by Cat Carmine
“Okay. Well, if you’re sure about this, we support you. Whatever you want to do.”
“Thanks, Rori. Now, I should probably get going. I think Logan’s already here.” Actually, I know he’s already here, since I saw his car when we pulled in, but I’m trying to sound casual here.
Rori wishes me luck, and I head into the cafe. It’s lunch-ish, so the place is busy, but I spot Logan right away, sitting at a small booth in the back. He’s impossible to miss, really. His broad shoulders are unmistakable, and the light catches his blond hair in a way that looks almost like a halo. How fucking ironic.
His eyes are laser-trained on the door, and he sees me right away, too. He stands, and the way his face lights up cracks something open in my chest.
Be strong, Blake, I tell myself. You know what you have to do.
“How are you doing?” he asks, as soon as I’m near. “And how’s your Dad?”
“He’s doing better, thanks,” I say, ignoring the first question since it has no easy answer. “The doctor says he’ll be able to come home in a couple of days.”
“That’s great. Really, Blake. I’m glad.”
“Thanks. Did you want to get some coffee? They have the best spice cookies in all of Connecticut here.”
“Sure, yeah. Anything you want.” Logan looks nervous, and again, something shifts inside my ribs. I know I have to be strong, but the kind way he’s looking at me right now isn’t making that easy.
We get coffee — well, herbal tea for me — and spice cookies, then return to our seats.
Logan sits across from me, and even though the booth can’t be more than two feet wide, it feels like he’s an ocean away. He still has that hopeful look about him, a look that’s more golden retriever than lion. Somehow, it’s just as sexy as the wild animal look.
For a second, I wonder if I’m completely wrong about this. God, I would love to be wrong.
Finally, he runs his hand through his hair and lets out a nervous breath. “Blake, I’m really glad you called. There’s something I have to tell you.”
Hope runs through me, but I hold up my hand. “Wait. I have something to say, too, and I’d like to go first, if that’s okay.” If I don’t do it right now, I may never get the nerve. I try to crack a smile. “And besides, you went first last time.”
“Right. Of course.” He still looks optimistic, but there’s something much more guarded about it now.
Instead of saying anything, I blow on my tea and then take a sip. Break off a piece of cookie and nibble on it. Logan is still staring at me expectantly. Okay, Blake. No more stalling.
“Logan, I quit.”
He blinks in surprise. “I’m sorry?”
“I quit. My job,” I add, when he still looks confused. “I can’t be your assistant anymore.”
“Oh.” He purses his lips. “Oh. Why? I thought you enjoyed working for me.”
“I do. I did. But I’ve decided to move back to Connecticut. At least for now. My parents are going to need the help while my dad is recovering.”
His expression darkens. “I understand they might need the help, Blake, but you know I’d be perfectly willing to get someone for them. A nurse, perhaps, for your father. And if they need help in the store, I can send down someone from operations. I have excellent people, you know.”
He’s rambling. Trying to grasp control of a situation that feels out of his control. I shake my head.
“It’s not about that. Not entirely, anyway. I just think Connecticut is ... a better place for me to be. For a variety of reasons.”
“Funny, because I think the best place for you to be is with me.”
I hold my breath. If he can say it, I think — if he can tell me that he loves me, maybe that’s a sign that we can bridge this gap together. But he doesn’t say anything else, just stares down into his coffee, at his untouched cookie.
So I force myself to press on. But first, I shove another bite of spice cookie into my mouth — they really are absolutely to die for.
“There’s something else I have to tell you.” My skin starts to tingle. Logan is sitting with his back rigid against the seat. He already looks like he’s bracing for the worst. “I’m pregnant.”
Logan looks like he just got punched in the stomach. His shoulders slump, and he lets out a breath that’s more like a whoosh.
“You’re ... pregnant?”
“About ten weeks now.”
“And it’s ... mine?”
I scowl at him. “Of course, it’s yours.”
“But we used ...”
