Indiscreet (The Discreet Duet Book 2)

by Nicole French

  But the biggest change was the extra level that had been built on top of the house. Now it boasted an entirely new third story, with unobstructed views of the water.

  “Holy shit,” I stammered as I stared up at it. “What did you…what did you do?”

  “I took a chance,” Will said. “And I built us a home.”

  He tugged on my hand, turning me to face him so he could take my other one. His thumb rubbed over my left ring finger, but he only smiled. My heart picked up a beat.

  “Lil, this is for us,” he said. “And if you don’t like the changes I made, we can tear them down and start over.”

  I gazed around. “I thought that security was too hard here.”

  “It was. Which was why I had a fence and cameras installed too. The whole property is fenced in, and there’s a gate at the top of the driveway.” There was sadness in his voice, the disappointment that he couldn’t ever completely open us up to the world. Our son or daughter wouldn’t even know what it was like to run across the street to a friend’s house or walk around a neighborhood alone. That wasn’t going to be in our future.

  But so, so much else was.

  “Before Ellie passed…” Will paused, allowing that shadow to move by. “Before that, I thought we’d always come back here, you know? This place, where I met you…when I imagine home, Lil, it’s you. Just you.”

  I turned back to him and cupped his face. “You are home to me too,” I told him, and was immediately rewarded with a wide smile. I kissed him, pulling him toward me so I could show him with my arms and mouth what words couldn’t ever cover.

  When we broke apart, Will was out of breath and looked like he desperately wanted to find someplace private.

  “All right,” I said. “Show me our new house.”

  With shining eyes, Will unlocked the front door, which was brightly lit by the porch light. The main floor wasn’t changed much—still the same comfortable living room, the same large kitchen. But there was one major difference: photographs. Pictures of us over the past few months were everywhere. Some of them I recognized as paparazzi shots, others were from events we had attended, and a few from when we first met. I picked up one from the fireplace mantel.

  “This is the photo that Lindsay took,” I said, recognizing the two of us curled together, smiling over the flames of the fire near the inn.

  Will nodded. “I asked Lucas to get the file. I figured if the press could have it, shouldn’t we?”

  I replaced the photo, my fingers lingering over the silver frame.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I think so.”

  “There’s more.”

  I followed him downstairs, where, again, most of the rooms were still as before, with the exception of his bedroom, which had been emptied completely.

  “This is for you,” he said, gesturing inside. “An office. A space to do whatever you want. Write music. Be alone. I figured you’d need a place of your own.” He quirked an eyebrow. “Sometimes I can be a bit of a handful.”

  I snorted. “That’s one way to put it.”

  He smacked another warm kiss on my lips and snuck a handful of my ass, causing me to squeak. I nuzzled into him and looked around the room. “Thank you.”

  He set his chin on top of my head. “It’s yours, Lil. Everything else. Come on, I want to show you the upstairs.”

  “The studio is still here,” I said as I followed him back down the hall. I peeked into the room where I had once recorded a song for him, and afterwards, we had recorded ourselves making a different kind of music.

  Will wrapped an arm around my shoulders, rubbing his stubbly cheek to mine. “Well, I figured you’re going to need it.”

  I snorted. “Right. For what?”

  “Well, after the world hears ‘Cavern’ in Green Lantern, I’m guessing you’re going to be in pretty high demand. Corbyn wants to use it in the trailer.”

  I pushed out from under his arm and turned. “Come again?”

  “Cavern” was the name of the song I’d recorded in LA before finding out about Mama. I had felt lost when I’d recorded it, and it certainly wasn’t finished. I hadn’t even asked about it, just assumed it had been swallowed up in the behemoth of Capitol Records.

  Will grinned, and in the middle of his deep green eyes, the gold flecks in the centers sparked. “I hope you don’t mind. I got the recording after you left Capitol and passed it on to Corbyn. He didn’t know it was you, Lil, only that it was some fresh talent. But the second he heard it, he knew it needed to score the climax. He’s been chatting with Calliope all week––she’ll probably be calling later tonight with details about the contract.”

  I slumped down the wall to my heels, suddenly faint. Was I hearing this correctly?

  “Next week, when we’re filming, Corbyn wants you to work in the studio,” he said. “To assist Rob with the orchestra while they record this piece for the final scene of the movie.” Will squatted down next to me and placed a hand on my knee. “Lil, what is it? I thought you’d be happy.”

  I pressed a hand to my chest “Oh, God. Oh…God. I can’t breathe.”

