by Amber Burns
My look of appreciation doesn’t go unnoticed either. River tilts up his head and I don’t need any other signal.
Vanna isn’t in the closer of the two bedrooms, the smaller, too. She’s in the master at the end. And she looks shocked enough to drop the wriggling purple bundle in her arms.
“Amos!” she’s got a loud whisper, her glance flitting down to the precious carriage in her arms. I hear the baby before I see it. Maybe two or three months, the blonde child coos at Vanna’s bouncing and soft humming.
She’s mother material, even squeezed in a corset and a gaudy tutu-inspired skirt, Vanna is the center of my attention, my world.
I gently close the door behind me, leaning back against the wood to watch her.
She doesn’t look up until the child’s wriggling stills, hinting at the sleep of the innocents. She sits down, still holding the child, on the edge of the bed and raises her gaze to me.
“Why?”
Not ‘how’ or ‘what’, she’s jumped right into the deep end. Maybe Vanna’s changed in the week – six days – since I last saw her. She hasn’t changed outwardly.
Her dark hair is coiled, the upper section of her hair clipped high, the lower section cascading over her shoulders. Lips colored a light pink, she’s got blush over her cheekbones, and her lashes are darker and longer.
And with the kid in her arms, and minus the make-over, she looks exactly like how I’d picture her in our bedroom-turned-nursery, caring for our baby. It’s really not entirely as crazy as it could be on Vanna.
But I know I’m fucking bias as hell. I’ve proved that from Day One. Vanna in the display case in that ugly sweater dress and black tights; I saw beyond the clothes, with the help of her delicious ass, and there was no looking back.
There would never be looking back. I come to the conclusion then, while we’re having this stare-down.
Vanna, you ruined me.
You ruined me and broke my heart.
“Wes and Violet,” I struggle with the words, gaining a handle on my emotions to continue. “They were worried first after you left without a word, and then when your parents told them you were getting married.”
“Oh.” She drops her head and touches a finger to the bundle, and I move away from the door, drawn to her action. Vanna’s stroking the sleep child’s cheek, and I’m mesmerized by her adoring expression, dewy eyes and parted lips, and the baby’s complete trust and peace in his cousin’s arms.
“Boy?”
“Girl,” she whispers. “Tabitha. We call her Tabby, though.”
It’s a toss-up as to who has my attention more, Vanna or little Tabby.
“Why?”
Now it’s my turn to seek elusive reasoning. Vanna and this marriage aren’t adding up. We seemed so in synch before she shoved me off the boat without a life-vest.
Metaphors aside, she’s seriously crushed me and, being the only woman to hold that especial accolade, I’d like to know why.
“I, I don’t know what you want me to say,” she’s looking at the child, but those heart-breaking words are directed to me. “I just am, Amos. And you shouldn’t be here.” I hear the stammer; it’s light, but it’s there.
She’s lying and I seize onto the opening she’s given me.
“Do you love him?” at her head swiveling in my direction, confusion holding her expression, I add, “The guy you’re about to marry, bind yourself to for the rest of your life: Do you love him?”
Back to Tabby, Vanna sighs. “Please don’t.”
Ignoring her plea, I repeat, “Do you love him? Yes or no, Vanna? Do you love your husband-to-be?”
It’s the last thing I want to ask, too. Believe me, Vanna. But it’s the only tie holding me to her.
“I’m marrying him, aren’t I?”
“That’s not an answer.”
She lowers her face, lips ghosting over Tabby’s forehead. “It’s not about love,” she says when she moves up.
I can’t believe what I’m hearing!
I don’t know when I fall to the ground, but I’m on one knee and arm’s length from her.
“You don’t believe that.” I whisper, knowing it to be true, knowing that from our passionate encounters. The sex brought wallflower Vanna to life; she bloomed in my arms over and over, too much for me to ignore the evidence and let that lame excuse of a response go. “You don’t believe that any more than I do. You have so much love and life to give; you wouldn’t throw it away on a loveless marriage. It’s not you, Vanna, so don’t lie to me and yourself.”
Her mouth is quivering, lashes ringing watering eyes. Shit, she’s going to cry.
I recall what Wes said. She’d cried after I left, cried for six days, through our entire break-up.
If there’s a time to close the physical and emotional distance, it’s now.
On both knees now, I crawl to lean in front of her, hands cupping her bare knees, thumbs stroking the soft flesh.
“Vanna, what are you doing?”
“I-I don’t know,” she sobs softly, sniffling much louder. The baby stirs. She drops her voice and gaze, shaking her head. “I don’t know.”
“It’s not too late, sweetheart. Never too late to shut this ugly mistake down now, and if anyone says otherwise, they’ll have to answer to me.”
Her sobs are rocking through her, shaking the baby. I reach out for Tabby’s bundle, still amazed how such a cute child could be produced by Vanna’s aunt Tilda.
Vanna sees what I’m angling for and turns around, hooking her knee over the side of the bed to stretch and lay Tabby down on the bed.
