by Iris Morland
“So, why are you here, exactly?” Naoko sat on the couch, cross-legged. “Did something happen?”
I sighed deeply. Suddenly, I felt ridiculous for running to Naoko’s. I had nothing to be ashamed of; Lochlann was the one who’d been a giant douche canoe.
But Naoko wanted an explanation, and considering what had just happened, I owed her one. I told her about Lochlann and I sleeping together again, something that made me blush, along with what had happened in the lab.
“So you don’t know if she saw you guys?” said Naoko by the end of my monologue. “Maybe you guys were freaking out for no reason.”
“I hope so, but Lochlann thinks she saw us and could do something to us. To him. He was really upset about it.”
“Well, he had no reason to lash out at you.”
“No, he didn’t, but I can see his side, too. The stupid thing is that I’m just as freaked out as he is.” I wrapped my arms around my knees—or at least tried to, given that I had a baby bump in the way now. “He might lose his job,” I whispered, feeling anguished. “All because of me.”
Naoko gave me a sympathetic look. “Do you love him? Because it sounds like you do.”
My lip quivered, remembering how Lochlann had rejected my declaration, as if I couldn’t possibly understand my own feelings toward him. My heart felt like it was being torn into pieces, like an evil little rat was nibbling on a piece of cheese. Except in this instance, Lochlann was the rat, I was the cheese, and I was kind of over being just a moldy dairy product.
“I do love him,” I said, wishing I weren’t so close to tears. Damn hormones. “And it’s not just because he knocked me up, either. He’s a good man. He’s smart, and kind, and supportive, when he’s not being a jerk-face butt-hole.”
“I hope you called him that exact insult.”
I smiled a little through the tears. Wiping my eyes, I said, “I should probably get back. I need to at least tell Lochlann that he’s dumb and can suck eggs for what he said.”
“Probably a good idea, although you never know: he might actually apologize.”
Before I left, I made sure to check in on Henry. He gave me a thumbs-up, even with a bag of frozen carrots cradling his crotch. “If I can’t have kids, I’m blaming you,” he joked.
I was walking to my car when I heard someone calling my name. A blonde woman strode up to me with purpose in her step.
It was Dr. Martin. Why was she wandering down this street at night? There was no way she lived in one of these tiny student apartments. Based on how she was dressed, she had the money to get a nice place off campus.
“Kate,” she repeated, smiling down at me. “I’m so glad I ran into you. I wanted to speak with you.”
I blinked in surprise. “You did? Why?” My heart was hammering so loudly that I was afraid she could hear it. I hoped, naively, that she wanted to talk to me about something banal. Maybe she wanted to ask for directions. Maybe she’d gone on a walk, had gotten turned around, and then her phone battery had died so she had to talk to me, specifically.
“Is there something I can assist you with?” I replied, sounding so formal that if I weren’t practically peeing my pants I would’ve laughed at myself.
“Actually, I was about to go up to your apartment, but this works just as well.” Her smile turned catlike. Under the streetlamps, she looked particularly feline: like she’d rip your throat out before you could blink.
Her words finally registered in my sloshy brain. “You came to my apartment? Why?” I wasn’t about to let on that I’d moved over a month ago.
“I’d rather not have this conversation on campus.”
“I feel like a lot of people use email for that reason.”
She chuckled. “You’re cute, but we both know that you aren’t stupid, either. I saw you and Lochlann.” She clucked her tongue. “What a naughty girl you are, getting involved with a professor. Granted, he is pretty handsome, especially with that accent. I can’t say that I blame you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about. If that’s all you wanted to say...” I moved to go around her and to my car, but her next words stopped me in my tracks.
“I wonder what the university will say when they find out a professor got a student pregnant? It wouldn’t be good, now would it?”
I couldn’t breathe. How did she find out? Had someone told her? Swallowing against the lump in my throat, I said, “What do you want? Because if you want money, I don’t have any.”
Dr. Martin snorted. “I don’t need money, sweetheart. But you have access to the one thing no one else does: Lochlann’s research. Give that to me, and I won’t spill your secret.”
“Are you seriously blackmailing me? Are you insane?”
“I’m just trying to make a deal with you. You want me to stay silent? Pay up. Give me what I want, and it’ll be like nothing ever happened.”
I lifted my chin. “You’re assuming that I’d care if you told.”
“I saw the way you looked at him. You’re in love with him. The thought of him losing his job, his visa, everything? There’s no way you’d let that happen. Not when you need him around to pay for this baby. They’re so expensive.”
She moved in closer, her voice lowering. “And when everyone finds out you messed around with your own advisor, what happens to your reputation? Do you think anyone will take you seriously? That you won’t be ostracized from the program? Come on. We both know you’re smarter than that.”
I clenched my jaw so hard it ached. “I’m not doing shit for you, lady. You can go choke on your own bullshit for all I care.”
As I got into my car, Dr. Martin said ominously, “You have a week to make a decision. I know you’ll make the right choice.”
Chapter Nineteen
Lochlann
After the incident in the lab, Kate began to avoid me. I’d text her, but she’d respond hours later. At one point, she’d gone silent for so long that I’d banged on her door, terrified something was wrong. She’d looked at me like I was insane.
