"Do you want to do something fun?"
As soon as the words had left her mouth, Genevieve felt an overwhelming compulsion to smack herself in the head. Out of all the things she had planned to say when her fiancé walked into the room, that was not what she had planned to go with. As soon as she had seen his massive form and signature mark, she had no control of what came out of her mouth with how nervous she was, only that she had said something.
She let out a nervous giggle as Bjorn tilted his head, his icy eyes piercing her own as they narrowed at her in suspicious intrigue.
"A simple yes or no is all I need darling."
"Yes."
The long, drawn out yes that almost sounded like a question had her smiling on the inside but pouting on the outside. She kept the pout strong on her face as she stood in front of him and held out her hand to begin one of their nightly routines.
"It is just a game."
"What are the rules of this game?"
She was glad that he had finally lifted his arm from his side, and she could look away from his eyes to focus on the task in front of her. He couldn't see the shit-eating grin on her face, and she could take all the time she needed to control her facial expressions to what she needed them to be. With the bonus that she could pretend her shaking hands was from concentrating on not making a mess of untying the laces on his vambraces and not because of how nervous she really was.
"Have you heard of a game called twenty questions?"
"No, I have not. Is it some sort of interrogation game?"
"Yes, that's right but you only get twenty to figure out what it is the other person wants to say using yes or no questions only."
"I understand. So, you'll be asking me the questions?"
"Nope," she slid a brace off of his arm, threw it to the table behind her somewhere and reached over to start on the other. "You'll be the one asking me questions as I have something to tell you. Start whenever you're ready."
"What do you have to tell me?"
The snorted laugh escaped her before she had a chance to stop it, causing her to shake her head before bringing his hand up to place a soft kiss to his palm. Her eyes flickered to catch his briefly, showing her mirth as she lowered his arm back down to continue what she started.
"Yes or no questions only."
"Is it news?"
"Yes." She did manage to suppress the snort that time.
"Is it good news?"
"Yes." The second vambrace came off and was thrown as she answered, letting her make full eye contact with Bjorn and watch as he pondered his next question.
"Are you pregnant?"
"Turns out you didn't need all twenty questions to figure it out."
Her smile was now one of nervous excitement. While they had talked about having many children and never used anything to prevent a conception between the two of them, this wasn't talk. This was the real deal, and she was really carrying a child of theirs.
"Is that the entire game?"
"Well, yeah, but people usually use a lot more of the questions before they're able to figure it out."
"Are you going to use something similar when you are actually pregnant and not just a game?"
Genevieve's heart dropped. The smile vanished from her face as she took a few steps away from him. She knew that Bjorn could be dense when it came to her sometimes, but this was on a whole other level.
"Do you remember, not that long ago, when I was explaining how to play, and I said I had something to tell you?"
"Yes, but I thought it was just the premise of the game."
"Well yes but no. That was legitimately what I had to tell you."
She wasn't sure how much more of his obliviousness she could take before she stalked over to the table to pick up his vambraces to beat him over the head with them. She was sure she would be able to hit him twice before he got over the shock and stopped her. For now, she would give him a minute before she did it.
"I see. Forgive me, I will now rectify my reaction."
Genevieve saw two things that day she would never forget. The first being that she had never seen Bjorn move as fast as he did in that moment as he swooped in to pick her up before spinning them both. The second was him smiling so widely and joyously that she never wanted this moment to stop so she could see his face like that forever.
