Closing Costs

by Liz Crowe

  Letting his body lead he got on his knees and parted her legs, a pure shaft of lust pierced his spine, nestled in for the long haul in his cock. He ran his hands up her thighs, over the tight skin of her stomach, marveling at the way her body had shifted and changed to accommodate life. Her fingers threaded in his hair as he kissed his way up her belly, lapped at her newly reddened nipples. By the time he reached her mouth he thought he could very well come in his pants.

  "God I miss you." He said around her lips.

  "Shh, no talking," She insisted, reaching down to unzip him, wrapping her hand around his aching shaft. "More kissing."

  "Gladly," He pulled her back up, his head spinning, spine thrumming with energy.

  Mine.

  He put a hand on her stomach, loving the heat of her skin. "God, Sara," Jack groaned as she gripped his cock again, rubbed her hand across the weeping head. "Why won't you let me," She covered his mouth, shutting out words. His whole world narrowed, focusing again on his need for her. But he finished in his head: Why won't you let me be with you, all the time, take care of you every day? Why won't you let go of your infernal need to prove something by doing all of this alone?

  She whispered in his ear. "Do you know what the most comfortable position for me right now? Even just standing around?" He shook his head, ran his tongue down the line of her neck, tasting the newness of her. "Watch." She shrugged out of his arms and turned, propped her elbows on the bare kitchen counter, back arched, ass in the air.

  "Dear Lord, woman," he sighed, admiring the view. "I don't want to hurt you but…"

  "Fuck me Jack. Please. I need you." Something made him stop. Running both hands along her hips, he wrestled around and found his better self, drug it out to the light of day.

  "No. I'm not playing man-shaped dildo for you." His eyes burned at the sight of her beautiful ass. He bit down the need to slip inside her. She spread her legs wider. "I can't be your fuck buddy, baby. I won't. I'm too invested." He sighed and pulled her shorts back up, cupping the heavy swell of her stomach once, leaning onto her back. She squirmed, wiggled her ass against him. "No fair," He muttered into her hair.

  She made a whimpering noise and turned around to face him. Tears stood in her eyes. Without thinking, he reached out, wiped them away and kissed her again. She broke away. "Stop. You're right. I'm not being fair."

  He sighed, ran his fingers through his hair and willed his libido back in its cage. It went, but with a warning growl that did not bode well for his mood later.

  "So, you closed last week. You move this week, then, baby, eh?" He propped his hands on the counter behind him, opposite her, keeping his distance. She sighed and put a hand in the small of her back.

  "Yeah. What happens next, I have no idea. The whole "baby comes" part I've read about but…oh hell." She waddled out into the living room.

  "Offer is still on the table." He waited. She stuck her head back into the room.

  "No. Unless it's the offer to help me paint the baby's room."

  He shrugged. "Do you realize you've now officially refused an offer, which countless women have cast themselves into the sea over, not once but three times? And, I hate painting. Hire somebody." She stuck her tongue out at him.

  "Goes to show those women were weak. I'm stronger and can resist your charms. As for painting, it only means something if you do it yourself."

  "No, you're just the most stubborn female on the earth. I'm gonna go. I'll email you the numbers of my father's favorite painting crew."

  "Better, before I rape you." He grinned, cupped her chin in his hand.

  "Promises, promises." She sighed and leaned into his palm, making the already unbearable band around his chest tighten further.

  "You are killing me." He nibbled her neck. "Marry me Sara. Let me take care of you and the baby." He ran his hand over her belly again. "Stop fighting it, why don't you? What the hell are you trying to prove?"

  She stepped back and crossed her arms. "I don't have to prove anything Jack. Not to you. Not to anyone. Thanks for helping me and for the snack. See you tomorrow, I guess. Got an appointment in the morning. Hopefully they'll give me a get-out-jail-free card. If I sit here much longer..." He put a finger over her lips.

  "Enough of that. Do what the docs say. Promise me," he kept his voice light, but his grip on her arm tightened.

  "Whatever. I'm sick of being such a goddamned invalid."

  "Yeah so is the rest of Ann Arbor."

  "Fuck you. Go away. Leave me alone to pout and feel sorry for myself."

