Fighting Irish

by Katy Regnery

  “True, that. I barely know her and she’s engaged,” he blurted out. “You’re exactly right. I’m stupid and she’s impossible.”

  “Ah-ha,” said June, nodding sagely before she took another sip of beer.

  “Honestly, I’m not even that interested in her.”

  June’s hand landed in his lap, her fingers on his crotch, but Rory gently pulled them away.

  “All evidence to the contrary,” said June.

  Rory held her hand, lifting it to his lips and kissing the back gently before letting go. “I shouldn’t have come over tonight, June. I’m sorry.”

  “I’m not,” she said, placing her beer on the coffee table, then taking his and doing the same. “We can still fuck. I don’t mind.”

  “You don’t mind that I’m thinking about someone else?”

  “No. Why would I mind? It might even make things hotter.” She laughed for a moment, then stopped, scanning his eyes before sobering to explain, “Whether you’re thinking about her or me, your cock’s long and thick, and when you slide into me, lover, it’s all mine. You lap up my cunt like it’s covered in honey, and you make that sexy fucking sound in the back of your throat when you come. Why would I care who you’re thinking about? You’re a damn good fuck, Rory. Our arrangement isn’t exclusive, and I’m not looking to change that. It’s perfect the way it is.”

  Except…it wasn’t. Not for Rory. Not anymore.

  Because despite the hot things she’d just said about him, there was no part of Rory that wanted to have sex with June. Have a beer? Sure. Sit and talk? Absolutely. But get naked? He couldn’t think of anything he wanted less. He didn’t want to fuck June or anyone else. The only woman he could think about was Brittany.

  “Oh, dear,” said June, leaning forward to pick up her beer. “She’s not just anyone, is she?”

  “No,” murmured Rory, hating that it was true. “She’s not just anyone.”

  “I think you’ve got it bad, lover,” said June.

  I think you’re right.

  “Well, I tell you what…why don’t we finish our drinks and call it a night? I have pictures to edit, and you, my sweet, are clearly not in the mood for fucking.”

  Rory winced, turning to June apologetically. “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be,” she said, smiling at him. “If your impossible girl stays impossible, you’ll have to let her go, won’t you? When you do, give me a call. I’ll be here.”

  June’s tone held a slight note of mockery, and Rory turned to her. “She is impossible, June. She’s getting married to someone else.”

  “I know what engaged means,” she said lightly. “It means ‘not married yet.’”

  “It means ‘not available.’”

  “Take my advice, darling: either put up your dukes or move along.” She tilted her head to the side. “Me? I’m not a fighter by nature. Never was, never will be. That’s probably why I never fell in love. Love is the biggest battle there is.”

  Rory stared at her, confused by this point of view. He’d always regarded love as something that just happened—you fell into love, right? Slipped into it. Stumbled upon it. Felt it suddenly bubble up within you, unexpectedly, and maybe unwanted. Love and fate were bound together, mysterious and inextricable.

  But June was suggesting that an engaged woman was still available—no, it wouldn’t be easy to win her—that with enough “fight,” Brittany could somehow be his? He didn’t even know where to start or how to begin. For heaven’s sake, this morning he’d convinced himself of all the reasons he and Brittany wouldn’t work.

  Besides, the fact remained that she was getting married in a few weeks.

  “How do you fight for someone who’s already been won by someone else?” he murmured, the question an extension of his swirling, confusing thoughts.

  “Oh, Rory, my sweet Boy Scout.” June hummed softly, finishing the last of her beer before meeting Rory’s eyes. “You break the rules.”

  CHAPTER 9

  The Monday after their fight, Brittany still hadn’t called Ben, nor had he reached out to her.

  At first, when her hurt and indignation were sharpest, she’d expected a grand gesture, like a bouquet of flowers with an apology or a knock on her door to reveal a complacent Ben, holding a bottle of chilled champagne and two crystal flutes.

  By three of four days after, her expectations had lessened—she hoped for a conciliatory phone call or a sweet text telling her that he missed her and wanted to work things out.