Baby out of harm’s way, I climb on the bed beside Vanna, drawing my arms around her middle and bringing her against me.
It’s the first time I held her since we had sex last in Pearlwater. She doesn’t struggle out of my embrace either, instead sinking back against me, her head lolling to rest over my shoulder, and exposing her throat and the low dip of her shirt – if you could call it a shirt, down to the valley of her breasts.
Hands over mine, she squeezes and I can hear the smile in her voice, and confirm it when I’m strong enough to rip my gaze off her chest to her side profile.
She’s looking at Tabitha. “I tried. I really tried. It made my parents and everyone so happy. The wedding, I mean.” She raises one hand to brush under her eyes, catch a tear mid-trek over her cheek. As much as I want to kiss the liquid pain away, I know it’ll stop her train of thought, and she needs to release all the pent-up poison of shoveling duty-after-duty onto her shoulders, to heal and to think with her head and not her easily swayed heart.
“It just snowballed like crazy; next thing I know my aunt Tilda – she owns the house – is surprising me with a makeup and a party, inviting people from high school and neighbors and her own friends, none of which I definitely didn’t want.”
“It was supposed to be quiet. Mom and dad promised,” she sighs. “I didn’t even want Wes and Violet to know, in case they tried to talk me out of it.”
“Which would be a bad thing?” I promised to keep quiet, but she broke the restraint with that last comment.
Vanna turns in my arms, peering up at me, lips doing that quivering thing to signal the coming waterworks. “You hate me, don’t you?” she laughs a watery sound. Tabby raises her little fists at the sound, her eyes still closed settle us down.
“I b-break up with you,” nice to hear that that’s hard to say for her too, “and then I’m getting married. You think I’m totally nuts.”
“Ballpark,” I chuckle at her innocent look; I did rush over her to shake some reason into her, and get some answers to allow me to move on, but a part of me wanted this – this easy position we’re in now. Vanna looking frighteningly sexy in the ugly outfit Tilda dolled her up in, the sweet smell of a baby powder cocooning us and the big, bad reality outside the tiny bedroom window.
Vanna’s mouth is soft and yielding. She opens up to me, one arm snaking backwards to hook around my shaved head, to bring me down a
nd deeper into our lip-lock.
My tongue gaining entrance dances around hers and does its cavity check and spirits out of her mouth as my teeth sink down, teasingly tugging and earning a moan for the move.
“Vanna,” I brush our noses, probably the sexiest Eskimo kiss ever.
“Amos.” She’s doing that thing; stretching my two-syllable name much longer than it is on a mewling moan combo.
I have one of her tits in my hands, the heavy, full flesh the best thing I’ve ever held. I pinch her nipple, rousing another moan, her back arching from me, yet somehow bringing her closer.
“The door’s locked. I thought we could use the privacy.” For the talk, at first, but I hadn’t thought we would ever – Vanna, why the hell have you been holding out on me?
All this time she’s wanted me. I can see it. I recognize that warm look because it’s the look I’ve seen every morning, in spite of the hardness and hate I tried to erect as defense against any Vanna-related subject.
Love, clear as mud, is charging between us.
“Vanna, I – ”
A perfectly timed knock stops as cold. Vanna doesn’t draw from me as I answer. In fact she’s leaning back, eyes a little wild, expression wary.
She’s scared – scared to face the world beyond our bubble, our safe haven, our love.
“Who locked this door? Open up. Vanna, are you in there? You better not be doing the nasty with that man on my bed, and with your poor baby cousin in there. Young lady,” I help Vanna up after I get to my feet.
I look to her for a sign. She nods and I let her aunt in before she fulfills her latest threat to call Vanna’s daddy and knock down the door.
Vanna is glued to my side, arms wrapped around my middle when her aunt looks between us, mouth open, her drinking lacing over her spicy perfume.
“Vanna Kendall Sterling, have you lost your ever loving mind?” she points a finger at me then. “And you! Get the heck out of my house this instant before I get around to calling the police!”
“And you have a right to call yourself her aunt?” My voice is cold, and my glare has to match because she withers. I see River hovering in the hall, caught up by a younger female who’s failing in getting him to…sniff her finger?
It’s a crazy house, and I’m done playing polite and nice for our company.
“Took the words right out of my mouth, though,” dropping a hand over Vanna’s shoulder, I move us forward. “Let’s go.”
I repeat as much to River when I reach him.
Aunt Tilda is scurrying out of our way down the hall, knocking what I’m suspecting is Vanna’s bridal tiara askew in her rush, her sleeping infant daughter unaware of the madness around her – the madness I’d be carrying Vanna from even if she wasn’t coming with me on her own free will.
“I’ve already called your father,” she hollers at us to the quiet rapture of her guests. “He’s on his way, Vanna, and so is that husband of yours.”
