Heart & Soul

by Nicole Williams

  She gave me a look but took the water. “Ditto.” Her eyes dropped to my beer. “Please.”

  Garth watched me with that observant expression I wasn’t used to seeing on him until lately. Whenever he looked at me like that, I felt as if he was inspecting a bomb about to explode and trying to decide which wire to cut to keep it from detonating.

  “Where’s Josie?” I asked, hoping if I found her, I could distract Garth from continuing to dance with Rowen.

  “Close by,” he answered.

  “Don’t you think you should find her? It is you guys’s engagement party, right? Aren’t you supposed to be together, you know, as an expression of your commitment to each other?”

  Yeah, I was totally making that up as I went.

  One side of Garth’s face creased. “Unlike some guys I know, I don’t feel the need to stifle the woman I love with my unending presence. We’re okay being away from each other. You might want to work on that, Jess. Before Rowen gets sick of always being in your shadow.”

  When the skin between my brows creased, Rowen noticed it. She smiled and shook her head. “Getting sick of you? Not possible.”

  The blaring sound of the band came to a next-to-screeching halt, then broke into something slower and softer. Now that, that was better. Rowen’s face ironed out with hope, giving me a look that required no words. I returned a look that needed no words either.

  “I saved this one for you, Jess.” Garth held out Rowen’s hand for me, and I took it like I hadn’t held it in months. Her hand was hot and damp too.

  An MIA fiancée appeared over Garth’s shoulder. “Dance with me, Black.” Josie slung an arm around his neck and kissed the side of it, already swaying to the music despite the unconventional stance.

  “With the way you just asked me, hell, I couldn’t say no if you’d just handed me a knife and asked me to stab my heart with it.” Garth tilted his head back so their faces were aligned before kissing her.

  After a few moments of that, Rowen steered us away from them some. “I can’t be that close to them when they’re that close to each other.”

  A smile started to come over my face. The music had slowed, so had Rowen, and on the edge of the dance floor, it was cooler than an inferno. “A little PDA isn’t so bad.”

  She blinked. “That’s a little PDA?” As quickly as she’d glanced at Garth and Josie, she glanced away. “Yeah, and I’m a little pregnant.”

  By that point, Josie’s hand was sneaking under Garth’s shirt past his collar as their kissing entered the for-adults-only zone.

  “They love each other. A lot. That’s how they express it. It’s not like they give a crap what anyone else thinks about how they show it.” I pulled Rowen to me and wrapped her in my arms. Her hands found their spot behind my neck as her head settled against my chest. I felt like I was able to exhale some of the air I’d been holding for hours.

  “I love you. A lot,” she said, her words vibrating against my sternum. “I know I give those two a hard time about the public display thing, but if you ever wanted to, you know, give it a go . . .”

  “What do you mean? I thought we already did.”

  Her head tipped up enough she could look at me. “Well, yeah, we kiss, we hug, we hold hands—”

  “We slow dance,” I added, moving her as slowly as I could and still be considered dancing instead of standing in place.

  Her gaze roamed the masses around us. “What if we got crazy and added a little crazed kissing to our slow dancing and really spiced up our PDA repertoire?”

  “That sounds a little . . . crazed . . . given your condition.”

  “Which condition are you referring to? The one where I’m so sexually frustrated that when I finally implode, I’m going to become one gaping black hole in the galaxy?”

  I looked around to see just how many people were getting an education in my wife’s sexual frustration. Didn’t look like anyone other than myself though.

  “Because for that condition, crazed sounds ideal,” she added.

  When I started to think about what I could tell she was thinking about, it didn’t take long before I’d arrived at the conclusion that crazed didn’t only sound ideal, it sounded pretty damn tempting.

  “It has been so long since I’ve seen that look on your face, I’d started to wonder if it was gone for good, but look at that”—Rowen’s finger circled my face—“there it is in all its glory. The one that says one thousand different words, all of them deliciously filthy.”

  I didn’t have a chance to respond before she grabbed my hand and started to pull me through the crowd toward the doors we’d come through. We were just about to them when a couple drifted in, finally making their appearance.

