by Carol Rose
They’d made love three times. Hungry, satiating sex. She’d found herself crying afterwards, filled with a sense of connection she couldn’t explain.
In the weeks since, she’d craved his touch, ignoring her confusing emotions, but aching to kiss him, hold him. Needing, thirsting for physical union.
Wasn’t ovulation supposed to do that to women? She’d read a theory once that claimed the hormones connected with ovulation prompted women to want sex. A dirty trick of evolution to continue the species, some expert said.
She buried her face in her trembling hands. It couldn’t be. She couldn’t be pregnant. Despite the longing that little Amelia had triggered inside her, it wasn’t time to have a child, was surely the worst time. As much as she’d always wanted a family and children to nurture, this wasn’t the way she wanted it to happen. Children should be planned, eagerly anticipated.
Babies needed families. Loving parents like Amelia’s. People who had a chance of staying together.
With everything between she and Jared, the possibility of her actually becoming pregnant while on the pill seemed unreal. Maybe she was imagining the whole thing. Maybe she’d miscounted somehow, mixed up her pill packets. Since misplacing them on their honeymoon, she’d taken to always having two packets on hand—if only to keep herself from doing something really stupid like getting “accidentally” pregnant on purpose.
Opening her eyes as a low moan escaped her, she looked at the pregnancy test. It sat on the countertop, undeniably real.
She’d counted and recounted, checked and rechecked. She was late and she’d never been late. Certainly not this late.
Fear, dread and panic battled in her chest. This couldn’t be. She wasn’t ready for it, couldn’t do the job right. In her dreams of motherhood, she’d felt stronger, had planned all the particulars.
Except the father. That part had never been clear. If love didn’t bind a man to a woman, how could she rely on his love for their child?
Either her own father hadn’t ever loved her and Amy or had lost that emotion early in their lives.
What kind of father would Jared make?
Involuntarily, she remembered him rolling on the grass with his niece. Remembered him holding the baby at the hospital two nights ago. What would he be like with their child? Her treacherous imagination supplied an immediate answer.
Jared holding a small, pink baby, it’s face scrunched up in a squall as he rocked, his voice low and soothing.
Jared tickling tiny pink toes, blowing bubbles on a small tummy. A baby with his dark eyes, laughing with joy.
She could instantly envision him walking confidently down the street, a pink diaper bag over one arm, their infant cradled in the other. The man did everything with assurance. He’d parent no differently.
Kelsey sobbed suddenly, the sound echoing in the bathroom. A baby would tie her to him forever. He’d never be like her father, never abandon his child and its mother to the world. No matter where she went or what she did, a child would link them together irrevocably.
Leaning her head on her crossed arms, she cried heavily, impervious to the cold tile counter top beneath her arms.
She wanted to be tied to him. Wanted to secure him to her forever. That was why their lovemaking had taken on a tender, earth-shattering flavor. The realization only made her cry harder.
She loved Jared, really loved him. Those few relationships in her past that she’d thought had been based on love had felt nothing like this. Somehow, she’d always managed to keep herself a little apart, never really at risk. Always heart-whole until now.
Sobs wrenched her body as though each was torn from her. She’d never been so frightened in all her life, never felt more alone.
Nothing lasted. No one knew that better than she. Friends were more constant than lovers and even friends sometimes drifted away.
This marriage had come with an expiration date and no love at all. It was designed to fail, based only on necessity and lust. How could she have let herself fall in love with him?
Kelsey straightened, staring at her tear-ravaged reflection in bitter recognition. This was new. Never before had she felt this kind of yearning. Never had she known with certainty that she wasn’t whole without him.
All those times she’d thought she was in love, she’d just been playing a game, always keeping some part of herself back. Always planning for the day she didn’t want to come back to it. Watching out not to care too much.
But Jared had slipped under her guard. Before she’d known it, he’d captured her heart.
And he’d done it with so little intent. The man enjoyed having sex with her…and he wouldn’t mind her having a child or two for him.
He’d never claimed love, never asked for it from her.
She stood up jerkily, grabbing the pregnancy test off the counter. She couldn’t face it, couldn’t deal with this now.
Walking quickly into the kitchen, she shoved the box into the trash, making sure she covered it.
If she didn’t use the test, didn’t know for sure, maybe she could wish the situation away for another few hours, another day or so.
Dressing quickly, Kelsey refused to think about anything. Instead, she sped up her routine, hurrying to get out of the apartment. She needed the distraction of work, people around her.
She couldn’t do this, couldn’t let herself feel this horrible certainty of doom. Being pregnant now would be bad enough, but loving him--that was the kicker.
Loving Jared meant losing her heart forever. Meant slipping into a tormented world of battered emotion. The world in which her mother lived.
The last few weeks, last few days, had been heaven. Laughing and talking together. Making love till she wept in his arms. How could she survive losing him? When it all came crashing down and the divorce lawyers stepped in, what would be left of her?
Leaving the apartment, she fled to the street, rode the subway to work and forced herself to think of the job. She had to proof the art for the bank campaign. It was already overdue. There was a concept meeting at ten. Later, there was a photo shoot to be personally supervised.
