by Lily Cahill
Emma held her hand back out to Ava's forehead. "It's the seventh. Maybe you are feverish."
"The seventh?" Ava's brow crinkled. And then her eyes popped open, and she bolted upright in bed, flinging off the sheets. She grabbed her day planner and furiously flipped through the pages.
There was a little red star on the sixth of this month, Ava's special mark to herself showing when she was supposed to start her period. Maybe she'd counted wrong from her last one. She went back and started counting the days.
"What's wrong?" Emma asked, but Ava was too immersed in what she was doing to respond.
Twenty-eight. She counted again. Twenty-eight. Ava was never late. She put her hands on her head and closed her eyes. She couldn't be. She pulled a fistful of hair tighter, letting the pain radiate through her scalp. She could be. She hadn't taken her birth control with her on her hike, and she'd assumed that it would take a while to get out of her system, but apparently not. Apparently birth control left your system faster than a hangover.
Emma bent down next to Ava and tried to see what Ava was all worked up about. She flipped through the pages and saw the star with no slash through it.
"It's a sign," Ava said.
#
"Maybe you're just late," Emma tried.
"I'm never late."
"I'll run to the store and be right back. We can find out right now."
"I'm going with you. I can't just sit here and think about it."
Emma drove them to the convenience store. They rode in silence, with Ava's hand tucked into Emma's the whole way.
They found the pregnancy tests and Ava pulled one off the shelf without looking at brand or price. The first stick she saw, she took, making a beeline for the bathroom, opening the box and pulling out the test along the way.
"Ava!"
Ava threw the box and her wallet back to Emma. "Go pay for it."
When Emma rapped on the bathroom door, Ava let her in. She was staring at the strip in the sink. The sisters held hands, staring at the stick and waiting.
A light pink line made its way into the viewer, a little blurry at first, but unmistakable. Ava was pregnant.
Chapter Thirteen
Liam
Liam looked at the little house in Larchmont and immediately felt Ava'a presence there. Even if they barely knew each other, this place just seemed like her. In the front of the house tulips were blooming in a flower bed, a tin bee flying overtop. The perfect garden decoration. Her front door was ruby red, and the shutters matched. There was a porch swing that hung lopsided, angling down so that whoever sat on it would always be pulled to one side.
He rapped on the old-fashioned door knocker. Ava answered the door, though apparently without checking the peep hole. When she saw Liam at her front door, she froze. The color drained from her face, her creamy skin turning a ghostly white.
"Hi." Liam shoved his hands deep in his pockets. He'd been so torn up about whether or not to come here and so obsessed with how much he missed Ava, how much he couldn't stop thinking about her, that he hadn't considered what to say or if she would even want to be with him. They were fated, he knew that, but she didn't. What if she hadn't given him a passing thought since he'd dropped her off in town.
"Hi." A strand of blond hair had fallen in front of her face, but she didn't move to tuck it back. She didn't move at all--her body stock still blocking the way in.
"Can I come in?"
Ava looked down at her feet, scuffing the floor with the toe of her sneaker.
"I'm not so sure that's a good idea."
"Can I take you out for coffee?"
Ava still wasn't looking at him.
"I have to be at my lab soon." Her voice trailed off, the excuse falling to the wind.
He wanted to reach out and pull her into him, kiss her and make love to her and remind her of the magical time they'd shared in the woods. He wanted to push his body against hers. He wanted to taste her. He wanted to make her his.
He tilted her chin up to look at him. Her skin was soft and her eyes lifted to his, half lidded and expectant.
"I'm sorry I just showed up here. I know how creepy this must seem. I didn't even know your last name, Ava Taylor. I had to look up your program on NYU's website and then I found your address." He was trying to explain, but the more he said, the worse it sounded. "This isn't coming out right."
The distance between them was making him dizzy. Being without Ava had been like holding his breath underwater for too long, and now that he was at the surface, taking her in, he couldn't get enough of her. And he wouldn't be able to think straight until he'd had his fill of her.