  I broke to a stop, unsure what to do next. Then I noticed Lily’s hair was more rumpled on one side, her cheeks were still flushed, and I knew exactly what to do.

  I WAS REALLY not going to catch a break during this pregnancy. The thought of Colt Mason being with his oldest sister about made steam plume from Jesse’s ears, so getting to see them in real life—holding hands and wearing expressions just guilty enough to give away that they’d been making out—made him look like he was about to go nuclear.

  When he’d broken to a stop after following me so willingly to whatever quiet, somewhat comfortable place I could find for us before I went nuclear due to lack of sexual anything, I’d tried tugging him forward. Then I tried pulling his wrist as I really dug my feet into the ground. I might as well have been trying to move the Great Wall of China. Jesse wasn’t going anywhere.

  “Maybe we should go say hi?” I suggested after giving the move-the-fortress thing one more try.

  Jesse’s reply was his expression darkening two more shades.

  “Okay, maybe the mature one should go say hi,” I mumbled as I started in Colt and Lily’s direction.

  “Rowen . . .” he called, not quite an order but several degrees much too authoritative for my “I am woman, hear me roar and hyphenate my last name” liking.

  “Jesse,” I replied, hoping he heard the annoyed tone and caught it in my expression when I glanced back at him.

  I wasn’t just annoyed that my schemes for taking advantage of my husband had been foiled; I was also annoyed by his immature approach to Lily dating Colt. Jesse was typically chill and took a “live and let live” approach to those around him. It seemed, however, that whole “do what’s right for you” methodology had a caveat—his sister dating a Mason.

  I might not have punched my own personal stamp of ideal on Colt and Lily, but it didn’t matter what I thought about the idealism of their relationship. At the moment, for the last few months of moments, both of them had obviously been in agreement that their relationship was more than ideal, and that was what mattered. I wanted Jesse to back down and remember what would have happened to us if we had listened to people’s opinions on the idealism of our relationship at first. We never would have made it past day one, let alone gotten married.

  I kept moving toward Colt and Lily. When they’d noticed me coming their way, they both smiled and started to close the gap between us, though I couldn’t help noticing that every few steps, one of them would throw a hesitant glance over my shoulder at where I guessed Jesse was still fuming-meets-sulking.

  Most of the time, I reminded myself why Jesse got so worked up about Lily’s beau: he loved Lily and wanted the best for her. In his opinion, Colt Mason wasn’t the best for her. In my opinion, I doubted that any man would be what Jesse considered best for his sister. The same would hold true when Hyacinth and Clementine got to this stage. Actually, it would probably be worse since Lily was the calm, rational Walker sister, though if I were to ask Jesse, I knew he’d say she wasn’t being rational in her choice of boyfriends.

  I might not have been an objective party, but I felt I could at least be fair. Yes, Colt was older than Lily and maybe a bit too “California” for my country through-and-through husband’s likes, but he was a good person, took such good ca
re of her, and looked at her like idolizing her was his religion. That he’d stuck with her even after Jesse had made his disapproval of their relationship so well known I half-expected an article to be printed in the local paper about it said a lot about the feelings Colt had developed for her in a short amount of time.

  Oh yeah, and there was the whole thing about Lily liking Colt and Colt liking Lily. They’d chosen each other, and for me, that was enough. It wasn’t enough for my brooding husband though.

  The closer I got to Colt and Lily, the more I felt Jesse’s irritation rolling off of him. It didn’t stop me though. If he wanted to continue making his stance on his sister’s boyfriend evident, that was his prerogative. My prerogative was a tad different.

  “Hey, you guys,” I greeted when we were within a few feet of each other. “Nice of you two to finally show up all shifty-eyed with mussed tresses.” I ran my fingers through the side of Lily’s hair. It was such blaring piece of evidence of what they’d been doing, I came close to blushing as I untangled the knots. “Mirror. Brush.” I finished smoothing the last tangles. “Check it and use it next time.”