  Will fell all the way to the floor and took my hand in his. “Babe, did I fuck up? Honestly, you can say no, Lil. We can call Corbyn right now and tell him you don’t want to have your song in a stupid superhero movie—”

  “No!” I broke out. My song. In a movie. It was…it was almost too much. And more than I’d ever hoped for.

  Are you a musician or a composer?

  Rob’s question, asked so long ago, echoed in my mind.

  Composer, I’d said. And now it was really true.

  “Is this…is it real?” I wondered. “It seems too easy.” Even the best things in my life had always come hard.

  As if he was reading my thoughts, Will pressed another kiss to my forehead and nuzzled me close. “I think that’s why they call it a break, babe,” he said. “And it’s high time you got yours.”

  We sat there together in the hall for a moment, digesting the news, the house. The fact that we had a moment just to be together. Nothing to do. Nowhere to go.

  Then Will stood and pulled me up beside him. “One more thing.”

  He led me up the staircase that had been extended to the addition. The new third floor consisted of three large bedrooms, including a master on the far side, with its own large bathtub suite, and a king-size bed that looked out to the water.

  “The other rooms are for the kids,” Will said as I looked around, taking in the off-white furniture, the wood floors. Everything was comfortable, but luxe.

  I turned. “Kids?”

  Will smiled and arched a blond brow. “You didn’t think we’d stop at one, did you?”

  “You’re pretty presumptuous, Baker. Who says I want to have any more of your Goldilocks babies? How many extra are we talking here?”

  “Not too many. Maybe four or five.”

  My eyes about bugged out of my head. “Four or five?”

  “Well, yeah. I figure now that we’ve gotten started, we should plan on probably one a year until your baby maker breaks down and—”

  He couldn’t finish, in part because I was busy smacking him on the shoulder, but also because he was too busy laughing. And not just little, subdued chuckles, the way he used in front of a group or when we were out and about. Not just a bark, something that burst out of him before he could clamp it back. These were real, gut-wrenching belly laughs, the kind that came from his toes. The kind he couldn’t stop, even if he wanted to.

  It was the best sound in the world.

  “Oh, Jesus,” he wheezed before he broke down all over again. “Holy shit, Lil, your face! I thought your eyes were about to pop out of your head!”

  “Well, you looked serious!” I squealed, which only caused him to break down in laughter all over again.

  “Oh, Christ, Lil.” He slumped against the window, still holding his stomach. “You kill me, baby. You really do.”

  I threw a pillow at him, which he batted away eas
ily. “You’re wicked. You shouldn’t mess with a pregnant lady. Don’t you know that?”

  Will quirked an eyebrow. “Honestly? You want to have one, or you want to have five? I don’t really care, Lil. We’ll do what’s right for us. I just want to start now.”

  And with that, I was summarily scooped up and tossed onto the bed. Will practically jumped on top of me with another laugh, but his joy quickly turned to something else as my hands wrapped around his neck, and our lips found each other. He pulled off my t-shirt and then his own. A few moments later, we were both naked, skin pressed to warm skin as he caged me against the soft white bedding.

  “These,” he whispered as his hands found my breasts. “Are getting bigger. Did you know that?”

  I arched into his touch, enjoying the tingling of my nipples as his fingers played over them. “More sensitive too. My ass is growing too, if you hadn’t noticed.”

  In response, a hand wormed playfully under my back and began pinching the exact part of my anatomy I’d mentioned.

  “Oh, I noticed,” Will said in between kisses that left me breathless. “And I’m planning to take full advantage of it for the next seven months.”

  Both hands slipped under me to do exactly that, and he sat up, rubbing himself over my moist center while he looked me over.

  “You know you can’t actually get me pregnant now, right?” I said with a smirk as he began to slip inside. “Like, it’s already done. We’re good for a while.”

  Will rolled his eyes, then fell back on top of me, hushing my comments with a kiss that wiped away all sarcasm. “Nobody says we can’t practice,” he murmured.

  His mouth drifted reverently over my face, floating over my eyes, my cheeks, my lips. If this was practice, I wondered what he intended for the real thing. He slid inside, finding his place within me. The place that always welcomed him, molded to him.

  “I love you,” I said opening myself fully.

  “I love you,” Will whispered, his throat hoarse and full of emotion. His eyes were wide and full of awe. No traces of fear at all.

  I smiled.

  “I won’t tell,” I said as I wrapped my hands around his neck. “It will be our little secret.”

  “That I love you?” Will wondered. “Please. I want to shout it to the whole damn world. There’s no need to be discreet.”

  Epilogue

  Three years later

  Will

  “And the award for best original screenplay goes to…Will Baker for Wind in the Sails!”