He reached out for Ava. If he could just show her, somehow. She stepped back, avoiding his touch--her body still blocking the entrance to the house.
"Liam," she said his name like an apology. "I like you." I love you, he thought to himself, the platonic like jarring in his ears. "But," her voice trailed off again.
"But what?" He was leaning toward her now. She was so much shorter than he was, and he felt his body curling to hers.
"But I think what happened in the woods should stay in the woods."
She looked up at him then, full in the eye for the first time since he'd arrived. Her blue eyes piercing and clear. He straightened his back and took a step back, realizing how much he'd been crowding her.
"I don't," he said simply. Ava was wrong about this. She was made for him. He wasn't going to just let her tell him no and walk away from his one true mate forever.
"Well, I'm sorry, but you're not the only one that gets to choose. I don't think we're good for each other." She raised her voice.
"How can I get you to change your mind?" Liam reached one arm out to the door frame and leaned back in toward her. She sucked in a sharp breath, but didn't step back this time.
"You can't." Her voice was stern and she still hadn't blinked her eyes. "Just the fact that I'm attracted to you means you're a bad idea."
"So you admit you're attracted to me."
"Yes, but that's besides the point."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"Let's just say, I don't have the best track record."
"What if I could prove that we have something here."
She shook her head no, biting her lower lip in that way that was so incredibly delicious.
"Liam, don't." Her eyes were pleading. If she'd asked him for anything else in that moment he would have said yes. But leaving her alone was the one thing he couldn't do.
He could smell her hair from here, the fresh laundry scent that he wanted to wrap himself in. She was so close to him. She was still looking up at him, her chin jutted out, keeping eye contact.
All he had to do was lean down a bit further and he could kiss her.
He folded into her, and she let him kiss her. Her smooth lips slid against his, and he let his tongue melt into her mouth. The kiss was soft and wet, their lips barely moving. Liam wrapped his arm around Ava and deepened the kiss. She kissed him hungrily, and he felt her hand move up to his chest, warm, even though his clothes. But then she pushed him back through the door frame and closed it suddenly, leaving Liam standing alone on the porch.
"I'm not going anywhere," he called through the closed door. That kiss was proof that he wasn't crazy. Even if she didn't know they were fated, she felt something. She wanted him. He would have to find a way to get her to change her mind.
Chapter Fourteen
Ava
Ava touched her lips as she peered out the window, waiting for Liam to leave, but he wouldn't budge. He just sat there as she kept peeking through her curtains and checking her watch. She was supposed to meet Emma at the book store in fifteen minutes. If he didn't leave soon she wasn't going to make it. She definitely wasn't prepared for another confrontation with him. How long was she going to have to stay locked in her house? The bag she'd packed to go find him was still sitting on her bedroom floor, and she kicked it. Her toe made contact with her hard plastic water bot
tle and she yelped out in pain, hopping on one foot and back over to her window, where she saw Liam climbing into his rental car and finally driving away.
She let out a long breath and grabbed her purse and keys, bolting out the door just in case he came back.
#
"He just showed up at your house?" Emma asked as they walked slowly down the aisle, looking over parenting books.
"Yes. He showed up, just like I was planning on doing. And it took every bit of strength for me to tell him no."
"Would it be the worst thing in the world to give him a chance?"
Ava's stomach twisted thinking of Liam standing on her step. He was even sexier than she'd remembered, towering over her and asking her to let him change her mind. "You think I should give him a chance? You're the one that's always telling me to look for stability and to stop trying to fix everyone."
"It's hard to see you go through that," Emma said. "You're always so devastated when the relationships end. When you and Josh broke up, you were a mess. You know I just want the best thing for you."
