The Late Bloomer's Baby

by Kaitlyn Rice

  Because you left her.

  When the marriage was failing.

  When she was struggling with a lot of problems that she needed to work out for herself.

  And now he threatened to take the baby she’d wanted so desperately.

  No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t stop wondering how much all of this was hurting her.

  About how much he was hurting her.

  Maybe the biggest mistake in resolving conflict, he decided at that moment, was in trying to decide exactly who the good guys and bad guys were.

  Maybe everyone fell somewhere in the middle.

  Chapter Twelve

  “Hey, are you going to sleep, too?” Callie whispered.

  When Ethan opened his eyes, she hitched her head toward the hallway. Luke was sleeping soundly, now. They could leave.

  Slipping off her side of the bed, she stacked pillows around Luke to keep him from rolling off, then walked out.

  Ethan followed her to his living room, where they stood eyeing each other.

  “We can talk now,” she said.

  “Guess so.” Ethan stuck his hands in his pockets.

  “It’s quiet in here.”

  “Yes, it is.” Ethan nodded toward his seating area.

  Callie sat on the sofa again and Ethan claimed one of the chairs across from her, and they sat silently, trading stares as if they were a blind-date couple meeting for the first time in a parent’s living room. With the parent present. After they’d each taken a good look and decided they didn’t like what they saw.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she finally said. “We’ve known each other for too long to be this nervous about talking. We’ve always found things to talk about.”

  “Maybe. But we have bigger things to talk about now. And big decisions to make.”

  “Huge decisions.” Callie shook her head. Then she made a vague, sweeping motion with her hand that she hoped would convey more than her words. “I’m sorry about all this.”

  Ethan nodded, as if he’d understood that her apology had been all-inclusive.

  She hoped so.

  Because she had meant about everything: The lie about Luke. The separation before that. Everything from their very first lover’s spat two months after their wedding, to now.

  She smiled sadly, remembering that first argument about tomatoes, of all things, and how to store and slice them. They’d each sulked for an entire day. Callie had recognized the stupidity of their argument, but she’d been frightened by their mutual anger.

  She’d worried that the marriage was ending, even then. But after that day, Ethan had deferred to her knowledge about produce storage. She’d learned that he was the more knowledgeable cook.

  And they’d made it eight more years.

  Too bad things had gotten so complicated since then.

  “I’m sorry, too,” Ethan said quietly.

  “For what?”

  “Everything.”

  She smiled. “After last Saturday night, I had trouble figuring out how to tell you about Luke,” she said. “I dreaded your reaction.”

  “I probably reacted worse than you expected.”

  Callie puffed out a breath and brushed her hair away from her face—summoning a bravery that came easier now that Ethan wasn’t so aloof. “Not really. Yes, you did get angry,” she said. “And I didn’t want to face that, but your reaction was normal.”

  “I played my part in our problems,” he said.

  “I didn’t mean to hurt you, Ethan,” she said. “I knew you’d be a wonderful dad, but I couldn’t face the idea of losing Luke. After he was born, the fierceness of my love for him surprised me.”

  “I know. I feel that way already.”

  She nodded. “I can tell.”

  He stared at her for a long moment. She wondered if he was thinking the same thing she was—that the path they’d taken in their marriage was so very far from their original intent.

  “We’ve made a mess of things, haven’t we?” he said, grinning.

  That flash of a smile mesmerized her. Though brief, it had been incredibly warm and, most importantly, directed toward her.

  His question had made her feel closer to him, too.

  We’ve made a mess, he’d said.

  Not you or I.

  We.

  As if they were a pair again.

  She nodded. “Yes. An awful mess.”

  “Think it’s fixable?” he asked, his brown eyes dark with questions.

  Callie frowned, unsure about how to answer. Which mess? The problem of Luke’s custody, the divorce that never happened, or their constantly changing relationship?

  After a moment, she realized that she could answer his question the same way, however he’d meant it. She shook her head and said, “I don’t know.”