“Not the first time,” I remind him.
“Fuck. You’re right.” He runs a hand through his hair. His face seems to be processing a thousand emotions a second, each one flitting across his face like flecks in a prism.
“Yeah.” I purse my lips. “So ... I’m sorry.”
He shakes his head absently. “Don’t ... apologize. This is ... great.”
“Are you sure? You don’t exactly sound sure.”
I don’t know why I’m giving him a hard time. I’ve had weeks now to adjust to this new reality, when Logan’s had all of twenty seconds. The least I could do is give him a few minutes. I take a deep breath and force myself to smile.
“Anyway, I want to keep it. I understand this wasn’t in your plans, so I want to make it clear that you can have as much or as little involvement in the baby’s life as you want.”
“Involvement?” He shakes his head, still looking like he hasn’t quite come out of the daze of shock. “Blake, I don’t want to be involved.”
“Okay, then.” My stomach plummets. I expected Logan to struggle with the news, but I didn’t expect him to bow out of it so boldly.
He shakes his head. “No, no. That came out wrong. I mean, I don’t want to be ‘involved’ like some deadbeat dad who shows up for one baseball game every summer. I want to raise the baby with you, Blake. I want to be all in.”
“Oh.” Warmth buzzes through me. Maybe this can actually work. “Okay. Good. I want that, too.”
“We’ll get married,” he announces, as if he’s just decided that we’ll get Thai instead of Indian.
My brain does a record scratch. “Say what?”
He looks at me as if I’m five. “Of course, Blake. We’ll get married. What else would we do?”
“I’m not marrying you, Logan.” Never mind that this is the world’s most unromantic proposal, I don’t like the fact that he’s just assuming this is a done deal.
“Blake, don’t be silly. We’re having a child together. Don’t you want him or her to grow up in a home with two parents? Wait — do you know if it’s a him or a her yet?”
For a second, he looks so positively delighted that I actually smile. “No, not yet. Not until sixteen weeks.” I turn my smile into a frown. “And now back to the subject at hand. I’m not marrying you.”
“Is it because I don’t have a ring? I’ll get you a ring, Blake. You know I have access to the world’s most in-demand pieces, right? I’ll get you the biggest, nicest ring you’ve ever seen. How many carats do you want?”
I throw my hands up into the air. “It’s not about the ring, Logan. I seriously don’t care one way or another about the ring.”
“I can get it here before you know it. Don’t you worry,” he says, as if I haven’t spoken. He’s already pulling his phone out of his jacket pocket. “I’ll have it put on a prop plane. Be here in half an hour.”
“Logan, I don’t want the ring.”
“Forty minutes, tops.”
“You are infuriating. I’m not going to listen to this anymore.”
I stand up, then wrap the rest of my cookie in a napkin and shove it in my purse. Because I might be pissed at Logan right now, but there’s no way I’m going to walk away from a perfectly good cookie. Let’s just be practical here for a second.
“Where are you going?” Logan truly sounds befuddled.
“I’m going home.”
“You should come back t
o New York with me. We can talk about the marriage thing, but Blake — we need to be in this together.”
I shake my head. “We’re not in this together. That’s what I’m trying to tell you. I want us to both be involved, for the baby’s sake, but not together. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
He does. I can tell by the look that crosses over his face. His beautiful face. Shock and sadness and ... loss.
Probably exactly how I looked when he walked out on me at the hospital last night.
“Is this because of what I did last night?” he says. His voice is even, but his jaw ticks, belying his calm demeanor. “Is this because I left you at the hospital?”
“No. Yes. Sort of.”
“Tell me, Blake. Tell me why you won’t marry me.”
“Because you don’t love me,” I burst. People in the cafe turn to stare at us, and I slump back into the booth, if only so that I can hide from their eyes.
“I’m sorry, Logan, but look at this from my perspective. You’re trying to push me into marrying you when you haven’t even said that you love me. You’re just trying to control this situation the way you couldn’t control things with—”
His face turns to ice. “Go on, Blake, say it. The way I couldn’t control things with Laura. When she got sick.”