  By the end of the week, Brittany had to face the fact that she must have been in the wrong because his silence told her that no apology was forthcoming. If she wanted to get things back on track with Ben, she’d need to make the first move. She was the one who’d thrown him out, after all.

  After a week of thinking, she’d decided that she could make room for Angie in her life with Ben. As long as he prioritized her over his ex-wife, there would be room for everyone. Brittany just needed to trust Ben. He deserved that, didn’t he? He’d never given her a reason to question his commitment to her. And he was right—if he got along with Angie, it was better for everyone, especially the girls. And Brittany only wanted the very best for Ben’s daughters.

  On Tuesday morning, she called Ben’s receptionist and asked what hours he’d be working. Told that he’d be in the Mass General ER for most of the day, Brittany pulled on big-girl panties, Ben’s favorite jeans (which fit especially well, as she’d been starving herself since pasta night), and a cream cashmere sweater. Paired with pearls and metallic gold flats, she looked sophisticated but cute and felt confident as she hailed a cab in Cambridge around noon. She directed the cabbie to the hospital, hoping to talk to Ben in person during his lunch break.

  Striding through the automatic doors, she stopped at the information desk and said hello to Cecilia, the receptionist, who double-checked Ben’s schedule and confirmed that he’d be coming up for a break in about fifteen minutes. She thanked Cecilia, then headed to the elevators, pressing the button for the fourth floor, where the cafeteria was located. Choosing a small table in the sun beside the floor-to-ceiling windows, she withdrew a bud vase and a single white rose from her purse—white for surrender—then took a seat at the table, facing the cafeteria entrance, and waited for Ben to appear.

  It wasn’t long before she saw him—his blond, salt-and-pepper head inclined to the woman he was talking with as he entered the cafeteria. His eyes crinkled with humor, animated and soft, his body tilted toward her as they stood in line for trays. She was tiny and brunette, similarly dressed in light-blue scrubs and a white lab coat, and totally captivating when she flashed Ben a megawatt smile.

  Angela.

  Though they’d never met in person, Brittany had met Ben’s petite, olive-skinned, dark-haired daughters a couple of times, and they were doppelgängers of their mother.

  This must be Angie.

  Observing her nemesis from where she sat by the windows, Brittany noted that Angie was much smaller and slimmer than she, with her dark hair wound up in a chic bun. She wore dark-rimmed glasses that made her look super smart, her cheekbones were high, and her lips were red and full. She was a tiny, gorgeous, brilliant Italian American goddess-doctor, and Brittany felt useless, fat, and lumpy just looking at her.

  She dropped her eyes to her engagement ring, watching it sparkle in the sun, and took a deep breath, reminding herself that Ben wasn’t married to Angie anymore. He was, in fact, engaged to her.

  Standing, she put her Louis Vuitton bag on her arm, squared her shoulders, and approached Ben and Angie from behind, picking up snippets of their conversation as she drew closer.

  “She was always a stinker, Benji! You know that!”

  “I know, I know. But she’s almost fifteen now. I was certain she’d grow out of that.”

  “Fat chance,” said Angie, placing a hand on his arm. “She’s her father’s daughter.”

  “Maybe, Ang. But she got her mother’s looks, thank God.”

  “
Ah-hem,” said Brittany, clearing her throat. “Ben?”

  He turned around so quickly, his tray rammed into her stomach, causing a full mug of coffee to splash on her cream sweater.

  “W-What? Brittany?”

  “God!” she cried, gasping as the hot liquid burned her skin. She pulled the fabric away from her stomach, fanning it as droplets off coffee fell on her shoes, dulling the gold shimmer.

  “Aw, shit!” he exclaimed, looking at the spreading brown spot. “Are you okay? Sorry.”

  Brittany looked up and blinked at him. “I’m fine. No worries.”

  “You surprised me. W-What are you doing here?”

  The woman behind Ben in line offered Brittany a handful of napkins, and she blotted her now cooling sweater. “I um, well…that was the point. A surprise. I thought I’d surprise you for lunch.”