  She didn’t.

  She didn’t know how to divide their parenting so that it would be fair to both of them and to Luke.

  She didn’t know if she wanted a divorce at all, and yet she didn’t know if they could get past their problems and make a success of their marriage.

  She did know one thing, though. She desperately wanted to know Ethan’s thoughts.

  Did he want to try again?

  Callie’s eyes grew hot and heavy with tears, and that made her mad. She’d cried more since Ethan’s departure than during her entire adult life. She’d cried about everything from her mom’s lonely life to Luke’s first baby tooth. Sometimes, she’d found herself crying over a newspaper cartoon.

  When she felt a tear slip down her cheek, followed by another and finally a cascade, Callie swore under her breath. If she lost her composure, she certainly couldn’t help Ethan make sense of things.

  But Ethan moved across to sit on the sofa next to her, then looped an arm around her waist to pull her against his shoulder. “Hey, it’s okay,” he said. “We’ll work it out.”

  Work what out? The problems of the divorce and Luke’s custody?

  Or the problems, period?

  Ethan pulled his face far enough away to regard hers. He used his thumbs to wipe away the moisture, then he kissed the places he’d wiped.

  He maneuvered his hands around to the small of her back and pulled her nearer, then he brought his mouth to hers. Gently, he kissed her. His mouth was closed, but soft.

  Kissing was much easier than trying to talk. Ethan’s pliant lips answered so many of her questions without the necessity of a single word.

  When he kissed her, she sensed his caring. She knew he needed and wanted her. So she opened the kiss and let him know she felt the same.

  Ethan deepened the intimacy more by teasing her tongue with a quick brush of his, then meeting it again with an urgent sexuality that had her gripping his shoulders and pressing closer.

  She couldn’t get near enough. They were side by side on the sofa, with legs and cushions and buttons in the way. Ethan must have recognized her frustration, because he slid an arm beneath her knees and another around her back, then he lifted her across his lap.

  He was aroused.

  Wonderfully aroused. Callie moaned, loving the feel of his hard length against her.

  He kissed her again, but kept his hands at her thigh and back. Gentlemanly. As if he’d drawn a line between them that said this much was okay, but this much wasn’t.

  Immediately, Callie turned to straddle his lap, crossing that line. This desire between them might be wrong on some rational level, but it felt good and it was persistent.

  In any case, they were still married.

  Grabbing her blouse at the hem, Callie lifted it off and dropped it to the floor. Then, without taking her gaze from his, she unhooked her bra and tossed that down, too.

  Let him see the evidence of her desire.

  Let him feel it.

  He groaned, then lifted his hands to her breasts. He fingered her taut nipples and claimed her lips again, thrilling her with deep, endless kisses that felt sensual and forgiving and right.

  After a whi
le, he shifted his hands to her hair and his lips to her neck. She’d always loved the way those tiny kisses sent shivers down her spine.

  Once, she’d have exposed her neck for him, occupying her hands by exploring his body. Today, she worried that he would stop.

  Petting wasn’t enough. She wanted to love him in the most meaningful way. “I want you inside me,” she whispered.

  “You’re sure?”

  “Oh, yes.”

  He let go of her, allowing her to scramble off his lap. She stood next to the sofa on shaky legs, glancing toward his windows to ensure they were curtained before she slipped off the rest of her clothes.

  He followed her lead, managing to undress before she’d finished.

  She didn’t hesitate.

  She flattened a palm against his chest, pushing him against the sofa cushion. After ridding herself of her panties, she straddled his lap again and looped her legs around his torso.

  She wanted to see him, face-to-face in the afternoon light. As she eased his erection inside her, she gasped at the fullness of her body and heart, crying out at her intense feelings.

  She didn’t mind the tears this time. She wanted Ethan to see how much she needed him.

  The quiet living room filled with sounds that couldn’t be as loud as they sounded. The satisfying smack of kisses. Startled chuckles. Muffled moans and ragged breaths.

