey would have loved to act on the bubble of anger that growing in the pit of her stomach she knew that the girl beside her needed her support more than anything else. "What happened?"

"It-it was fine. I mean it's big news and I wasn't expecting to have it welcomed with a marching band and support." Despite her words Abbey knew that C. J. had expected some support. The type of support that went above work commitments and into the realm of friendship. "Josh was pretty happy for me though."

"What did they say C. J?" Abbey asked, her voice slightly raised at the end. "As for Josh, he'll make an excellent uncle I feel."

"Not much really. There were just a lot of mentions about how awful I looked and Leo might have said that he knew I would never be able to control myself around him and then he accused me of working for the Republicans," she sped through the accusations and comments before taking a big mouthful of ice cream. She didn't really want to relive the rather crushing moment.

The woman sitting beside her however saw red. She had called Leo early that morning so that could lay off the stress and work that C. J. faced every day. Abbey wasn't a naïve idiot; she knew that C. J. would have to face a certain amount of stress throughout the duration of the pregnancy but the First Lady had hoped to keep it minimal whilst she was trying to digest the news and tell everyone. How dare Leo say the things to her that he had? Abbey wanted nothing more than to blast the man but she knew that it would do nothing but harm Claudia Jean and that was the very last thing that she wanted to do.

There was something else though in C.J. murmur that caught the First Lady's attention.

"Who is the him that you supposedly can't keep your self control around?" Abbey had an idea but she rather wanted C. J. to confirm it.

"Damn, I can't believe I slipped like that," C. J. complained more to herself than her companion. "Danny, he meant Danny Concannon."

"The reporter?"

"You know exactly who I'm talking about and you knew who Leo was talking about before you bothered to ask me that question," C. J. said fiercely.

"Your veiled accusation that I was fishing for information is borderline offensive."

"It wasn't veiled and I'm sorry it was only borderline."

"Rude girl," Abbey said a small smile playing on her lips. "However in that case, tell me what is going on there?"

"Nothing."

"Liar."

"Now, I find that offensive."

"I'm finding your deliberate attempt to lie and not tell me information when I'm here to help you offensive."

"Fine, we kissed," C. J. admitted, hiding her face in the pint of ice cream. "That's it though. We kissed in my office."

"Well, that answers my next few questions."

"Good, then we can move on."

"Not that fast, missy. Why have you only kissed?"

"You've got to be kidding me right?" C.J. didn't have the time to list every reason that she and Danny was not an item. "There is a long and varied listing describing all the way that we would not work. His and my job being right at the top."

"What was the kiss like?"

"I don't know," C.J. answered sure that this was some sort of trick of Abbey's.

"Yes, you do," Abbey countered. "How did it feel?"

"It felt… gentle," C.J. said uncertain of what was too much to say yet strangely wanting to tell Abbey the truth. "Yet at the same time passionate. Like he was still learning how to kiss someone new but an avid student. I don't know. It was warm and soft and rushed and a million things all at once."

"I think that you really rather like him." Abbey was probably right, C.J. admitted to herself. She really did rather like him but that wasn't the problem. The problem was that kissing was never enough for either of them but more just wasn't available. She knew that lots of people would never understand but her job, before she found out about the baby she was carrying, was the most important thing to her. It's hard to explain to people what an election like that does. It bonded her not just to the fight but to the people she was fighting along side and for and she couldn't leave her job and she could never ask Danny to because writing was his passion… and it was just clearly all so much more than if she liked him enough or not.

"It's really not that, Abbey," C.J. lied unwilling and unable to articulate her real feelings to others, even the First Lady. "I-I wanted to kiss him to get it out of my system. It's done now. We are done now."

"Did you tell him about the baby?"

"Did I tell a White House reporter about the baby? No, I decided that I wanted to keep my job."

"I don't think that's why you haven't told him?"

"What other reason could there possibly be?"

"I don't know exactly but I think the key to your overall happiness is figuring that out. Maybe it is because it would endanger your job or maybe…"

"Maybe what?"

"Maybe you didn't tell him because it meant he'd know you'd been with another man and you aren't ready to possible lose him for good."

C. J. didn't have a chance to rebuttal because her stomach gave one more uncomfortable roll and she lost the small amount of ice cream she had eaten that morning.