  “You, uh…” He looked at Angie, and Brittany followed his glance, meeting Angie’s wide brown eyes behind those fashionable glasses. “You should have texted so I knew you were coming.”

  She ignored Ben, offering Angie the hand that wasn’t covered in coffee. “Hi. You must be Angie. I’m Brittany.”

  Angie didn’t make a move to set down her tray. Nor did she smile, though she did manage a curt nod as she said, “Hi.”

  Brittany awkwardly lowered her hand. “I’ve heard a lot about you.”

  “Is that right?” asked Angie, flicking a look at Ben before sliding her eyes back to his fiancé.

  “Yes,” Brittany said, trying to keep her voice warm. “I hear you’re a wonderful mother.”

  “Hmm,” Angie hummed, blinking at Brittany, unsmiling. “Do you have any children, Bethany?”

  “It’s Brittany. And, um, no. Not yet.” As she said this, she looked up at Ben, who couldn’t possibly look more uncomfortable than he did right now.

  “Yet?” asked Angie, looking at Ben for a long moment before turning back to Brittany with a sigh. “But you want them?”

  “Of course.”

  “Are you planning to adopt?”

  “No,” said Brittany, wondering why Angie would ask such a question. Perhaps she didn’t want Ben to have more biological children to compete with hers? “My own.”

  “Well…that’ll be quite the trick,” said Angie with a grim smile. She turned to Ben. “You need to talk to her. Catch you later?”

  “Yeah,” said Ben, watching as Angie turned away from them, headed to the food station across the room.

  Brittany’s cheeks flared from the awkward meeting, but she was most bothered by Angie’s questions.

  “Ben? What was that all about?”

  “What?”

  “‘Quite the trick.’ What did she mean by that?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Ben,” she insisted, annoyed that he was still tracking Angie’s progress at the goddamned salad bar, where she was piling up on lettuce and carrots with no dressing. Brittany was getting upset, her fingers cold and shaky, like something terrible was about to happen. “Please tell me what she meant.”

  “We need to talk.” Sighing, Ben placed his tray on a counter, and took her arm. “Come with me.”

  He walked briskly to a waiting room just outside the cafeteria, pulling her inside and closing the door. Once alone, he faced her, staring down at her face.

  “It’s reversible.”

  “What is?”

  “A vasectomy.”

  A vasectomy?

  She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t breathe. It felt like her throat was closing up. Ben whacked her on the back and she suddenly inhaled, sharply, painfully.

  “Calm down, Brittany.”

  “You c-can’t—you can’t have kids?”

  He stared at her, then sighed, shaking his head.

  “W-When did you have it? The…v-vasectomy?”

  “After Sabrina was born.”

  The room was spinning like a cyclone, all of her hopes and dreams swirling into a big black funnel. She’d chosen him because he was a great dad, because he loved kids, because surely he wanted more kids, because he knew how terribly she wanted children of her own.

  “But you knew…you knew how much I…you knew I wanted…” She couldn’t form sentences, couldn’t find the words she needed in her muddled head.

  “Brittany,” he said, putting his hands on her shoulders and shaking her gently, “calm down. Just breathe.”

  She reached up for his hands, pulling them from her shoulders, then took two steps back until her thighs bumped into an aqua, vinyl-covered loveseat. Slowly, she lowered herself down, her fingers curling into the plastic on either side of her hips.

  “Why didn’t you tell me?” she whispered.

  “For one, you never asked—”

  “If you’d had a vasectomy?” she half-sobbed, half-screamed. “Ben! Why would I ask that? And why the hell would you get involved with me if you didn’t want any more kids? The night you met me, I was sobbing over the fact that my ex-husband had started a family with another woman! I didn’t have to ask. You knew!”

  “I didn’t know if I wanted more kids!” he bellowed. “I just wanted to be with you! You were fun and young…and things were so hot between us. I fell for you. You made me forget about my divorce and—and…and things just…”

  “Things just what?” she asked, her voice far away like she was having an out-of-body experience.