  This was Callie’s first time making love to Ethan since he’d learned the truth about their baby. She felt more vulnerable.

  More aroused, too.

  Now that he’d had time to adjust to the truth, some wall between them had crumbled. Honesty heightened their intimacy.

  But this was also her first time making love to anyone with a baby in the house. If she and Ethan had stayed together, they’d have learned all the tricks that loving parents must know. They hadn’t, so Callie worried that her son would awaken.

  She wanted to be quiet, and she wanted to finish before they were interrupted.

  Instead of closing her eyes, she watched the coupling of her body with Ethan’s. She slid her hands along his flat, muscled tummy, reveling in the look and feel of their bodies, together.

  Immediately, she climaxed.

  She shuddered and closed her eyes, stilling her movements for a moment.

  “Cal?”

  Opening her eyes, she caught Ethan’s questioning expression and nodded. “Don’t worry, I’m not done,” she murmured, beginning to move again.

  Then she followed his pace, watching the strong man she loved achieve a shuddering satisfaction while her body found a deeper and more lingering response.

  While baby Luke slept on.

  “Man,” Ethan said a moment later as he reclined against the sofa cushion and caught his breath. “It’s hard to be quiet.”

  “I know.”

  “I think we might have set a time record, too.”

  She was glad to know they were thinking the same things. She leaned forward against Ethan’s chest and listened to his heart find its normal rate.

  Soon, they’d be able to put words to these actions. Maybe they could let all the bad history fall to the wayside, and concentrate on their most basic feelings for each other.

  They might even be able to talk about it all before she left his house today.

  Callie had every reason to believe so, until she heard another screech of tires. She peered through the curtains.

  “That’s Josie!” she exclaimed, pulling immediately away from Ethan to jump off the sofa and grab her panties.

  He was up and off the sofa alongside her. He grabbed his clothes and half of hers, and had sprinted halfway to his bedroom before he remembered and announced, presumably to himself as well as her, “Luke’s in there!”

  So they ran to his office, each dressing on the way. He finished before she did, and as the doorbell rang he waved her into a second bathroom. “Get decent,” he said. “I’ll answer the door and tell them you’re napping with Luke.”

  She nodded.

  Moments later, she walked to his living room carrying the still-sleeping Luke and feeling about as composed as she could.

  She hated what had just happened.

  They had both felt compelled to run and hide.

  But they were married. They had a right to have sex, whenever and wherever, until the day they were no longer married.

  Of course, they’d want to be dressed for company, but she wished Ethan wasn’t talking about Isabel’s brand-new smooth-top range and pretending that Callie had just awakened from a nap.

  She wanted to tell her sisters they should always call before they visited a married couple. She wanted Ethan’s hair to be more mussed—when had he found time to comb it?—and she wanted him to look at her as he had on that sofa, and not as if she was merely the Blume sister who had once happened to be his wife.

  She wanted to stay married to him.

  She just wished she’d had time to find out if this afternoon had meant as much to him as it had to her.

  AN HOUR AFTER Callie and her sisters had left with Luke, Ethan busied himself with grilling some steaks and portobello mushrooms for dinner. He didn’t know what would happen with Callie, but he suspected that this afternoon had marked a step forward. Whatever else had happened between them, whatever their stupid reasons for letting go, they loved each other.

  That was cause enough to celebrate.

  Wonderful smells wafted from the grill, so Ethan tested the sizzling steaks by poking an index finger into the thickest part of the bigger one. It sprang back against his finger, hot and juicy but not too soft, so he grabbed his spatula and transferred both filets to the plate next to the mushrooms.

  He’d always made two of whatever he was having—two chops, two burgers, two skewers of shrimp. Sometimes LeeAnn or a buddy showed up to have dinner with him. Sometimes he stuck the extra in the fridge for leftovers. He hadn’t realized it at the time, but he must have always had Callie in mind.

