by L. E. Rico
“You too, huh?”
She doesn’t open her eyes, only nods. I decide this is the moment. It’s now or never…I don’t know when I’ll have the courage to do this again.
“Jameson—” I begin.
“Scott?” she says at exactly the same moment.
Her big, beautiful, moss green eyes are open now, and they’re locked onto me like some SciFi tractor beam.
“Go ahead,” I say.
“Uhh…no… You know what? It’s not important. What were you going to say?” she insists, squashing my momentary hope at a reprieve.
This woman has no idea how beautiful she is. Or how sexy. Or how much I think about her every hour of every day. It’s this thought, more than any other, that makes me just say it with no preamble.
“Jameson…is it possible…I mean…could you maybe be…” I take a deep breath and spit out the last word as quickly as I can. “Pregnant?”
She looks at me hard and then blinks hard. Once. Her mouth opens to say something, then closes again. I was hoping she’d start to laugh—just throw her head back and tell me I’m being ridiculous—but she doesn’t. She just stares at me.
“You okay?” I ask.
“Yeah…”
“James?”
“Hmm?”
“Are you…”
“Yes.”
“Really? You’re sure?” I ask slowly.
She nods.
“I’m sure.”
My turn to stare.
“Scott?” she asks.
“Hmm?”
“Are you…are you upset?”
The question hits me. Literally slaps me so hard that my head turns a little to the side with the force of it. It’s that slap that you see in the old movies—the one where someone slaps the hysterical person to bring them back to reality. And I’ve just got my butt smacked right back down into Tuesday evening.
Before I can even think about it, I’m on my feet, pulling her up and off the couch with me, sweeping her into my arms and spinning her around until she’s laughing so hard she’s crying.
“Stop!” she cries out. “Stop or I swear I’m going to yack down the back of your shirt! Scott, stop spinning!” I stop. She smiles. “You’re…you’re happy, then?” she asks tentatively.
I smile. I nod.
“Yeah, James, I’m happy. I mean, at first I was a little—no, I was a lot—terrified. But now that I’ve had some time to let it sink in…and now that you’ve said it out loud…I—I think my heart’s going to come right out of my chest!”
“Oh no, you’re going to need that,” she informs me. “Babies need lots and lots of love…and they are not for the faint of heart, my love!” Then she stops and tilts her head, considering me for a second. “Wait, wait, wait…how did you know? I mean, I only just found out myself…”
“It was Win,” I begin quietly.
“Win? Win!” she squeaks, not quietly. “What does Win have to do with it? You know what, put me down now, please,” she demands, and I comply.
“It was the cookies,” I try to explain quickly, before she can be angry about me having this discussion with Win before I’ve had it with her. “I mentioned the oatmeal raisin cookies, and he got all suspicious—asked if you were tired and emotional—which you have been… And then he told me that when you were…you know…pregnant with Jackson, you baked oatmeal raisin cookies all the time. So…he thought maybe…”
I just let it hang there, waiting to see if I get slapped for real this time. But I don’t. My petite redhead firecracker starts to laugh—the way I thought she would when I asked her about it in the first place.
“Cookies!” she declares. “I’ve been outted by cookies!”
“So you…you suspected then, I guess?”
She stops laughing and twists her mouth around the way she does when she’s thinking about how to say something.
“Ummm…well…surprisingly, no. I mean, honestly, my body’s been all out of whack with the overnights, and I’ve never had a regular cycle…so I didn’t think anything of it when I missed a month…” She pauses and takes a deep breath. “Two months.”
“Two months?” I echo a little too shrilly. “You’re two months pregnant?”
“No…actually, Scott, I’m three…”
Chapter Nine
Jameson
September
“Stop fussing with your hair!” Bailey chides me for the tenth time.
“I don’t know, I think maybe I should’ve worn it down,” I mumble. Again. “I really wish I’d gone with the veil…”
“Honey, there just wasn’t enough time to find the right veil once you decided you wanted one. And since you didn’t want to wear mine…”
“Hen, your veil is stunning—but it’s much too fancy for this dress,” I explain. Again. “Oh, it’ll just have to do,” I say, turning away from the mirror.