  Colt shifted beside Lily while she averted her eyes from my pointed stare.

  “How have you guys been?” I asked as I gave Lily a hug. She gave firmer hugs now. I didn’t know why I noticed, because it seemed like a small thing, but ever since she started dating Colt, she embraced people with a bit more purpose. “Besides all tangled up around each other in Colt’s truck?”

  When I bounced my eyebrows, Colt shifted again. Lily didn’t shift though; she rolled her eyes. Go figure the guy who’d convinced an entire town he’d made ego his bitch was the one shifting in place, while the girl who’d made an art out of blending in with the walls was the one rolling her eyes.

  “We’re great,” Lily answered, her eyes lowering to my stomach once they were done revolving. “How are you doing?”

  “I’m doing good.” As a policy, I rarely, if ever, gave vanilla answers to any kind of question, but I was fresh out of colorful responses to that question. But How are you? weighted with just enough enunciation to imply disaster was tiptoeing behind me? I got asked that question a lot.

  “How did your appointment go?” Lily asked.

  “It went good.” Another vanilla response. I was just so tired of talking about me and the unsaid of what might happen sitting beneath the surface of every similar question. I knew people asked because they cared and were concerned—I knew I’d be doing the same if situations were reversed—but I’d answered enough questions about how I was doing and how my appointments had gone to last my next ten lifetimes. I needed a break. I needed to talk about someone else’s issues instead of my own.

  My gaze lingered on where Colt and Lily’s hands were joined. Colt was a big guy, and Lily was small for a woman. I would have expected Colt’s hand to swallow Lily’s entirely, but instead—with their fingers laced together as they were—they looked close to the same size. “We’ve got to figure out what to do about your brother.”

  “I agree. He hasn’t been looking good, or even healthy, for months.” Lily’s gaze drifted behind me to where I guessed Jesse was still stewing in his boots. “He’s worried about you though. I don’t think he’ll get past this until you’ve delivered and both you and the baby are okay.”

  I smiled at Lily. She might have changed in some ways, in some good ways, but she was still about as sweet and selfless as they came. Where she’d thought I’d been referring to Jesse needing help pertaining to me, I’d actually meant he needed help regarding her and her choice of boyfriends.

  “Don’t worry—I’ve got that covered. I’m going to start slipping Xanax into his coffee in the morning and another in his cup with dinner. He’ll be a happy, unconcerned potato for the next few months.” I angled myself beside Lily just enough so I could see Jesse. He was in the same spot, arms crossed and body rigid. His expression was the same—cross and rigid. “But that’s not anxiety right there. That’s unbridled fury. Boundless anger bordering on rage. There isn’t a pill for that.”

  As quickly as Lily looked at her brother, she looked away. I knew it was difficult for her to know that her big brother didn’t approve of her boyfriend. I knew she felt as though she’d disappointed him in some way and that it killed her. I also knew she wouldn’t give up someone she cared about because someone else she cared about wanted her to. It was in notions like that one that I saw more of myself in Lily than not.

  “I don’t know what to do. I’ve tried talking to him.” Lily absently played with the hem of her dress as she stole another glance at her brother. “But all he ever answers with is him not wanting to talk about Colt and me in the same sentence, or he gets up and leaves the room.” She exhaled what sounded like weeks of emotional weight. “I can’t talk to him because talking requires the other party to actually engage in conversation.”

  “Okay, so the talking plan’s a bust. Why don’t you try something else?”

  Colt and Lily looked at me, waiting.

  “Why don’t you try showing him instead?”

  “Showing him what?” Colt asked, shuffling in closer so the three of us formed a loose circle.

  “What your relationship is about.” I lifted a shoulder. “He’s under the impression you’re no good for one another and that your relationship could never work. You guys are under a different impression, so why don’t you show him that?”

  Lily’s brows pinched together. “How do we show him that when he’s having a tough time being in the same ginormous barn packed with people as Colt? Not sure that’ll work if we show up at breakfast tomorrow and try to slide into the chairs across from him.”