"Did you tell him about the baby?"

Abbey's words played through C.J's mind all morning and late into the afternoon. She should tell Danny and she wasn't sure why she hadn't already. Any time she had ever really needed him he had always been there and she was grateful for that but those times were positively different. Those times were not her having a child with a man that nobody, even her really knew.

Because it seemed she had the worst luck of any one else in the country her thought were brought out by the man himself. "How are you C.J.?"

"I'm fine." She didn't allow any emotion into her voice. She knew it would have been the perfect time to tell him, that he was giving her an opportunity to explain herself but she found when push came to shove she just couldn't.

She would eventually, knew she needed to but it was a lot harder then what she thought it would be. "You aren't alright but I'll let that go for now because I have a story and I would like a White House comment."

"What's the story?" She could tell that did not know of her pregnancy which was a relief but she also knew that whatever story he did have would not one to flatter the administration.

"I want the truth about the Lowell's. They don't like the new law and I don't know if their embarrassed of the son or the President but I do know they'll talk to me. I'm giving you the chance to get in first."

This was the last story that she wanted out there.

"I'm pregnant." Apparently it was the very, very last story that she wanted out there.

"Nice try C.J. but I'm not that easy to fool, baby."

"Evidently you are since in 8 months I am having a child." She wished that he would just believe her. It was hard enough telling him let alone having to stand there and try to convince him that her words were the truth.

"Claudia Jean, are you saying this because you are telling me that you are pregnant or are you trying to distract me from the Lydell story?"

"Why can't it be both."

Suddenly all the colour drained from Danny's face as he came face to face with the unbelievable truth that the woman he was falling in love with, the woman that he kissed just hours earlier was pregnant and he was not the father.

Without thinking and without forethought Danny dropped the notes that he was holding and rushed out the door, leaving a heartbroken C.J. in his wake.

C.J. spent the next hour just sort of sitting quietly in her office. She's sure that there is something she's meant to be doing or feeling but she can't for life of her think of what. Her brain has stalled and she can't seem to push her mind past the idea that she had trusted Danny and he had left.

She should never have told him about the baby. It was no small thing and she had imagined originally that he would not take it well but never had she imagined that Danny would be so cruel to her, especially after speaking with Abbey. Not that she's sure what she really wanted from him. Sure they had kissed, more than once, but she knew now that he could never be the man that she needed or that she wanted. Her baby needed someone that could love them no matter the circumstances of their conception. With that final thought she cast away any lingering thoughts of her own sadness and picked up a paper that needed reading.

She pushes herself into work and before she knows it she's read all the papers that have been assigned to her and the clock is saying that it's a reasonable enough hour for her to return home. Her mind strays one more time to Danny and thoughts to where he might be or what he might be doing before she forces herself to stop, packs up her bad and heads out the door.

She goes home every night with the hope of cooking a proper meal but tonight she is just too tired. All she really wants to do is eat something quick and then go to bed where she can try her best to think of anything other than the events of the day. It's while she's halfway through heating up a prepackaged meal that she hears the doorbell. Unsure who it could be at this hour she opens it without hesitation.

"Hi," Danny says, putting his foot in the door before she can shut it in his face. "I brought you some food. I can't imagine how tired you must be so I figured you might not feel like cooking."

"I already have something, thank you." Short, sharp and he won't stay is all that she can think, if he doesn't stay he won't break your heart.

"Please Claudia, just let me in. I need to talk to you." She's not sure if it's being called Claudia or the way that he says need he to talk to her but either way she takes a step back and lets him in. Danny walks past her and she follows him into the kitchen silently wishing that she could wash this all away with a glass of merlot. "How are you?"

"I'm all right. Tired, always tired but I'm fine."

"That's good. I hear that tired is normal when you know- you're – well, you know…"

"When a woman is pregnant?" C. J finished for him taking the bag of food form his hands and getting two plates. "You can say the word. Pregnant. We are all going to have to get use to it."

"I know," he said, defeat evident on his features.

"Do you? Because once that settles in I'll have a baby. It won't be just me anymore but also a tiny, innocent baby."

"I get it, C.J."

