by Nalini Singh
The only reason she’d pulled them on today was so she wouldn’t be naked while she stared at her wardrobe and tried not to throw up in panic. And now the woman she desperately wanted to impress was walking toward her. Diane Bellamy was as elegantly dressed as always, her black hair in a neat bob and her face made up with exquisite perfection, her flawless skin a sunkissed brown.
“My dear Sarah.” The older woman drew her into an embrace scented with White Diamonds before Sarah could snap out of her frozen state. “It’s so good to see you.”
The words, the tone, they got through the ice. Trembling, she slid her own arms hesitantly around the petite form of Abe’s mom; she couldn’t speak, entirely too choked up. Abe’s eyes met hers over his mom’s shoulder, and in them was an intensity of emotion that stripped her raw.
Pulling back from the embrace when Diane Bellamy released her with a kiss on her cheek, Sarah made a gesture to welcome the other woman inside. She was bewildered by the warmth of Diane’s greeting, only found her words after swallowing hard twice. “I’m so sorry. I’m not dressed for g—”
Her former mother-in-law took her hand with a deep smile, squeezed. “I know what it’s like when guests barge in unexpectedly. Let’s go in so you can dress. Abe can take your adorable dog for a walk.”
“I guess I have my orders,” Abe said with a wry smile before whistling for Flossie. “Time for a walk, Floss.”
Sarah’s pet, ecstatic about an outing, ran off to get her leash, then joined Abe. That quickly, Sarah was alone with Mrs. Bellamy. “You like tea,” she said, remembering her manners. “Come in, let me make you a cup.”
She managed to do that without dropping anything or making a mess, and once Diane Bellamy had her cup in hand, the older woman urged her to head on up to dress. “I hate feeling unprepared myself,” she confided. “Abe’s father could never understand why I had to put on makeup to go to the corner store, but it just made me feel more confident.”
Climbing the stairs beside the other woman, Sarah felt a fragile hope. “Especially with people taking photos,” she said softly. “At least if I’m dressed nicely they have to work much harder to take ones that are unflattering.”
“I worry about you and Abe living in the spotlight,” Diane said with a frown. “You do what you need to do to handle it.” The tenured law professor took a seat on the small vanity stool Sarah had in her room, then nodded at the wide-open wardrobe. “You always look stunning in color.”
Taking the hint and happy to have some direction on a day when she felt as if the ground had fallen out from under her feet, Sarah pulled out several dresses in bold colors. “This one’s my favorite,” she said, holding up a dress that was pure sunset. Not orange or red or yellow but a stunning color that was a blend of all three.
Despite the vivid shade, the dress itself was light and summery with a high neckline. The dress hugged her body to the hips before opening out just slightly into a bias cut skirt. “I don’t really look good in A-line dresses that have a flowy skirt, but this gives me that feeling while suiting my body.”
Stop babbling, Sarah, ordered the small part of her brain that wasn’t completely thrown by having her ex-mother-in-law sitting in her bedroom.
“It’s a wonderful choice.” A twinkle in her eye, Diane added, “And my dear, if I had a figure like yours, I wouldn’t care about full-skirted dresses. I’d be buying up as many slinky, body-hugging things as I could!”
Sarah was surprised into a snorting laugh.
Horrified, she clapped her hand over her mouth, but instead of frowning at the unladylike sound, Diane threw back her head and laughed until Sarah was cracking up again.
Ducking into her large attached bathroom after she’d finally caught her breath, the right bra for the dress in hand, she left the door partially open so she could talk to Diane while she dressed. The distance made it easier to say, “Abe told you?” She had to know if her former mother-in-law had all the facts.
“About the baby?” Pure joy in those words. “I’m so happy for you both. And for myself. I’m already planning how I’ll spoil my first grandbaby.”
Knees a bit shaky, Sarah leaned against the wall to catch her breath. She wanted to say so many things, admit her fears, but the words wouldn’t come. So she finished putting on the dress before walking out into the bedroom.
“You’re lovely.” Getting up with that sweet comment, Diane put her cup on a bedside table, then took a seat on the bed so Sarah could sit at the vanity to do her makeup.