“Why aren’t you answering your phone?” I demanded, wincing internally at how I sounded.
“Because I’m busy? I have work to do, too, you know.” Her eyes were sad for a moment before she added, “If you don’t actually need anything...”
Then she shut the door in my face.
It didn’t help that I was torn between confronting Liz and hoping she hadn’t seen anything. When days passed and nothing happened, I could almost believe it had been a false alarm. She would’ve gone to the dean already. If she waited too much longer, she’d have to wait until after the Thanksgiving holiday. Apparently Americans took their turkey and football very seriously.
Yet Kate avoiding me gave me a bad taste in my mouth. As Thanksgiving approached, she only became icier to me. Frustrated, I entered her flat without knocking one Thursday evening. We had to fix this. We had a baby coming: we couldn’t be in some emotional standstill.
You should probably apologize for being an arse, my mind said. You never did, you know.
I’d wanted to, I argued, but Kate hadn’t let me near her for days now. It was like I’d contracted the plague.
Kate came out of her bedroom, scowling at my intrusion. “Did you even knock?”
“No.” I looked her up and down, drinking in her appearance. She was wearing her usual t-shirt and sweats, her hair in a messy bun, her face devoid of any makeup. There was a red stain on her t-shirt, and she was wearing mismatched socks to boot.
Yet she was somehow the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen.
“You’ve been avoiding me,” I accused.
Kate just crossed her arms and looked away.
“I want to know why,” I continued, advancing towards her. “I’ve wanted to apologize about how I spoke to you in the lab two weeks ago, but you haven’t given me a chance to explain.”
Her eyes flashed fire. “Oh, when you basically told me I was a naive moron? Is that what you’re talking about?”
> “I never said you were a moron.”
“You implied as much.”
I let out a frustrated sigh. “Look, I should’ve handled it better. You are young—no, don’t get all offended. I didn’t know shite when I was your age, either. I’m not saying I’m some fount of wisdom, either, but I do have more experience in the world. You can’t deny that.”
Kate just clenched her jaw.
I gentled my tone. “But it doesn’t matter what I meant: I hurt you. I’m sorry.”
I could see the words slowly make their way from her ears to her brain, before her emotions got the message. Her clenched jaw unclenched, and she finally looked me in the face. But her posture still screamed, don’t touch me.
“Apology accepted,” she said in a clipped tone.
I sighed, pushing my fingers through my hair. “You realize what this means, right? This was basically a warning for us. We have to be more careful.” My stomach dropped into my toes as I looked at Kate’s white face. “We should end this.”
“How can we end something that was never a real relationship?” she whispered.
I took her by her forearms. “We might not be in love but we have passion. We have sex. And we have a baby on the way. But if we want to protect her future and ours, we can’t act like there aren’t serious consequences if we get discovered. Liz seeing us was a huge wake-up call.”
Kate extricated herself from my grasp. “You think I don’t know that this entire thing is a hot mess? That I don’t lie awake at night, agonizing over it? Some days I have to force myself to eat because the stress is so intense, and I love to eat. I’m fucking pregnant, for God’s sake. I should be eating my way through the entire city of Seattle and closing in on the suburbs. Renton should’ve been destroyed by now from my appetite.”
I hated that stress was causing her not to eat or sleep. I blamed myself for it entirely. If I’d just made certain the fucking condom was a good one—no, if I hadn’t given into my baser nature and slept with a girl I’d met at a pub.
I should’ve kept my cock in my trousers. That failure would now haunt me for the rest of my life.
“We should stay away from each other for a while,” I said into the silence. “I don’t want to, but it would be wise. If Liz is still suspicious, we can’t add fuel to the fire.”
Kate’s chin started to wobble. “So I’m going to have to do everything by myself again? Great. Awesome.”
“I never said that. I’m talking about our romantic relationship—”
“We don’t have a ‘romantic relationship!’ We have fucking. You eat my pussy, you put your cock in it, that’s it. Oh, and you get me pregnant. I think what we have is a breeding relationship, nothing more.”
Red clouded my vision. “Now you’re just being disgusting.”
“Am I? Or am I being honest?”
Why was I fighting her on this? She was right, and I’d been the one to draw the line in the sand that this couldn’t be more than sex and co-parenting.
But it hurt. It fucking hurt like a bitch. If I examined that hurt more, I’d probably see how much my feelings were entangled in all of this.
Kate had folded her arms across her chest, not looking at me. I waited for her to say more before breaking the silence. “Is that it? That’s all you want to say?”
“Do I need to say anything else?”
I growled my frustration. “If you can’t tell me what’s wrong, I can’t do anything about it. You realize that, yes?”
In an instant, the wall crumbled, and Kate looked stricken. My heart clenching, I took her hands, forcing her arms from across her chest.
“Kate, what is it? You’re scaring me. This isn’t just about our disagreement in the lab, is it? Is this about Liz? Because I’m fairly certain that she didn’t see anything. If she had, she would’ve said something by now.”