"Yeah, I know you get it. Which is why I don't get what you are doing here?" C.J yelled throwing her hands in the air. If he got it so much then why was he at her house acting like they had a future. "Why are you bringing me dinner and coming over when you clearly are not in this."

"How do you know that I'm not in this?" Danny yelled right back.

"I told you that I was pregnant and you walked out. The light went out of your eyes and you just left me in that office." She turned away from him then no longer willing to talk about it. It had happened. He had left just like everyone else always did so what was the point in talking about it anymore.

"I was in shock. You had kissed me only an hour before. I'm sorry that I was in disbelief, not just because you were pregnant but because you clearly want to see other people."

"I'm not choosing to see other people. I saw one other person once and we weren't even vaguely chatting about us having something more then."

"Oh, so that makes it alright?"

"Yes, because I was not and I am not beholden to you Danny. I can sleep with whomever I like because we have never been anything." It was brutal but it was the unfortunate fact. "You want to know the truth Daniel? I think I love you. I really, truly do but I could not see a way for us to be together and I was lonely so I got drunk and slept with a stranger. That's what happened. That's how this little miracle came to be. I got dumb and drunk over a boy and slept with someone that'll I barely remember."

She stormed off then, charging for her room. She needed something solitary, somewhere that she could pull herself together. She was losing someone very important to her and as much as she needed to cry she'd be damned if she did in front of that very same someone. C.J was so wrapped up in her own thoughts that she didn't even notice Danny following her.

"C.J." Danny muttered, grabbing her elbow and pulling her to face him. "I love you too," he added pulling her even closer to him and kissing her. "I love you so much."

She pushed him away only see a look in his eyes that she was becoming more and more familiar with as the days past; desire. She pulls him back towards her and he kisses her with the kind of passion that all through her college years she would have dies for. The kind of kisses that had always, ever since she finished high school and left Dayton, been her kryptonite. She let him kiss her until she forgot that she was pregnant, until she forgot that he was a Washington Post reporter, until she forgot her duty to her country.

The next morning, she wakes up to unexpected warmth on her back. Her eyes are closed but she can feel that she is lying on her side, which is yet another change from her usual sleeping patterns. So often to being alone she tends to lie diagonal. Her eyes shoot open when the night before comes back to her and suddenly the warm cocoon feels a little less sweet.

This thing with Danny is the last thing that she and her child needs. She is meant to provide a stable life for the little person growing inside of her and this relationship with Danny seems to be the exact opposite of that, as of late. She wants to be in denial, to close her eyes and pretend that she didn't have sex with a man who 12 hours ago could not stand the sight of her, but unfortunately a now common revolt in her stomach pushed her out of bed as she rushed to the bathroom.

Unable to hear anything over the deafening sound of her retching, she was shocked to have Danny suddenly beside her. "Good morning," he said grabbing a hair tie from the bathroom sink and tying up her hair.

"Some good morning," C.J quickly muttered before she once again vomited.

"You are only meant to vomit for the first trimester right?" Danny asked. C.J gave a quick nod of her head unable to speak as she was hit by yet another wave of nausea. "Well, that's good then because I cannot take this every morning for nine months and neither could you."

With all the vomiting she had been doing it took a second for her mind to wrap itself around that last sentiment.

Nine months.

He couldn't handle it for nine months.

For a split second she wants to argue that for this child that she has come to very much love she could take anything for nine months but thinks better of it. She needs to see how much he really wants this. If he really is in it for the rest of this crazy ride or if she needs to find the emergency break and let him off.

"You were planning on seeing me through the nine months?" she says lightly, playing with the buttons on the oversized shirt she had on. Her nausea had diminished slightly and for that at least she was relieved.

"Yeah, of course. I meant what I said last night, C.J," he replied grabbing her hand and finding her eyes before repeating the words she longed to hear, "I love you too."

"I really want to kiss you again but my mouth tastes like vomit."

"How about I find you crackers or something while you brush your teeth." He kisses her on the cheek as she nods in acquiesces. She brushes her teeth as her smile broadens and wonders how on earth she'll tell Abbey the new turn of events.

This was going to be a new and interesting day. C.J. just hoped it would be a good one.

-

I hope you all enjoy that and I promise the next chapter won't be such a long wait.