“You look beautiful,” Walker comments from the kitchen table, where she’s pulling my bouquet out of the florist’s box. “And the roses look great.”
“Yeah…” I sigh.
“What?” Hennessy demands, smacking her hands on the arms of the wheelchair she’s occupying for the day. “What is it now?”
“I don’t know…the roses…they’re just not quite…”
“Right?” Bailey fills in the blank. “Jameson, nothing’s been quite right since you moved this wedding. I don’t understand—why don’t you just wait?”
“Because there isn’t time,” I blurt before I can stop myself. Shoot. How to recover?
“Time for what?” Walker asks. “Dude, it’s not like there’s a ticking clock here. Why not just put it off for a couple months?”
“Because—because Henny’s going to be too busy with the twins in a few months. And, besides, all the plans are in place already. We can’t just cancel now—at the last minute…”
“What plans?” Henny interjects. “It’s just us, Big Win, and Scott.”
“Don’t forget about Win and his girrrrrrrlfriend,” Bailey throws in with a little tease and a giggle.
“Seriously—we’ve cancelled bigger family dinners than this, James. You’re clearly not happy about doing this right now. Let’s just get Scott on the phone. He’ll understand…”
She’s right, he will. He’ll understand that we can’t afford to wait to get married. Because the longer we wait, the bigger I’ll be. And the bigger I am, the harder it’ll be to disguise my pregnancy. Not that any of that matters to him…Scott would get married anytime, anywhere I said. But it matters to me. I refuse to be that woman who wears the maternity wedding gown. I know, I’m a divorcee. And a mother. Hardly a blushing virgin…but there’s just something about the idea of my children looking back at my wedding pictures and seeing their mom looking as if she swallowed a basketball.
“No,” I declare resolutely. “Nope. Today is the day I get married. Not even Father Romance himself could talk me out of it…”
The knock on the front door startles all four of us.
“You expecting anyone else?” Walker asks.
I shake my head—every fiber of my being telling me not to open that door. There’s bad news on the other side of that door… But Bailey’s on it before I can think of a reasonable reason to ignore it.
“Hey, Julie!” Bailey steps back to allow Julie Freddino entry into our living room. She’s the owner of The Knitty Kitty—creating custom-knits for pets all over the country—including those with celebrity owners like Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, and Katy Perry.
“Hi, guys,” she says, anxiously twisting at her long, purple ponytail. “I have some news…”
“Oh, no!” Henny gasps. “Oh, please tell me Scott’s okay…”
“What?” I shriek. “Why wouldn’t Scott be okay?” I demand, looking at my older sister, who’s burst into tears. “Henny! Stop crying! Julie, tell her nothing’s wrong with Scott!” I implore our friend, who looks more uncomfortable by the second.
“No, no, no! Nothing’s w
rong with Scott…”
“Brrrryyyyannnn!” Hennessy wails from the wheelchair, suddenly convinced it’s her own husband who’s been felled by whatever tragedy has unfolded.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” I say sharply enough that she stops. “Hennessy, cut it out already! Your hormones are in hyperdrive! Will you please just let Julie get it out already?”
Henny nods, and all eyes swing back to an alarmed-looking Julie.
“Uh, yeah, so, everyone’s fine,” she stresses, holding up her palms in an attempt to keep us all calm. “It’s just Father Romance…”
“What about him?” Walker asks.
“He kinda can’t marry you today,” Julie blurts.
“What?” I ask. “Why not?”
“It’s the animals… You know, the blessing of the animals mass was this morning. And there was a little bit of an incident…kind of a melee, if truth be told…”
We’re all staring at her, trying to process what it is that she’s telling us. Clearly, we’re not getting it, so Julie throws her hands up and takes a few steps closer to me.
“So, James, Miss Lucy’s cat, Queen Elizabeth? She’s had a beef with the Hemsworth brothers for a while now… Not the actual Hemsworth brothers, of course, you know the cat Hemsworth brothers that live in the real estate office over on Main Street. Chris, Liam—”
“We know what the names of the Hemsworth brothers are, Julie!” Walker snaps.