Sarah’s hands threatened to shake as she picked up her compact.
“Losing a child is difficult.”
The quiet words had Sarah forgetting all about the makeup. Dropping the compact, she turned to face the other woman’s eyes, eyes that held an old, deep sadness. “Yes.” It came out raw, torn out of her.
Abe’s mother just held out her arms.
Sarah went into them in a jerk of emotion, let herself be held in a soft maternal embrace by a woman who understood the loss of her baby as even Abe couldn’t. She and Diane didn’t speak, just held each other.
LATER, AFTER SARAH HAD WASHED OFF HER FACE and hidden the ravages of tears with makeup, she glanced at her hair and sighed. If she tried to fully dry and straighten it now, they’d miss their dinner reservation. So she got out the curly-hair goop she kept on hand for emergencies and worked it into her wildly kinky hair so that at least it wouldn’t go fuzzy.
That done, she picked up her treasured pearl necklace from the special velvet-lined box where she always kept it… and saw Diane dab away another tear of her own.
It made her smile, hope a bright flame in her heart now.
Necklace on, she found her shoes, her purse. “Thank you,” she said as the two of them prepared to go downstairs, Abe and Flossie having returned ten minutes earlier.
Diane turned to tuck Sarah’s hair behind her ear, cup her cheek, her next words intense with emotion. “I’m here for you, Sarah. Anytime you want to talk about the baby, ask my advice, anything at all. Even if it’s Abe you’re angry with, don’t feel you can’t come to me and talk.” Dark shadows in her eyes. “And call me Mom, okay? I so terribly miss having a daughter.”
Sarah nodded jerkily, swallowed back the surge of emotion inside her, and—after a quick hug—they both headed down the stairs. The big man who waited at the foot of those stairs looked at Sarah in a way that tangled her up until she could hardly breathe.
Flushing, she stopped so that they were eye-to-eye. “What?”
He ran his fingers through her curls. “You.” A quiet murmur, his touch a possessive promise. “I’m not letting you go ever again.”
Sarah sucked in a breath, the flame of hope white-hot.
PART FOUR
CHAPTER 29
SAFELY PAST THE TWELVE-WEEK mark in her pregnancy with no signs of complications, not even any morning sickness, the baby still safe inside her, Sarah couldn’t imagine being happier. Her and Abe’s relationship made her heart hurt in the best way, Diane had become a cherished maternal figure in her life, she had a beautiful circle of friends, and her business was growing in exactly the way she wanted.
She felt like she was walking on air.
Then Abe asked her if they could tell his bandmates about the baby. Because, somewhat shockingly, she and Abe had managed to fly under the radar with the media—at least on that point. Handlebar-mustachioed Basil had gotten a payday with his reunion story, but sadly for him, it hadn’t been a big one because of a political sex scandal that had broken the same day.
That scandal had very quickly buried the news of Abe and Sarah’s reunion, and they’d done nothing to reignite that interest. Sarah had known they couldn’t keep the news of the pregnancy quiet forever, but she still wasn’t ready for Abe’s request—though, of course, he was right: it was time.
Especially since she’d already told Lola—the other woman knew Sarah well enough to have picked up the delicate changes in her face and body. A week earlier, she
’d asked point-blank if Sarah was “cooking up a tiny human-shaped bun in a certain oven.” It had made Sarah laugh, admit to it.
“Yes,” she said to Abe now. “I want Molly, Kit, and Thea to know too.”
A day after that conversation, however, she fidgeted in the passenger seat of Abe’s SUV.
Abe closed his hand over her thigh, bared because she wore shorts paired with a floaty top. “Hey, you good?”
“No,” she admitted, folding her arms and slumping into the seat. “I should’ve let you announce the pregnancy without me.”
“Sarah.” Abe ran his thumb over her skin. “It’ll be easy—we can tell everyone at once at this ‘pool-warming’ of Noah and Kit’s.”
Sarah nodded. “I know.” The other couple was excited about their new pool, had invited everyone over for an inaugural swim. “Are you sure they won’t mind me being there?”