I feel terrible. More terrible than I think I’ve ever felt in my life. Logan’s face looks so … broken. The same way my heart feels right now. I force myself to nod. “Yes. I’m sorry if that sounds harsh, but it’s true. You don’t love me, Logan. I’m not even sure if you can.”
For a minute, we just stare at each other. I wait for him to tell me that I’m wrong, that of course he loves me, that he wants to be there for me the same way that I want to be there for him. But he’s silent.
Stoically, maddeningly, heartbreakingly silent.
I push myself out of the booth again. If it was just me, maybe I wouldn’t be so quick to walk away. Maybe I’d be more willing to go along for the ride. But it’s not just me anymore. I have a baby to think about. A baby that doesn’t deserve to have to ride the Logan Cartwright seesaw.
So even though I want to turn and throw myself into Logan’s arms, even though I want to let him cover me with kisses, even though I want to ignore the fact that I might never get anything more from him … I don’t. I force myself to be strong. I’m the only one I can count on, when it comes down to it, and I’m the only one my baby’s going to be able to count on, too. It’s time to finally — finally — grow up.
At least that’s what I tell myself as I turn around and walk out of the cafe.
But as I cross through the parking lot, he’s right behind me.
“Blake, wait.”
There’s a note of command in his voice that is so like the first Logan I met. Logan, who was always so firmly in control. Logan, who liked things the way he liked them. Logan the boss. Logan the lion.
I stop. My body tenses as he approaches. Even though I can’t hear him, I can feel him. Can feel his breath on the back of my neck, can feel the very essence of him, hovering just a foot away from me. He almost seems to vibrate.
“Blake.” His voice is a hoarse whisper.
My body is frozen in place. Logan brushes the blonde hairs off my neck, and then I feel his lips there, running across the fine skin of my nape. The tiny hairs stand up on end. Everything in my body seems to stand up on end. I wait for him to do it. To say the three words that could make me stay.
“Don’t do this.”
I choke out a sob. Then I shake my head, and I walk away.
Twenty-Eight
“Blake! I didn’t know you were working here again.”
“Hi Mr. Lonney! Yes, I’m back. Just helping out while Dad’s out of commission.”
He grumbles something and shakes his head. “I heard about your dad’s heart attack. Damn shame. Your father’s a great man.”
“Thanks. He really is.” I’ve had pretty much this exact conversation with about a hundred different people in the last three weeks. Being back at the shop is both agonizing and soothing — like putting cream on a burn. It stings, being back here in Connecticut, walking away from the New York life I thought I wanted. But it feels right, too. The pale green walls of the flower shop feel like home. I hadn’t realized how much I missed it until I walked back through those front doors. The smell hit me like a tidal wave — the heavy perfumes of the roses, the gardenias, the springy scent of the daisies, the lilacs, and beneath that, the loamy smell of the soil from the potted plants we sell. I half expected the melange to make me nauseous — after all, just about everything does these days — but instead it just made me feel calm. Peaceful.
“What can I get for you, Mr. Lonney?”
“A dozen roses.” He takes off his tweed cap and presses it to his chest, chuckling to himself. “Had a little incident installing the new dishwasher.”
“Oh dear. Dishwashers can be tricky.” I tap the side of my nose knowingly.
“I’ll say. ‘Course, it helps if you hook the thing up right, so that when your wife turns it on for the first time, the water actually goes into the dishwasher instead of gushing all over your brand new kitchen floors.”
“Ouch. How are the floors?”
“Being replaced next week.”
“Double ouch. Want to make it two dozen?”
“Yeah, maybe you better.” He sighs, but it’s not bitter. It’s the contented sigh of a man resigned to the playing out the same dynamic in his life over and over.
I guess those dynamics aren’t so bad, if they’re ones that are warm and comforting.