  “Got serious! You’d look at me with those wide eyes, wanting more, needing more, and I wanted to be there for you. I like you, Brittany. So much, and I—”

  “You like me?” she demanded, her voice breaking off at a high-pitched shriek. “I’m going to be your wife!”

  Her words seemed to reverberate off the walls like a grotesque echo: Wife. Wife. Wife. Ben didn’t say anything. Tight-lipped, his expression a mix of annoyance and contrition, he shook his head and whispered, “I don’t think so.”

  “Oh. My. God.” Her whole body slumped and hot tears pricked the back of her eyes. “Are you breaking off our engagement?”

  “You knew this was coming. You knew something was off between us.”

  It was another blow, because she knew that things weren’t perfect between them, but no, she hadn’t seen this coming. Certainly not today when she had picked up a white rose on the way to lunch.

  “Fuck you, Ben! I paid the deposit on our wedding venue five days ago! We’re getting married in six weeks!”

  “I didn’t give you that date! You forced it on me!”

  She gasped in shock. “I didn’t force you to propose six months ago.”

  He ran his hands through his hair. “But you did, babe. I knew it was what you wanted.”

  “What did you want?” she murmured.

  “Please make this easier for me,” he begged her in a gravelly voice.

  Her eyes flared with indignation and anger. “For you? Easier for you?”

  She jumped to her feet, beating at his chest with balled fists, tears streaming down her face as she sobbed that she hated him and he was a cheating asshole and why did he propose if he never loved her? If he never meant to marry her in the first place?

  Holding her wrists tightly, he looked down at her face, his own eyes watery. “I did love you. I did mean to marry you. But then…but then…”

  He looked at her helplessly, and suddenly, in a flash, she knew. She knew why she’d objected more and more to Angie—because no matter how much she wanted to deny what was wrong between her and Ben, she couldn’t fool her intuition.

  “Angie,” she sobbed. “You stopped w-wanting to be w-with me because Angie d-decided to f-forgive you.”

  Ben nodded, reaching up to brush a stray tear into his hairline. “Yeah.”

  “You still”—she gulped—“love her.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You want her back.”

  “Yeah.” He nodded, letting go of her other wrist and backing into a chair. He sat down, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees and rubbing his cheeks. “It’s what she wants too
.”

  You need to talk to her. Catch you later?

  “Oh. Oh, my God, I’m such an idiot.” Brittany sat back down on the loveseat, feeling spent and foolish. “Did you sleep with her?” When Ben didn’t answer, Brittany looked up at him. The answer was written on his face, but she needed to hear the words anyway. “Did you?”

  “Not until this week,” he said, staring down at the floor. “Not until you threw me out on Monday.”

  “Oh, wow,” she said, laughing at him bitterly through her tears. “So it’s my fault that you fucked your ex-wife while you were engaged to me?”

  His neck jerked up when she cursed because she didn’t do it all that often. He shrugged, looking miserable. “I didn’t say that.”

  “Is anything ever your fault, Ben?”

  Raising her hand from where it was fisted on the plastic upholstery, she unfurled her fingers, looking down at the diamond ring he’d given her. It didn’t sparkle in this dimly lit waiting room as it had at the table beside the windows. Her tears stopped as she slid it off her finger. She stood up, crossed the room, pulled Ben’s hand from his knee, turned it over, and placed the ring in his palm.

  He closed his fingers over the ring, looking up at her.

  “I’m sorry, Brittany. I’m really sorry.”

  And suddenly, looking down at his face, she realized something important: she wasn’t.

  Oh, she was sorry that he wasn’t the man she thought he was, and she was sorry that her plans to start a family would be delayed. She was sorry that she hadn’t seen the signs sooner, and she was sorry that she’d wasted more than a year of her life with him.

  But she wasn’t sorry to be walking away from this user, this cheater, this man who would have eventually broken her heart if she’d stayed with him.

  There was even the tiniest part of her that was grateful. Not to him, but to the fates or grace or the universe for showing her exactly who he was before it was too late.

  She lifted her chin and straightened her spine.

  “I’m not,” she said simply.

  Then she turned on her heel, put her back to Dr. Benjamin Parker, and walked away.