  He touched her nose, stuffed his hands in his pockets to keep from picking her up and dumping her in his car, the need to take care, to possess, to be hers, blinding him for a minute. He closed his eyes. When he reopened them, she had a funny look in her eyes.

  "You okay Jack?"

  "No. But that's your fault so..."

  He left, but the word "mine" beat a new pulse in his heart.

  Chapter Six

  "Sara! What are you doing here?' The sales secretary stood, alarm in her eyes. "I mean, it's good to see you…" her voice trailed off as Sara heaved her awkward bulk through the front door of the downtown office. She sighed and dropped into one of the low slung chairs, half wondering how in the hell she'd be able to stand back up, but not really caring, as long as she could sit.

  "If I stayed in that frigging oven of a condo surrounded by boxes another minute I was gonna…ouch," She put a hand on the huge swell of her stomach, pressing a heel or hand or something away from her ribs. "How in God's name does anyone think this is nice? I hate it." She shoved her hair out of her eyes.

  Several of her colleagues entered the public space at the front of her downtown real estate sales office. She tried to focus on them, but she hurt all over, including a pounding in her head that she knew damn good and well did not bode well for her blood pressure. She'd been so stir crazy at home alone she'd needed to move around, even if it meant going out into the ungodly August heat. Her phone buzzed and she dug it out, groaning at the sight of her father's number – Again.

  "Hi Dad," she shifted her feet up onto the coffee table, hoping that would help ease the tension in her ankles. Pam took a seat next to her, pointing and frowning at her swollen feet. "No, I'm, you know, taking it easy like you said."

  Her father rattled off more statistics, asked for the millionth time why she wouldn't get a paternity test now that the baby was nearly thirty seven weeks, then berated her for a while about being too stubborn. She listened, adding "uh-huh's" and "sure's" and a few "spare me's," ignoring most of it and wishing once again that he were not a retired obstetrician.

  "Dad, please just because you know what can go wrong doesn't mean..." He cut her off with more facts about her condition. Sara stopped listening. It wasn't like she hadn't lived through it – the bed rest within ten weeks for a misplaced placenta or some shit; the high-calorie diet for the next trimester thanks to all the weight she lost throwing up morning, noon and night for the first three months. Now, swelling, headaches, high-blood pressure and the usual fun of having to pee every ten minutes, which made getting any significant sleep impossible.

  "Look, Dad, the doctor said I was close enough to term that if I went into labor now… I had to get out of there, okay? I was going nuts!" She sighed. "Don't make me hang on up you again. Where's Mom? Let me talk to her."

  The minute her doctor had called her father with news of early complications, her parents had moved back to Ann Arbor, into the condo they owned over her brother Blake's brew pub downtown. They'd been doing everything in their power to make her completely insane ever since. Between her father's overt busybody meddling with her appointments, and her mother's passive-aggressive micromanaging of everything else, it was no wonder her blood pressure shot up on a regular basis.

  At her last emergency room visit she'd been proud of her doctor, standing up to the Great and Powerful Doctor Thornton, letting Sara go home after doing all the ultrasounds and testing to make sure the baby was fin
e. She'd slipped, fallen and landed hard on her ass. After getting up and recovering her dignity she'd noticed blood in her panties, so had panicked and called 911 and it was nothing. Just a late-term spotting thing, but her father had been apoplectic, again.

  "No. We've been through this. I don't want him there." She held out a hand and her friend, Val, hauled her to her feet. Her back developed a dull toothache-type sensation all of a sudden. Moving around seemed crucial. Her skin crawled with tension at the sound of her father's voice now that the conversation had taken its usual turn in the "why isn't that asshole around more" direction. Trying to explain the complexity of her relationship with Jack to her father only served to make her more exhausted.

  She waddled out of the public space and down the hall towards her old desk. The air conditioning made her shiver as she slid into a conference room chair. "No, it's not the immaculate conception. Yes, I realize the baby has a father. No, I don't know who he is. Yes, it could be Jack. Okay Dad – now will you please stop harping?" She winced, tried not to let him hear her groan while readjusting herself in the seat. Her heart pounded. "I'm gonna go. You're stressing me out. Yes, I love you too, bye."