"That's just it. It's not just me anymore. I have this little pea to think about." Ava rubbed her hand over her tummy. She was too early on to have a bump, but she still felt a connection to the life growing inside of her. "I can put myself through that, but I don't want to put a child through it. I waited years for Josh to kick his drinking problem. I gave him everything. All the support and encouragement. I gave him years of my life because I believed in him. All that potential, washed away with alcohol." She was feeling worked up just thinking about it. Josh was brilliant and frustrating and a hopeless drunk. She knew that now, now that he was the distant past, but it had taken her a long time to give up her last bit of hope. "I might be willing to wait around for someone to change, but I don't want to make that decision for a helpless baby." She clenched her teeth and swallowed down her regret.
"Yeah, but it's his little pea, too, right? Don't you think he'd want to know?"
"No." Ava slammed down a book. It smacked against the shelf and turned heads their way. Ava lowered her voice. "Once he knows, there's no going back. I would have to be willing to make parenting decisions together. He could be a part of our lives forever, and I barely know him. I can't." She shook her head, strengthening her resolve. "No. I won't take that chance."
Emma rubbed Ava's back.
"Do you think I'm doing the right thing?" Ava had thought her sister would be on her side. It's what Emma herself would have done, wasn't it?
Emma nodded and pulled Ava into a hug. Ava let herself slump into her sister and realized that she'd been tense since the minute Liam showed up. Relaxing her body like this, all her anger and frustration melted away and was replaced by sadness. She sobbed into Emma's shirt, letting out all the emotions she'd been trying to pretend weren't there.
When she pulled away, Emma's shirt was darkened from her tears. Ava wiped the back of her nose with her hand and Emma pulled a napkin out of her purse, offering it over with her lower lip pouted out and her head titled.
"Sorry. Pregnancy hormones." Ava cracked a smile and tried to muster a laugh to combat the tears.
#
As much as Ava desperately wanted to avoid Liam, it was impossible. He was always at her house. He said he wasn't going away, and apparently he'd meant it. Things around her home that had been broken or were in bad shape for years were suddenly getting fixed. A broken gutter had been dripping rain to the right of her front door for at least a year, but now the gutter was flush and sealed, no longer dripping. The rotted board underneath it had been replaced, too. Her flower beds, which were scant with a tulip here and there, planted by the previous owner, were robust with color--daffodils and dahlias mixing in with the tulips filling out the beds.
She held her back high and took a deep breath before forging up the path to her house, clutching her purse under her arm. Liam was there, fixing her porch swing so that it hung level. He was wearing a T-shirt that strained over his biceps, looking like the fabric might rip as his arms flexed. He had a power drill and was unscrewing a bolt. His forearm with the tattoo flexed, and she remembered their savage love making.
She'd been ignoring him while all these improvements were going on, hoping he would go away if she just didn't encourage him, but this was just too much. How long was he going to hang around here, upgrading her house? And where was he getting all these tools?
"Liam."
He had the entire porch swing dismantled now, sitting on the wooden boards of the deck as he fixed the post it all screwed into.
"You have to stop doing stuff around here. I'm not going to change my mind."
"So you want me to leave?"
"Yes," Ava said, jutting her neck out.
"Just leave the porch swing dismantled and walk away?"
Ava looked at the porch swing. There was no way she could lift that thing on her own. But fuck it. She'd figure it out.
"Yes," she said again.
Liam's mouth ticked up in a half-smile. She'd hesitated too long before answering.
"If I just leave this here and walk away, is that going to prove to you somehow that I'm exactly what you think I am?" He stepped closer to her. She backed away, her feet stuttering over the movement. She knew from the last time that she wouldn't have any self control if he started kissing her.
"No," she lied. "It will prove that you respect my wishes, and I'll remember you fondly."
"What if I don't want to be a memory." He moved toward her again. Her body reacted to his proximity. She sucked in a breath and she felt her cheeks flush.
"We've been though this before." She barely got the sentence out. Her mind was clouded over with images of him pulling her into him, of her jumping into his arms and wrapping her legs around his waist, of them clambering through her house and to her bed.
"Give me a chance, Ava."
She felt her back bump into the porch railing. She had nowhere else to go, no more room to back up.
Her purse fell from her shoulder and landed on the deck with a thunk.