Somehow, she’d make it. She had to.
But nothing seemed right. She got off the elevator and hurried to her office, waiting for the familiarity of the routine and the place to soothe her jumpy nerves.
An hour later, she still couldn’t shake the panic in her stomach. She was fine, she reminded herself over and over. Today was no different than a hundred days before.
Except that she loved Jared. Had lost her heart to him irrevocably.
Forcing herself to function, she couldn’t still her incoherent, fragmented thoughts. Couldn’t gather her distracted focus. One minute she conferred with her boss, the next she sat at her desk imagining divorce proceedings, imagined sending her child away every other weekend. Unless Jared was like her father, having no interest in his child. Perhaps she’d been wrong about that.
No. He’d be more likely to demand joint custody. Then she’d send her child away every other week.
The pencil in Kelsey’s hand snapped.
What would it be like to see Jared every week, loving him, knowing he didn’t love her? There would be other women. With a man like Jared, that was certain.
Nausea hit her like a freight train. Kelsey bolted up from her desk and ran for the restroom, barely making it in time.
Throwing up, she could only be grateful no one else was there to hear her. As she wiped her face a few minutes later with shaking hands, Kelsey bit back a sob.
She had become her mother. A woman buffeted by love. Ever hopeful, always hurt. How had she let this happen when she knew the dangers better than anyone?
How many times had she promised herself she wouldn’t end up this way?
Kelsey dried her hands and left the restroom, walking back to her office with a determined step. She had to regain her perspective, had to recover her armor.
Sitting down at her desk, she pulled a proof sheet in front
of her, knowing she couldn’t continue living with Jared. She had to get away now while there was still some possibility of recapturing her equilibrium.
Thank God, she’d kept the apartment. She’d go back to the home she’d made for herself and remind herself that she could make it on her own.
Please, please, please, don’t let me be pregnant, she prayed with silent desperation. Not because she wouldn’t love his baby, but because she couldn’t afford to love him.
If she could only get away from Jared, maybe she could heal herself.
Remembering that Jared had a five o’clock meeting that would put him home a little after six, Kelsey made a point of leaving the office early.
With blank and mechanical preciseness, she unlocked the apartment door and went to the bedroom. Packing the things she needed immediately took her less than an hour. The rest could be boxed up later.
She buzzed the doorman to help with her bags and get her a taxi.
Having deliberately left herself only a few minutes, she sat down and wrote a note.
Jared,
I spoke with Amy. She tells me she’s through with Doug. He’s a lost cause and she hates him now. I realize our agreement had a specified time, but that was more for my benefit than yours. You’ll never have trouble getting sex. Now that it doesn’t matter what Doug believes about us, we should probably end the charade.
Thanks for everything.
Kelsey
Angrily brushing back the sudden rush of tears, she left the note on a table in the foyer along with the apartment key.
It was a simple as that.
They’d married because of Amy and Doug. Now it was over.
***
Jared stared numbly at the note in his hand. He felt paralyzed with shock. What the hell was going on? He’d left her this morning with no indication of coming home to this.
She’d seemed tired, a little tense, but there had been no hint that she was thinking of…leaving him.
The panic that hit him when he read the note shifted to a deep, horrible fear. She couldn’t really mean it. He’d had a year, damn it, a year to win her love. She couldn’t change the rules now!
He crumpled the note in his hand, striding through the living area to their bedroom. Flinging open drawers and closets, he found confirmation. She’d taken some and left the rest.
Jared sank onto the bed, Kelsey’s note still clenched in his fist. He wasn’t done.
He’d find her, make her listen. Hell, if nothing else, he had a verbal contract. She, at least, had to give him the rest of the year.
He couldn’t live without her. The thought was completely unacceptable.
***
Kelsey sat cross-legged on the floor in the living room of her apartment, trying to ignore the nagging ache in her back. Wearing flannel boxers and a tee-shirt, she absently rubbed at her damp hair with a towel, feeling as wrung out as an old sponge.
Somewhere between losing her lunch at work and crying her eyes out in the shower, she’d started her period.
No baby.
No sweet-faced snuggly with his father’s eyes, and certainly no Jared, not that there’d ever been any real hope of that. No matter how she reminded herself that his interest in her had little to do with her, she still cried at the loss.
She’d said goodbye to her heart and there was no getting it back. Any sane woman would have been grateful not to be pregnant. Kelsey couldn’t work that emotion into the grief, desolation and sadness.
The whole episode had only shown her how much she needed and wanted Jared. How much she loved him, despite all her intentions.
The door buzzer sounded.
In spite of herself, she tensed. Not moving, she heard it ring again. And again.
When the rude sound came a fourth time, she got up and went to the intercom. “Yes?”
“Let me in.” Jared's voice sounded grim.
She pushed the button, knowing she should have expected him. He certainly wasn’t the type of man to let her leave without an explanation.
As she struggled to formulate the words that would send him away as simply and painlessly as possible, he knocked on the door.