“She could still say something,” murmured Kate.
“Yes, that’s true. I’m not saying we’re out of the clear completely. Just that I don’t want to let what happened hang over us like an ax about to fall. That’s no way to live.”
“Isn’t that what we were already doing? Keeping us, this baby, hidden? I’ve felt like I was one wrong move from destroying your life and mine.” Kate’s eyes filled with tears. “I don’t know if I can bear it much longer, living in fear like this. It’s terrible. I hate it.”
Her voice broke, and I instantly took her into my arms. I murmured words into her hair, hating myself for putting her in this position. I wanted to do right by her so badly that I was tempted to confess the truth. I could deal with the fallout in regards to my career. At this point, that didn’t matter: what I cared about was being here for Kate and our daughter.
“Hush, darling. Don’t get yourself worked up. We’ll figure this out,” I said, even though I could hardly believe my own words. “There has to be some solution.”
“We run away to the circus?”
I tried to smile, but couldn’t. “I could resign,” I said quietly.
Kate looked up at me in horror. “Don’t you dare. You’ll lose everything you’ve worked for. I’m not going to be the reason you have to give up your dreams.”
“It’s the honorable thing to do. I should’ve done it the moment you told me you were pregnant, but I was too selfish.”
Kate grasped my shirt, her eyes pleading. “Don’t do anything yet. Please. There has to be another way.”
I doubted that, but for the moment I let us both believe there was a solution other than the one I knew I had to accept. If I resigned, I could attempt to find another position. That would also mean I’d have to disclose why I’d resigned from UW. Who would hire me then?
I led Kate to the couch. “Wait here. I want to give you something. It’s in my flat.”
When I gave Kate the baby blanket, edged in delicate lace, I said, “It was mine as a baby. I finally persuaded my mam to send it to me, although she was suspicious of the reasons why.”
Kate looked sad. “You haven’t told your parents they’re going to have a grandchild?”
“How could I without telling them everything?” I shook my head. “I will—eventually.” I sighed deeply, hating myself for all the lying, the sneaking around.
“My great grandmother made this for her daughter, and it’s passed on through the generations. It’s said to bring good luck to the new baby.” I pressed the blanket into Kate’s hands. “I thought it would be fitting for our daughter to be brought home in it.”
To my surprise, Kate threw her arms around my neck. “Thank you, Lochlann. For everything.” She kissed me, and I let myself revel in the taste of her for a long moment.
How had this woman managed to take hold of my heart so quickly? It was if she’d cast a spell on me the moment we’d met in Ireland. She was a fairy princess, enchanting me completely.
“I want you to know that no matter what happens, I’m so glad that you’re going to be the mother of my child,” I said, cupping her cheek. “You’ll be an amazing mam.”
“And you’ll be a great father. I know this baby hasn’t made things easy. Things have been such a mess. But I’ll never regret having that one-night stand with you.”
I chuckled before pressing my forehead to hers. In that moment, I could almost believe that everything would work out all right.
Chapter Twenty
Kate
I knew what I needed to do, but that didn’t make it any easier. A week before Thanksgiving, I emailed Lochlann as my advisor to meet with me in his office. I needed a neutral place, one where we both remembered that he was a professor and I was his student.
Not lovers. Not soon-to-be parents. What we should’ve been all along: professionals working alongside each other.
If you’re wondering if I gave Dr. Martin Lochlann’s research, the answer is: fuck no. I wasn’t about to let her win. I didn’t fully understand what she was after, but it didn’t matter. Her bitchery wasn’t going to ruin Lochlann’s life because of me.
“Please don’t forget to work on your projects over holiday,” he was saying to his class. He was at the front, his shirtsleeves pushed up his arms, his hair a little wild. Clearly he’d been teaching a lively class.
I couldn’t help but watch him work. From where I was standing, I could see both him and most of his students. Lochlann leaned against the desk and folded his arms over his chest.
Could anyone blame me for giving in and letting this man bang me into next week? He was so sexy. Even worse, he was kind, he was funny, he was smart. He even apologized when he fucked up. He was like some dream man I could never actually have.
The baby kicked me, as if she knew my thoughts. I know you don’t agree, but sometimes adults have to do things that suck.
“Are you celebrating Thanksgiving, Professor?” asked a student in the front row.
In profile, I saw Lochlann smile. “Wasn’t planning to, no.”
“You can come to my family’s Thanksgiving,” a female student said before giggling.
I’d been so caught up with everything that I’d forgotten I would be going home for a few days. Our entire family generally congregated at our house, although luckily for us, that didn’t include any random cousins or uncles and aunts. My parents’ siblings lived on the East Coast, anyway.
The thought of Lochlann spending Thanksgiving by himself broke my heart, but how could he attend my family’s Thanksgiving without giving away our secret? Liam would most likely invite him along, but I doubted Lochlann would accept.
The bell rang, and the students began to pack up. “Have a great holiday,” said Lochlann as his students filed out.
It was then that he realized I’d been watching him. As his students filed past me, though, they hardly noticed I was there. It wasn’t like grad students hanging around professors was an odd sight.