“Right, right,” she continues, not at all flustered by my sister’s outburst. “So apparently, while all the animals were waiting for Father Romance to bless them, Queen Elizabeth managed to slip out of her kennel, and she made her way under all the pews until…until she found poor Liam, curled up in a ball, asleep on the cushion. He wasn’t really supposed to be out but…well, that doesn’t matter now. Anyway, Elizabeth launched an all-out sneak attack, and it was like…like this cloud of fur just kind of rose up out of nowhere. The noise—my god—the yowling! I haven’t heard anything like it since Miley’s cat coughed up a hairball on Katty Purry… Yeah, so, everyone was screaming, the dogs were barking, even Missy Potter’s pig—Stanley?—he totally freaked and managed to pull down a bunch of the banners hanging around the church. Yeah…so…Father Romance tried to intervene and ended up with a wicked scratch down the side of his face. And…a hoofprint. On his back…from where Stanley trampled him. Just a little. It wasn’t a full-on stampede or anything…”
I stopped listening. My eyes can’t get any wider. My mouth can’t drop any lower. One by one, I start to pull the bobby pins from the hairstyle I don’t like while I kick off the uncomfortable shoes I had to settle for. I walk right past the roses that aren’t quite right and head down the hallway to my bedroom. As an unmarried woman.
Again.
…
“Jameson?”
“Hmmm?” I reply absently, my head still stuck in the doctor’s appointment I had this morning.
“Are you ready?”
Am I? I mean, I knew I wanted more children. And I knew I wanted them with Scott. It’s just that suddenly I’m recalling how exhausting it is. And terrifying. I think back to that night at the cabin, telling Scott about the preemie we lost in the NICU. The thought sends an unwelcome chill down my spine.
What if…
“Jameson?”
Bryan is peering at me with mounting concern. I can’t have him thinking anything is wrong—or, God forbid, putting two and two together to come up with pregnant. Not that he would…would he? Nah, he’s too busy thinking about his own kids’ arrival to speculate. Not that it would be the end of the world, but I want to be the one to tell my sisters about the baby…just not yet. Scott and I have been enjoying the deliciousness of the secret. It’s been such a special, quiet time for us—thwarted wedding plans aside. Once people know you’re expecting it becomes a whirl of questions…which means plans. Name? Where will you live? Where are you registered? When’s the shower? What do you need/want/love/hate?
Nope. We’re gonna keep word about this little guy—or girl—on a need-to-know basis for now.
“Yes, sorry, Bryan… Let’s bring her in…”
“You sure you’re okay?” my brother-in-law asks suspiciously.
I plaster a smile across my face and nod enthusiastically.
“Absolutely. Send in…” I glance down at the clipboard. “Send in Anastasia O’Rourke.”
He buzzes Helen and, a moment later, the office door opens and a tall brunette walks in. Where Penny’s name made me think she might be an adult entertainer, Miss O’Rourke’s made me think she might be some young coed. Miss O’Rourke definitely does not give that vibe in person. She’s wearing a black “pleather” skirt that’s both skin tight and thigh-high, paired with a hot pink, form-fitting top that’s so tight I can actually make out a few small moles on the skin underneath. I’m starting to wonder if Bryan accidentally contacted an escort agency for this one, rather than a nanny agency.
Her long, dark hair hangs down straight with chunky bangs taking up most of the real estate on her high forehead. There’s something about this woman that reminds me of someone… But I can’t put my finger on who it is.
“Miss O’Rourke,” Bryan begins as he—to his credit—struggles to keep his line of sight well above the woman’s décolletage, “thank you for coming in this morning.”
She smiles brightly, pouts for a brief moment, and then proceeds to bite her lower lip. But this isn’t some unconscious gesture. This is a woman who has clearly spent some time practicing the maneuver in the mirror. And it just looks…weird. But why? As it turns out, I don’t have to wonder for long.