  From prior experience, I knew that was true. Jesse had never said anything disrespectful to their faces, but his actions couldn’t be considered respectful. The last time we’d been in town and Colt and Lily had showed up to the Walker kitchen table at dinnertime, Jesse had dropped his napkin into his chair and claimed he had to finish watering the livestock. The time before that, a few fence posts had needed fixing. The time before that, the barn needed a fresh coat of paint. When it came to suffering though a meal with Colt, Jesse had no shortage of excuses for slipping out at the last minute.

  “So how about when I see you guys making your way to the table tomorrow morning, I’ll plop down in Jesse’s lap, and we’ll see if he’s able to escape so swiftly then?”

  Lily giggled at the picture playing out in her mind. “I like your creativity, but I’m not sure it would work.”

  “Why? I think it sounds like an outstanding plan.” When I glanced at Colt to see if I could get him to join my side, I found all his attention was focused on Jesse. Yeah, because making eye contact and challenging the fuming man balancing precariously on the ledge of sanity was a bright idea.

  “Well, because Jesse has been throwing around bales of hay and bags of feed like he was juggling snap peas since middle school. I doubt maneuvering the tiniest pregnant woman I’ve ever seen off his lap is going to slow him down from making his escape.” Lily motioned at my stomach like she was proving her point.

  I looked down to see if I’d gone from size Saturn to size Pluto. Nope. My stomach was still creating its own gravitational field. “It’s worth a try, oh you of little faith.” I thrust my hand behind my back. “And it’s better than letting these two continue their stare off from fifty feet apart.”

  Lily chewed it out on her lower lip, her gaze shifting between her brother and her boyfriend as if she was contemplating how to go about mixing oil with vinegar. “Okay, so if this is going to work, it’s going to take more than just you dropping into Jesse’s lap to get him to stay in his chair at breakfast tomorrow.” She continued to nibble on her lip as her eyes narrowed in concentration. “You better squirt a few rings of super glue onto his chair too. Just to be safe.”

  I bumped my arm against hers and smiled. “Already so two steps ahead of you. I’ve shuffled through the gray matter where useless information is ke
pt and dusted off the file listing where your dad keeps his tubes of glue”—I tapped my temple—“as well as a hammer and nails to secure the legs of his chair to the kitchen floor so he won’t think about escaping with the chair glued to his ass.”

  That made Lily laugh again. “You’re right. You are two steps ahead of me.”

  When I joined in with her laughter, only laughing harder as we glanced between the two stone-cold expressions on Jesse and Colt’s faces, I felt it again. Harder. Stronger. That stomach-tightening-before-snapping sensation hit me so hard it sent me back a couple of steps.

  “Hey? Rowen?” Lily’s laughter cut off instantly as she reached for my arm. “What’s the matter?”

  Colt had come around to my other side, one arm going around my back to support me as he exchanged a nervous look with Lily.

  That one had been painful enough it probably would have dropped me to my knees if Lily and Colt hadn’t been on me like white on rice. As sudden and staggering as it had been, it passed as quickly as it had come on. Barely a handful of seconds had passed, and the rip-me-open sensation was gone.

  And so was the guy guarding his post fifty feet away.

  “What happened?” Jesse asked in a tone hinging on scared shitless when he broke to a stop in front of us.

  Lily shook her head, studying me with her own mask of worry. I knew she and Jesse weren’t related by blood, but that didn’t change the fact that almost two decades of growing up together meant they could practically mirror each other’s facial expressions. Her worry lines folded as deep and in as many places as Jesse’s.

  “I don’t know. She didn’t say,” Lily said.

  “Rowen, what’s going on?” Jesse stayed right in front of me, not seeming to notice Colt camped out beside me, still ready to support me if my body gave out again.

  I paused before answering because this one required some deliberation. Whatever that hell-fire sensation had been, it had gotten my attention. It had even made me a bit nervous. I’d been feeling clusters of something similar all night, but in comparison, those had been weak tremors. This had been like the ten on the Richter scale.