Kelsey opened it, almost afraid to look at him. People said a woman looked different when she was in love. He couldn’t know, mustn’t guess. Jared played every card to get what he wanted. If getting her to have children for him was what he wanted, he was capable of using any weakness on her part to get her cooperation.
“What the hell is going on?” he said, shutting the door behind him with a snap.
She backed into the small living room, drawing in a deep breath like an actress before her big speech. “You got my note. I just don’t think we need to—“
“I could let you lie to me for five minutes,” he interrupted, “but I’m really not in the mood, so I’ll save you the trouble and tell you that I found the receipt from the pregnancy test.”
“What?” she gasped.
“On the floor in the bedroom,” he said, his expression implacable.
“I—“ She sank into a chair, not knowing what to say. Anger radiated off him in waves. Standing in front of her, his expression icy, he waited. She’d never seen him like this before.
“So you were just going to keep this little secret to yourself?” Jared demanded, fury in every rigid line of his body. “You leave me, not bothering to tell me that you’re pregnant, and go on with your life?”
“I’m not pregnant,” she said in a low voice, acutely aware of him standing in the midst of her tiny apartment, his presence as overwhelming as a black wall of smoke.
“And I’m supposed to take your word for it,” he sneered. “Obviously you bought the test for some reason. You must have suspected you were pregnant for days and never said a word to me. I come home and you’re gone.”
“I’m not pregnant,” she told him, meeting his eyes. “Really. I thought I might be, but I’m not.”
“And you left without telling me. You weren’t planning on telling me you might be pregnant.” He stood in her apartment, his face as cold as an arctic stone.
Kelsey rubbed a hand over her eyes. “I don’t know what I was planning. Yes, I left. No, I didn’t tell you I thought I might be pregnant.”
“So,” he said in an angry voice, “it’s over. Just like that?”
“Amy says she’s through with Doug,” Kelsey said, feeling herself on the verge of tears. Mired in her own pain, Amy was withdrawing into herself, not responding to Kelsey’s calls, making excuses not to get together. The estrangement ate at Kelsey. Because of her own past sins in leading Doug on, she’d become a part of her sister’s pain. “Doug’s an idiot. A fool, according to Amy, and she’s done with him.”
“How exactly is that pertinent now?” Jared’s eyes were hard.
“It’s no use,” Kelsey said jerkily, getting up and facing him. “I’ve screwed up Amy’s life and Doug’s life, and our getting married hasn’t fixed anything.”
“And that’s it? You don’t need to be married anymore, so we’re done?”
She cleared her throat, fighting the lump there, muttering. “You don’t need a wife to find a lover.”
“But I have a wife,” he reminded her nastily. “You are my wife. In the eyes of the State of New York. Before God and our assembled families. Most importantly, we had a deal.”
“Your parents will understand,” she said, wiping the back of her hand across her face. “Hell, they’re perfect. They’d love and accept you if we went on national television and told the world the truth about our marriage!”
“My family’s opinion isn’t under discussion here,” he said implacably. “We made an agreement. A year of cohabiting and everything that entails. You owe me the rest of the twelve months.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” she begged, not bothering to try and hide the trail of tears now sneaking steadily down her cheeks.
“We had a deal,” he said again, his jaw tight.
How had she ever thought hi
m tender? He was all chilly granite now, the fire of his anger kept tightly inside him. God, she loved him, Kelsey thought, a wave of it hitting her. Wanted to throw herself into his arms and tell him she’d never leave him. But she couldn’t. Couldn’t promise forever to herself, much less to him. She might as well get it over with.
“It’s not a negotiable thing, at this point,” he said. “Get your clothes and let’s go home. You made an agreement. I help you deceive your sister and Doug. You live with me and sleep with me for a year as my wife.”
“Well, I don’t particularly feel like having sex with you,” she snapped, anger springing up alongside her grief and miserable confusion. “I didn’t sell myself into prostitution.”
She saw the kindling light in his eyes and wondered for a moment if she’d gone too far.
“No,” he said with a soft note in his voice that left her more shaken than his anger before. “Not prostitution. A year of mutually pleasurable, conjugal intercourse. Now, get your damned clothes!”
“I’m not coming back!” she yelled. “You’re just being a manipulative tyrant!”
“Manipulative,” he echoed in disbelief. “What the hell are you talking about?”
“You!” she spat, her heart pounding in her chest like an animal in a trap. “You’ve been trying to talk me into getting pregnant! From the beginning, you wanted to get a child from this marriage. I’m just a means to an end and you’ve never been honest about it! I didn’t sign on for motherhood!”
“What?” he thundered, his brow darkening further.
“You tried to get me off the pill,” she panted. “Tried to get me to agree to having your child. You even told my mother we were going to have children.”
“Your mother misunderstood,” Jared snapped.
Kelsey gasped. “Don’t give me that! You as good as admitted to me that you promised her grandchildren. You asked me to have children with you! Don’t try and deny it.”
“I’m not denying it.” He stood staring at her for a moment, his eyes fathomless.
“You asked me,” she repeated, her voice shaken with everything that lie between them. She loved him. God, she loved him and she was afraid it would kill her.