“Please,” she says, “call me Ana. You know, like Anastasia Grey?”
Of course! So that’s what this is all about!
Bryan stares blankly, smiling politely but not registering the reference. He glances in my direction, hoping—I’m sure—for a hint.
“Fifty Shades of Grey,” I say and watch with amusement as my brother-in-law’s U-shaped smile drops on the bottom and rises on the top to form a perfectly shaped O.
Of course. Ana—though I somehow think this isn’t her real name—nods and winks at Bryan, causing a tide of crimson to rise up from under his collar almost instantly. I need to get this thing back on the rails—and fast.
“So, Ana, can you tell us about your experience?”
She switches position so that her right leg crosses over her left, and I see Bryan grab his water bottle out of the corner of my eye. Poor guy. He has no idea what kind of woman this is.
“Sure…well, I spent three years with the Caldwell family—they had three children. Mr. Caldwell was an architect…”
“And it looks like you just left them. What happened, if I may ask?”
“Oh, it was very sad, actually,” she informs me, leaning forward and speaking in a hushed “just between us girls” tone. “Mrs. Caldwell took the children and left. Just up and moved them to California.”
“Oh…well, that’s very unfortunate…” Bryan murmurs.
Ana shrugs.
“Maybe. Maybe not. I always told him he could do better…”
She what?
“I’m sorry…uh…you know what? Maybe you could give us a little more insight into your relationship with Mr. Caldwell?” I suggest suggestively.
“Well, now that’s a loaded word, isn’t it?” she says with a laugh. “Our relationship was…you know…close. I mean, we spent a lot of time together. And we liked some of the same things…”
Aha. Now we’re getting down to it.
“Like what?” I coax.
She rolls her blue eyes toward the ceiling as if consulting a list there. “Oh, let’s see…he loved to hear about the books I was reading…”
Of course he did.
“And he liked to talk hardware with me…”
“Hardware?” Bryan asks blankly.
“Sure, sure. He was real big on zip ties, rope, chain…sometimes duct tape…”
From next
to me, Bryan sputters, nearly choking on the sip of water he’s just taken. I reach over and pat his back without even bothering to look at him.
“I see,” I say without further comment. “And were you ever alone with Mr. Caldwell and the children?”
“Well, certainly. She was always out—always leaving him and those poor, poor kids to fend for themselves while she was off gallivanting with people from work.”
“Uh-huh. And what kind of work did she do?”
“Oh, she was a missionary.”
There’s just something about the way she wraps her lips around the word.
“A missionary…?” I echo.
Ana of Grey Gables gives me a coy, longwise glance.
“I know, right? It’s hilarious! Like ‘missionary position.’ We had more than a few laughs over that one, Brent and I!”
“And Brent would be…?” I ask, even though I already know the answer.
“Why, Mr. Caldwell, of course! He insisted I call him by his first name.”
“Well, I think that’s about all the information we need for now,” I say, plastering a neutral smile to my face and starting to get to my feet.
Anastasia O’Rourke doesn’t move an inch.
“But we haven’t talked compensation,” she says coolly. “I have certain expectations…”
“Ah, well, we’re not to that stage yet,” I explain. “We’ll be in touch either way as soon as we’ve met with the other candidates…”
She shakes her head, bites her lip, and whines at the same time. It’s quite a unique skill set—one I’m sure Brent Caldwell appreciated right up until the minute his wife, the missionary, left his butt.
“Nope,” she insists stubbornly. “My inner goddess tells me I’m meant to be the nanny for these twins.”
I snort. I can’t help it. It just sort of…slips out. She is, of course, referring to E.L. James’ prolific mentions of Ana’s “inner goddess” in the Fifty Shades book.
“Wow. Just…wow,” I mutter.
“Excuuuuuse me?”
The sex-kitten pout has vanished, replaced by a snarl worthy of Christian Grey himself.
“Anastasia,” I begin in as controlled a voice as I can muster, “I’d like to thank you for coming in today, but I think I speak for both Bryan and my sister when I say we will not be needing your services…”