“He’s can’t be her husband as she’s not married to him,” I correct. She’s seriously pushing my nerves in more ways than one. The idea that the bastard allowing Vanna to marry him without caring for her feelings, caring whether she loved him, is on his way to try to rob my girl from me twice boils my blood.
A part of me wants to linger and see if her aunt is telling the truth, meet this bastard and Vanna’s father face-to-face just to knock them onto their punk asses and whoop them.
Tabby, no longer asleep from all the hooting and hollering, is crying down the house from the master. Now we know where she inherited her lungs from; finished her yelling, and realizing she isn’t going to sway Vanna or stop me from walking out her front door, she picks up a bottle and throws it at us.
I pull Vanna out of the trajectory and turn to glimpse River ducking to save his own head…and by a couple inches. The bottle sails and smashes onto the carpet stretching into the hall.
“Fucking nut,” I hiss and she’s cussing me out. Vanna, who I’ve learned has no ear for cursing, winces at her aunt’s language.
“Aunt Tilda,” she starts and stops at my squeezing hand over her shoulder. I shake my head; better she save her breath at this point, she’s not going to get through the drunken haze adding to her aunt’s behavior.
Coming up my rear after dodging Bottle Number Two, River nods. “Not sure about you, but it looks like we’re outstaying our welcome.”
“You think,” I snap, just about ready to restrain Vanna’s crazy-ass aunt.
On second thought, I don’t think I had the patience to co-exist with Aunt Tilda for any longer than necessary, and certainly not long enough to wait for Vanna’s dumbass father, her dipshit of a fiancé and whoever else tagged along, maybe from the groom party, to catch up for a fight.
We stop only to find our shoes; Vanna takes a little longer to rummage her kitten heels from the pile of ladies’ footwear presumably from the other guests although I wouldn’t pass up Aunt Tilda being a serious shopaholic.
Despite being drunk as a skunk, she’s managing perfectly fine following us to the door in those platforms of hers. “Vanna, if you leave you’re dead to me, your parents and everyone you know.”
Such a heartwarming send-off; I’m tempted to shout back something snide like ‘what family’ or something equally smart-mouthed; I’m also worried Vanna will stop and hesitate, allow herself to be brought back into the fold rather than risk censure for chasing after her own heart’s desire.
My concern is unfounded.
Whatever transpired in the room – and I’m not talking the sexual pent-up stuff, Vanna and I connected and we made a discovery of our mutual love. Or would that be re-discovery.
“Good riddance.” I mumble, securing Vanna in the passenger.
Giving up his seat for my girl, River leans in from the back, his jacket on once more. “She did say the dad was on his way, right?”
“Yeah,” I start the car and back out from the pickup parked in front of me. “It’s our cue to exit.” I look to Vanna and she nods, decisiveness never looking sexier on a woman.
Not any woman, too.
My woman.
15
“This is where I split.”
“You’re heading out.”
River stretches and takes towards the door. Vanna stands with us, looking a little shook from our adventure. We’ve settled in from the drive from Rosebay and into a hotel for the night.
It’s not quite nine, but I’d have liked River to stay. I offered him a room on my expense, it’s the least I could do for bringing him out and his help so far, but he shakes his head like he did the other three times I’d asked earlier.
“Iris is going to kill me.”
“No, she isn’t. I told her everything. At least, everything I knew at the party.” He shrugged at my confused look. “I said I’d entertain the ladies, but I made sure to reply to my fiancée and let her know exactly where I was, with whom, and why.”
“Honest sonvabitch.”
“Amos,” Vanna’s scolding earns the opposite from me; I’m grinning because my girl’s by my side again, and we’re acting like normal.
“Anyways, I’m not wearing this suit for fun.” He tugs the sleeves of his dress coat. “And since I didn’t bring a change of clothes, I’d like out of it ASAP.”
That’s right. I’d been gunning to get to Rosebay that when we met up in Charleston for a quick game plan and River switched cars for my rental, I never got around to asking what the polished look was for. “Why are you wearing the suit?”
“I just got out of a school play.”
“Rochelle?”
River smiles the smile of a proud dad. “Yeah. She’s finally getting her act together. It’s good to see her laughing and happy and getting involved again. She used to love this stuff, y’know.” He scratches his shaved jaw, reminding me of my beard.
I am happy for him. From what I know, River went through an emotional and financial ringer when divorcing his first wife, and his now teenage daughter,
Rochelle, pulled away from him, mixing with the wrong crowd, a messed up boyfriend and, like most teens crying out for attention, making all sorts of trouble for her parents, school staff and most authorities.
Recently River had Rochelle move in with him and that’s surprisingly worked out for them. I knew bits and pieces from Iris, and even though the whole picture is elusive to me, I still wished the best for him and for my baby sister.
I make a mental note to call her once I get Vanna back to our place in Atlanta – if she’ll have it and me.
Maybe it’s a good thing River is leaving. In light of realizing she loved me too, I’m not stupidly ignoring the fact that we still have a lot to discuss.