  He’d never stopped thinking about her. Not for a meal, not for another woman. Not for a moment.

  Deciding to forego his usual habit of eating in front of a TV news program when he was alone, Ethan carried the steaks inside to his kitchen table. Dropping his basketball to the floor and a box of stale chocolates into the trash, he plunked his plate in the cleared spot. Then he scrounged a linen napkin and utensils and set those on the table before putting crushed ice, filtered water and a lemon slice in his glass.

  Callie had always insisted that they eat meals with the same level of civility that they would adopt in a restaurant. She’d also preferred a regular time for eating, claiming that that was the way of families. She’d wanted to raise their child in a household containing a wealth of such traditions.

  After he’d left, Ethan had immediately changed his habits. In fact, he’d done everything in a manner that would have chafed at Callie’s nerves. He’d left his newspapers lying around on the table and countertops, he’d eaten on the run and he’d washed his black socks with his white T-shirts whenever it suited him.

  Now he recognized the childishness of his rebellion.

  Ethan cut off a piece of steak and lifted it to his mouth, savoring it even while he wished that Callie were here to share the other. He could have asked her to stay this evening. He’d wanted to, until her sisters had arrived to scramble the situation.

  After ushering Isabel and Josie inside, he’d had to concentrate hard to make small talk. Ten minutes later, Callie had appeared with their sleeping boy and whispered that if they got on the road to Augusta he’d stay asleep.

  The Blume sisters had all tiptoed out.

  Since he didn’t know what Callie was telling her sisters about their changing relationship, Ethan hadn’t wanted to insist on a more satisfying goodbye. He thought he’d seen an apology in Callie’s expression, but he didn’t know the reason for her regret—her departure at such a lousy time, or their wild afternoon together.

  As Ethan ate a mushroom, he noticed the
envelope Callie had given him, lying beside him on the table. Grimacing, he put down his fork and slid the divorce documents off the stack of mail.

  After studying the front of the envelope for a moment, he got up to toss the confounded thing in the trash without opening it. It was obsolete, as Callie had pointed out. No need to keep it lying around.

  Again, he wished she were here so they could talk about things. This afternoon might have proven their stubborn desire for each other, but they still had so much else to resolve.

  He was still thinking about Callie after he’d finished the steak, washed the dishes and put away the junk on the kitchen table, so he decided to phone her. He’d insist that they get together again soon. Tomorrow, he determined as he dialed.

  She could tell her sisters she was bringing Luke to see him in the afternoon. Or, better yet, she could arrive in the morning. They could spend the entire day together and talk in between sessions of entertaining Luke.

  Or…what about tonight?

  What about telling her sisters that she loved her husband and intended to move her things out to his house? That she needed Luke to live with both parents, as God had no doubt intended?

  “Hullo?” The voice on the line sounded very much like Callie’s, but Ethan identified Izzy’s slightly higher pitch.

  “Hi, Izzy. This is Ethan. Is she there?”

  A heavy sigh. “Yes, but she’s really busy.”

  Isabel sounded rushed herself, and also reluctant. Ethan wondered why Callie’s sister was screening her telephone calls.

  He remembered the afternoon months ago when Isabel had met him at the front door of her flood-ravaged house, protecting her sister by trying to keep him outside.

  Now he knew why.

  Callie had been hiding Luke from him that day. Perhaps she’d been worried about him recognizing his own son. She hadn’t simply been upset about seeing him again. And she hadn’t been avoiding a divorce because she’d wanted to stay married to him.

  But why would she try to evade him now? Could this afternoon have scared her? She’d initiated the lovemaking. Hell, she’d practically demanded it. Perhaps the intensity of the experience had frightened her.

  Ethan squelched his worry, choosing to assume that Isabel’s behavior stemmed from ignorance about their afternoon together. “Tell Callie it’s me,” he said, adopting a tone of confidence. “She’ll talk to me.”