Logan and I … what kind of dynamic did we have? He’d always have all the power, would always have to be in control. I’d always be the one with no power, Blake the fuck-up, the baby. Well, I’d managed to break that dynamic, didn’t I? I finally stood on my own two feet. Even if it cost me everything.
“Where’d you go there, Blake?” Mr. Lonney is looking at me with concern.
I shake my head and give a small laugh. “Sorry. A bit spacey these days. We’ll get those roses done up for you right away.”
“‘Preciate it. Give my best to your father, too, won’t you, Blake?”
By the time I get back to my parents’ that night, I’m ready to collapse. My feet are aching. Even though my baby is still the size of a grape, I feel like I’ve been lugging around a twenty-pound bag of potatoes all day. A bag of potatoes that gives me heartburn and makes my ankles swell. Oh, and makes me have to pee all the time. This pregnancy defies the laws of physics.
Dad is sitting on the couch in the living room, watching Jeopardy. I can hear the shower running upstairs. That’ll be Mom. She was at the shop late, too, and only left about half an hour before I did. I’d offered to stay and tally the day’s receipts and lock up so that she could go home to Dad.
“Hiya pumpkin. There’s leftover meatloaf in the fridge,” Dad calls out as soon as I close the kitchen door behind me. “Well, lentil loaf, that is. I’m not sure what your mother was thinking with that one.”
I drop my bag, cross into the living room, and bend down to kiss his cheek. “She was thinking that she didn’t want you to have another heart attack.”
“Don’t you girls worry about that,” Dad says gruffly. “I’m just fine now. I should be going into the store, you know.”
“I know.” I smile. “But you know what the boss says.” Dad’s been off work for almost four weeks now, and it’s driving him crazy. His doctor said he could go back to work a couple of days a week, but Mom’s insisted he stay home for at least another week. And we all know she’s really the one he needs to listen to. So here he is, house-bound until she gives him her blessing.
I hobble back into the kitchen and grab the lentil loaf out of the fridge. I poke at it with a fork. It looks grey and kind of like it’s disintegrating. I can’t say I blame Dad for not wanting to eat this. On the other hand, I’m starving right now, and even this grey lump-loaf looks better than nothing.
Dad wrinkles his nose. “Even the smell is off-putting.” His eyes flick to the television. “Who is Marilyn Monroe?”
I blink in confusion, then remember he’s watching Jeopardy. Dad may not have gotten into Days of Our Bold and Beautiful Hospital, but he did discover a passion for the Gameshow Network. His particular favorite is quiz shows — I forgot how much my dad loves trivia.
“I don’t care,” I say with my mouth already half full of lentil loaf. “I’m famished.”
Dad frowns, pealing his eyes away from the television. “You’re working too much, Blakey. You need to take it easy.”
“I’m fine. Honest.” I’m not exactly fine, though. I’m exhausted. I go into the shop every day at seven a.m., and I don’t get home until after eight in the evening. Mom is putting in almost as many hours as me. When it used to be the three of us, we could split the work between us. Dad worked the front of the shop, and Mom spent most of her time in the back, working on the arrangements and dealing with the major greenhouses we work with. I would alternate between the two — covering for Dad in the front, and helping Mom in the back when I could. I wasn’t a floral designer like she was, but I could cut stems and ribbons and unwrap the deliveries as they came in. It worked well with the three of us, but now that we’re down to just two, it’s exhausting. I’m not sure how they managed without me when I was in New York, and the thought fills me with an agonizing guilt.
“I just don’t like to see you working yourself to the bone like this.” Dad’s hand-wringing is the same every day, so I’m starting to get used to it. I just smile and nod as I finish off my lentil loaf.
Imagine how much worse he’d be if he actually knew I was pregnant.
Yeah, okay, I haven’t told them yet. I know I’m going to have to tell them eventually, but I haven’t figured out how. It’s going to kill my dad, and I just can’t bear to see that look of disappointment in his eyes.