  Dropping the phone to the table, she laid her head down, the cool surface of the granite soothing her overheated skin. After a few minutes, she figured she would survive and stood. A sudden wave of dizziness coupled with a rush of nausea forced her back. The baby rolled, hard. "Ow." She put a hand on her stomach, suddenly scared. "Hey, um, is anybody out there?" A bright white bolt of pain slammed her between the eyes. "Holy shit." Her feet went numb and the room dimmed. "Help?" She grabbed her phone, using a familiar number on reflex.

  "You okay?" Jack's deep voice rumbled through her psyche, calming her just as her heart started pounding, racing really, making her breathless. She looked down. A puddle had formed at her feet; her legs were drenched. The liquid was a deep red.

  Not good.

  "No," she whispered. "No. I'm not."

  "Where are you?"

  "Office. Ow! Shit!" A band tightened around her middle, clamping down on her lower back and abdomen with so much force it brought tears to her eyes.

  "What? Why aren't you...? Never mind. Call 911. I'm around the corner. Be right there."

  The phone slid from her hand, landing in the pool of blood on the floor. A tidal wave of pain and nausea bowled her over. She could not get a breath. Her chest ached. "I can't feel my hands." She stared at her fingers, wiggling them, amazed, in a haze of agony. "Help." She tried to stay conscious. Her last memory was of arms cradling her and the sound of a deep voice.

  "Stay with me Sara. I mean it. Somebody call a fucking ambulance already!"

  "Jack?" She whispered as the room went black.

  Craig dismounted his bike, tucked the helmet under his arm and stretched. Two late nights of studying plus three gigs that week had taken their toll. His whole body thrummed with fatigue. The sight of Sara's black BMW in the lot made him frown. She was supposed to be off her feet.

  The minute he stepped into the back office hallway, Craig sensed something wasn't right. He dropped his helmet on a desk and started to the front, ignoring the strange emptiness of a normally busy summertime real estate office. A sharp, coppery odor stung his nose, making his heart race. As he sprinted around the corner separating the conference room from the open office area, he heard it. Just a soft moan, then the slam of a door, then nothing. His ears started buzzing and his stride lengthened but the hall suddenly felt like ten miles of empty road.

  As he approached the large conference room door he stopped, hearing only the sounds of his own breathing and laughter from the storefront side of the office, but he sensed her there, somewhere.

  "Sara?" His throat closed up when the knob wouldn't cooperate but he wrestled it open. His first thought upon entering was that someone had spilled red paint all over the carpet. Once his brain fully registered the scene, he saw her, half under the table, curled in a ball and moaning. "Dear Christ, Sara." He sat down, grabbed her hand, pulled her into his lap, then watched in helpless horror as her eyes rolled back, felt her body spasm with a terrifying seizure. "Stay with me Sara. I mean it." He glanced up. Pam and Chris stood in shock, phones in hand. "Somebody call a fucking ambulance already!"

  As Sara's body calmed, he brushed her hair back, no longer caring he sat in a pool of her blood. His ears roared but he kept his voice soft. She opened her eyes, tears dripped down her cheeks.

  "Jack?"

  He smiled, kissed her nose, the cloying odor of blood and fear clogging his brain. "No honey. It's Craig. Try to relax. There are some people coming to take you to the hospital." The next minutes passed like hours. Sara faded in and out of consciousness and the ogling crowd grew larger.

  "Oh God it hurts…." Her loud moan ripped through his gut. When a hand touched his shoulder he jerked away trying to focus on her.

  "Sir, sir, please, let us handle this."

  He started, then let the paramedic pull Sara off his lap. "Are you hurt?" The woman's eyes traveled up and down him as her partner laid Sara back and started taking her vital signs. He looked down at the apparent carnage reflected on his clothes. Her blood. So much of it. He swallowed hard.

  "No, no, it's not me. I found her here like this, sat down and…." His brain focused. "Take her to U of M. I'll meet you there."

  "Okay dad, calm down. We need to get her stabilized first." The woman patted his arm. By now the entire office had collected in the hallway, staring at the bloody scene. Craig struggled to comprehend what she said to him.