"Please, go." Her voice was weak, her body not wanting her to say the words. But somehow, it broke the spell. Liam, who had been sauntering toward her, trapping her like prey, blinked and looked at her like he was hearing her for the first time. His eyes were wide and his mouth was a hard line and then he bolted, flying down the front steps two at a time. Ava felt a sob in her chest as she watched his flannel shirt blur into a red streak as he sprinted out of her life.
Chapter Fifteen
Liam
Liam's body tingled, and he felt the hair on his back growing. He clenched his fists as he ran from Ava's porch and jumped into his car. He sped through the streets, taking turns too quickly and looking for any kind of coverage he could find. He was going to shift, and he couldn't do it in the middle of Ava's neighborhood. His foot was heavy as it moved from the gas to the brakes and back to the gas.
He had to find a place to shift. His hands gripped the steering wheel hard as he tried not to think. Not to let the single true sentence that was blaring through his mind take over. Ava is pregnant. When he'd approached her on her porch, she'd dropped her bag, and What to Expect When You're Expecting had fallen out of the purse.
He swerved into a parking lot when he saw trees and a sign for Larchmont Manor Park. It wasn't perfect. Far too exposed, but he was desperate. It was either this park with some trees or in his car. Fuck New York, Liam thought as he looked around to make sure no one could see him. Finally he unclenched his muscles and let his body morph into bear form. He wasn't used to suppressing the urge to shift, and when he finally let his body do what it wanted, it felt so good. His muscles expanded and he felt strength that a moment ago he didn't have. He let out a loud roar, releasing all of the air in his lungs. All his frustration and anger breathing through his mouth. He knew he shouldn't have. This wasn't the place to be wild, but he couldn't help it. He needed to feel some sort of release.
Ava was pregnant and she was keeping
it from him. Changing emotions rolled through him like a thunderstorm. He was angry at Ava for keeping this from him. Terrified about the possibility of being a father. Excited about having a little bear cub of his own. He paced around in the trees trying to figure out what to do, jumping up and clawing chunks of bark randomly off any tree that stood in his way. It was a small patch of trees that butted up against the Long Island Sound. The sun was going down now, and the night was chilly. The few people that had been on the beach when he'd arrived had gone. Liam bounded out from behind the coverage of the trees and thew himself in the water. Pacing around wasn't helping--he needed to move. He wanted to run, but seeing as that wasn't an option, swimming would have to do. He needed to exhaust himself and keep his mind from running.
He threw himself into the sound, water splashing up around him. He threw his head back, his nose in the air, and shook the water from his head. His big paws moved through the water, and he swam. He swam until his muscles burned and his body shivered from the cold, not even his fur coat able to keep him warm after twenty minutes in the water. He swam back to the beach and shifted again, laying wet and exhausted on the sand, staring up at the sky. The stars barely glimmering with the lights of the city so close. Ava is pregnant, he thought again, and it still felt like a shock to his system. They were going to have a little bear cub, and she wasn't even going to tell him about it. He didn't feel any better or less restless than he had when he'd fled her porch. Shifting didn't help him feel better, and it didn't solve anything. Ava still didn't trust him enough to let him into her life.
Liam had to gain Ava's trust. It was the only way she would let her guard down and give him a chance. He thought about rushing back to her house and confronting her, but he didn't want her to feel trapped. That was the last thing he would want, and he respected her too much to do that to her.
What could make Ava this distrustful of him? What had he done to her that would make her doubt him so deeply. He rethought of their time in the woods. The memory of Ava's naked limbs, long and inviting, sent a chill down his spine. He was a stranger living in the woods that she'd fucked relentlessly for five days and then disappeared. Was that all he was to her? A lay in the woods? And now, he felt her desire for him. It was palpable whenever they were together. But there was something else. Let's just say, I don't have the best track record. Maybe if he could prove he was different than her previous boyfriends she could learn to trust him. But there was no way she was just going to tell him what was wrong with her exes. He could barely get her to acknowledge his presence, and he'd been hanging around her house for over a week now.