“Sweetheart, quite aside from the fact you’re friends with the women, the guys all know we’re together, even if we haven’t done a couple thing with them yet—they’ve just been giving us space by not prying.”
Abe ran his knuckles over her cheek. “Only reason you didn’t get a separate invite is because they expect us to turn up together. I think they figure we must be ready to admit our relationship by now.” A grin. “I mean, they only have so much patience—except for Thea the whole lot of them have been pretending not to have seen that photograph of our kiss for months.”
That made sense. Of course it made sense. Especially since Kit had chatted to Sarah about the pool just the other day, her words holding an expectation that Sarah would be there this weekend to see it. “I’m crazy,” she announced.
“You’re just nervous.” Pulling the SUV to a stop on the side of the quiet Pacific Palisades road, Abe turned to face her, closing his hand over her nape. “So am I.” He grinned. “Shit, I’m going to be a dad.”
Sarah released a breath she hadn’t been aware of holding. All she had to remember was that they were in this together, a unit. She wasn’t alone. “Should we plan how to tell them?”
“We’ll figure it out as we go.” Moving without warning, he kissed her with a scorching heat that made her moan in the back of her throat as her legs pressed together. Abe put his free hand on her thigh in response, sliding it high enough that she had to nudge him off before things went past the point of no return. “You are not making me naked on a public road, Abe Bellamy.”
A wicked smile, then one more kiss that melted her bones before Abe settled back into the driver’s seat. They didn’t speak again until he stopped at the gate to Noah and Kit’s large property, but he kept his hand on her thigh anytime he didn’t need it to drive. It felt great. Wonderful. The stubbornly romantic girl in her loved it.
“Kit gave me a remote for the gate,” Abe told her. “It’s in the glove compartment.”
Locating it, Sarah pushed the button to open the gate. She made sure to close it behind them afterward, conscious Kit had once had a dangerous stalker. Even though that stalker was now locked up in a psychiatric facility, Kit was a well-known actress and Noah a rock star. Fans who wouldn’t normally intrude might forget themselves if given such a wide-open opportunity.
“What in the name of all that is holy is that?”
Glancing forward at Abe’s exclamation, Sarah felt her eyes widen. A hot pink Ferrari sat next to the crouching red beast of Fox’s Lamborghini. When Abe came around to open her door—she’d kind of gotten used to that, liked him to do it—she let him help her out, then went over to examine the car while he let Flossie out from the back.
Her pet barked excitedly at this new place before running over to lean her warm body against Sarah’s leg while she peered inside the astonishing car that was causing Abe to mutter epithets under his breath.
“I think I see diamantés,” she told him, nose pressed to the glass of the window. “And wow, there might be pink fur on the foot pedals.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake.”
Rising to her full height, she turned toward Abe. Giggles threatened. “You look like you’re about to cry.”
“I am. Who the hell would do that to a beauty of a machine?” Shuddering, he threw an arm around her shoulders, drawing her snug against his muscled heat. “Come on, I can’t look anymore. Look at Flossie—she can’t believe it either.”
She laughed softly as he led her toward the sounds of splashing and conversation, was still smiling when he opened the gate to the pool area and said, “Who the hell brought the pink horror?”
They walked into laughter and play and friendship.
Flossie was in heaven, racing around the pool and barking hello at everyone.
In the chaos, Sarah heard several shouted, “Hellos” including “Hey, Sarah!” and suddenly she felt silly for being nervous. These were all their friends.
“Your pool is amazing,” she said to Kit when Noah and Kit surfaced after a dive.
Pushing her hair off her face as she treaded water by the side of the pool, Kit met Sarah’s eyes with the sparkling amber of her own. “Did you see the waterfalls?” She was positively bubbling. “Noah got those for me.”
“I had to basically steal a builder,” Schoolboy Choir’s guitarist said from beside Kit, the golden skin of his shoulders beaded with water. “He was working for Beau Flavell at the time—I spun Beau a line about true love and winning my girl and he fell for the romantic bullshit.” Though Noah’s words were offhand, the way he looked at Kit was anything but.