  "Oh, no, I'm not," he looked up as Jack Gordon came barreling through the door separating the public from the private part of their sales office. "I mean, is she okay? She seized on me; about a minute."

  "Yeah, her blood pressure is through the roof, pulse thready. Let's get her out of here." The medics bustled around. "Excuse me sir, you need to move aside." Jack stood, staring at the room, mouth agape, eyes wild. Craig took in what the man saw: the floor darkened with Sara's blood and her back arched, feet kicking against the carpet as another seizure gripped her. He watched the man's face go utterly white. "Sir!" The medic shoved Jack out of the way and rolled the gurney in. Once she stilled, two EMTs lifted her up and hustled her out into the waiting ambulance.

  "You okay?" Craig narrowed his eyes at Jack.

  "No." The other man turned, pushed his way through the gathered crowd and ran outside. Craig grabbed his helmet and rushed out behind Jack. Following the ambulance through midday streets, taking deep breaths to calm his heart, he forced himself to focus on the traffic while long forgotten prayers raced through his brain.

  ****

  Jack watched from a safe distance as the emergency room staff did their thing, hooked Sara up to machines and tubes, spoke quickly and quietly and moved around to get her stabilized. His brain would not comprehend the scene. The sight of her body, swollen and continuing to stiffen with small seizures, made him want to punch a hole in the wall. He closed his eyes, hoping to erase some of the trauma from his memory.

  Why the fuck would she not listen to doctors? Her own father, for Christ's sake.

  When he made the extreme mistake of opening them, a drip of bright red blood splashed to the floor at her feet, making made his stomach do flips. He groaned and focused on not passing out.

  A hand dropped onto his shoulder. Craig's dark eyes met his. The man's pants and half his shirt had stiffened, dark with her blood. "We need you." Jack frowned at him.

  "I don't do blood. I can't...," but he stood.

  "She's come to, crying, won't relax. They can't get the needle in her spine...," Jack held up a hand, tried to keep the room from spinning.

  "No, I don't need to know any details." They both looked up at the sound of Dr. Matt Thornton's roar of outrage as he stomped into the curtained area.

  "What the fuck do you think you're doing? Get her upstairs. You will not operate on my daughter in this filthy ER."

  The commotion he caused ma
de Jack's hackles rise. He followed Craig across the room, listening to the man berate and brow beat every doctor and nurse in a five-mile radius. Jack settled himself at Sara's head, focusing on her eyes, brushing away the tears that streamed down her face. One of the guys moving around between her raised legs seemed to be charge. He pointed at Jack, Craig and Matt.

  "Who are all of you people? Can I get this space cleared out please? I have to perform an emergency C-section now."

  "Fuck you, I am her father, former head of obstetrics at this hospital, and I want her upstairs in an operating room." Dr. Thornton blustered.

  Jack just looked at Sara, running a hand over her hair. She locked in on him. "Listen to me Sara." He kept his voice low, adopting a tone he knew she'd recognize. "You have to relax. Roll up on your side. These guys are trying to help you." She groaned and closed her eyes.

  "I can't. Make it stop Jack. Please…oh God…" her body tensed and she grabbed his arm.

  "Sara, I mean it. Open your eyes and look at me." She did, and the pain he saw in them made his teeth ache. "Take a breath, keep your eyes on mine, and roll towards me. I won't let go of you, I promise."

  As her father and the ER doctor argued about seizure meds and placentas, Jack forced himself to stay calm, keep his eyes still and fixed on hers. She winced, then rolled. He put a hand on her belly.

  "That's it baby. Relax. Let them do what they need to do," he frowned when she flinched and cried out but kept up his stream of soothing noises. Craig nodded at him, indicating whatever needed doing had been done. She stuck out a shaking hand, touched his face. He saw her fingers come away wet.

  "All right all you lot, out of here now. This is my patient, and there are too fucking many people in my way." Jack swallowed hard, kissed her dry lips and stood.

  "No." She whispered. "Stay. Please."

  "Sara," her father's voice broke the moment. "Lie back. Let them get your baby out. He's not doing well. Do you understand sweetheart? We have about five minutes to get him out or..."