It was clear the bad boy of rock and roll was permanently off the market.
“Ignore him, Sarah,” Kit said. “He secretly wanted the waterfalls too.” Laughing when Noah threatened to push her under the water, she said, “Come join us. The water’s glorious.”
Sarah hesitated. She wasn’t really showing yet, but…
Sliding his arms around her from behind, Abe said, “Listen up! We have an announcement!”
Everyone waded closer. As if sensing this was important, Flossie padded back to stand beside Sarah. Her heart began to pound with all those eyes on her, her breath coming faster… until Thea’s voice cut through the air. “Is this like a reality-show pause? Dum, dum, dra-ma.”
Laughter filled the air, their friends yelling at them to hurry it up.
“I’m pregnant,” Sarah blurted out before Abe could say anything.
Surprise on more than one face, but it wasn’t the bad kind of surprise. It was the suspiciously gleeful kind. Whistles and congratulations filled the air the next second, the two of them bombarded with handshakes and wet hugs that had her beaming as Abe’s grin threatened to crack his face.
It was about five minutes later that Sarah finally had a chance to go behind the privacy screens of the newly built pool cabana and change into her deep green tankini with its fun white-on-green polka-dotted bottoms. The tankini style was her number one swimsuit of choice—she just felt prettier in it, and she liked being able to swap the tops and bottoms around to make fun combinations.
Abe whistled from where he’d already changed into his boxer-brief-style swimming trunks. “Sexy doesn’t do you justice,” he said, so much appreciation in the eyes that shaped her body that she might’ve lost her breath there for a second or two. “You still have that red bikini?” Abe asked. “The one that was all teeny tiny triangles and string?”
Sarah blushed; she’d bought that scandalous bikini for their honeymoon but hadn’t had the nerve to wear it on the white sand beaches of the tiny Fijian island where they’d spent a week. Instead, she’d only ever worn it beside their pool at home when it was just her and Abe. “No.” She paused. “I didn’t take it when I left. What did you do with my clothes?”
Scowling, Abe said, “First, I went in your wardrobe and sniffed your clothes like a pathetic fool.”
Sarah almost melted where she stood at this further evidence that he’d missed her, really missed her. “Then you threw them in the pool?” she guessed, remembering his fury during their divorce.
“Something like that.” A shamefaced shrug. “I was an asshole.”
“Don’t feel bad.” She patted his cheek. “If I’d had access to your clothing, I’d probably have taken scissors to it. Especially your favorite suits that you got on Savile Row.”
Horror on his face. “You have a mean streak.”
Winking, she sauntered out, well aware he was watching her ass. It made her grin deepen. Once outside the cabana, she dropped her hat on a lounger, then slipped into the crystalline blue waters of the pool to swim lazily out and join Molly.
The glee hadn’t quite faded from the other woman’s features.
“How long have you known?” Sarah asked. “About how serious Abe and I had become?”
“Well”—Molly smiled that wide open smile of hers—“I kind of figured out he had it bad when he kept messaging to ask how you were after Zenith.”
Sarah had seen one of those messages, hadn’t quite known how to handle Abe’s obvious concern when she’d convinced herself he didn’t care about her. “That was a while ago.”
“Yes, but then he started missing dinners with the rest of us and being unavailable when he usually wouldn’t be…” An affectionate shoulder nudge. “It wasn’t hard to connect the dots. Especially after David flat-out asked him.”
“Oh.” Sarah looked over to find Schoolboy Choir’s drummer sitting on the edge of the pool with Abe, both their legs in the water. David was having a beer while Abe was sticking to a nonalcoholic version Noah had stocked for him. The two appeared to be chilling, talking about nothing in particular. “Abe said he’d spoken to David, but I wasn’t sure how seriously anyone was taking it.”
“Are you kidding?” Molly shook her head. “After seeing you two at Zenith, we all knew it was dead serious.” The other woman danced in the water. “I’m so happy for you both. An adorable little Abra baby! I’m going to buy tons of tiny New Zealand branded infant clothes. So many that your baby’s going to grow up thinking he or she is a Kiwi!”