  The roar from the audience reaches the sky-high ceilings of the Dolby theater in Los Angeles. The people around us are smiling at me and clapping. A few different cameras have zoomed over the crowd and are pointed at me. But I can barely comprehend what’s happening.

  “Will?”

  I turn when Maggie places her small hand on my arm. Her touch is warm, even through my tuxedo jacket, and when she smiles, my heart practically thumps out of my chest.

  She’s stunning. Robin, the stylist we usually work with for crap like this, really outdid herself tonight. Not with me—I look the same as ever. If you’ve worn one black tux, you’ve worn them all. Maggie cut my hair, like she usually does when she says I’m getting too Yeti-locks for her taste. Right below the ears seems to be her sweet spot, where she gets caught staring at me with her mouth open, just begging for me to slip my tongue in it. Or, you know, something else. Even better if I happen to take my shirt off. Do I do an extra set of sit-ups every day because of the way she looks at my abs? Maybe, maybe not. Okay, yeah. I definitely do. Because three years later, that expression still puts the dirtiest thoughts in my head. Really, you don’t want to know.

  But somehow, I ended up with a woman who is game for just about anything, including getting busy in the limousine on the way here. She teases me about it, wondering how a guy with a social anxiety disorder gets off on sex in public places. I don’t have an answer for that. It’s just with her. It’s only ever been with her.

  But seriously. You try riding next to this woman looking the way she does and keep your hands to yourself. Because when Maggie walked out of the bedroom in our suite, I almost fell over. With her curls piled high and a few soft tendrils loose around her neck, she looked like a Greek goddess, not the girlfriend of a lowly actor/screenwriter. Her light green dress or gown or whatever you want to call it makes her skin glow, is pulled over one shoulder, and flows down the rest of her body. A bunch of designers and jewelers clamored to dress her, and not just because she’s my girl. It’s her big night as much as mine. And classic Maggie, she couldn’t care less about Gucci or Chanel. She went with a local designer and turned down all jewelry except for the pair of diamond earrings and the matching pendant I bought her after she gave birth to our first child, Michaela…

  I almost missed it.

  I was in Tokyo when I got the call, literally about to get out of the car and walk the final red carpet for the Green Lantern press tour. It took me two full hours of meditation and yoga to get ready for that walk, part of the regimen that Dr. Blanchard, my therapist, and I worked out to mitigate anxiety during the campaign. Does it work as well as Valium? No. But it helps. Not as much as having Lil beside me, but it’s better than shoving a bunch of pills and drink down my throat to get through it.

  Tokyo is the worst of all of them. The crowds are bigger, the craze of the city is contagious. By the end of the junket, I was ready to ask for a straitjacket myself. So when my cell phone rang, and Calliope’s frantic voice shouted over the screaming outside the limo, I was more than happy to tell the driver to go straight to the airport.

  And I made it just in time. Nine hours to Seattle. Customs, and then another hour to Spokane. Forty-five minutes to the hospital, where I burst into the delivery room right when the doctor was telling Maggie she could push.

  “Sir, you need to change—”

  “Where is she?” It’s a stupid question. There is only one bed in the delivery room, and one person lying on it, her feet in stirrups with a doctor crouched in front of her.

  “Just a few more contractions, Maggie, and then I think you can push. Stay with me now, sweetheart.”

  “Will!” Maggie finds me, her brown eyes frantic, and in another second, I’m at her side, taking her hand and pressing her head into my chest. “You’re still in your suit,” she whispers, fingering my jacket.

  I shuck it immediately, tossing the Armani to the floor, and grab a seat next to her. “Should I put on the Green Lantern costume?”

  But the joke is lost as her face screws up in pain as another contraction sweeps through her. A sheen of sweat covers her body, and tiny hairs are plastered on her forehead. She’s never looked more beautiful.

  “Your hand,” she breathes in a voice contorted in her effort. “Oh GODFUCKINGHELLTHATHURTSSS!”

  I pivot to the doctor. “Is this normal?”

  The doctor just gives me a cheery thumbs-up while she watches whatever is going on down there. “We’re almost ready,” she calls out.

  I turn back to Maggie, whose eyes are now closed. “I’m here, Lil,” I say. “I have you.” I’d give her any limb she wants. Whatever she needs right now. I just don’t want her to make that sound again.

  One eye opens, brown and deep. Even in her pain, full of love.

  “I knew you’d be here,” she whispers. “Don’t let go.”

  I smile. Her words call back to those moments when I’d say the same thing to her. About to do a step-and-repeat, or enter a room full of Hollywood jackals, when I felt the throes of a panic attack snapping at me like wolves. Don’t let go, I’d beg, though I was always more scared of losing her than of anything else.

  And she never did.

  And I never will.

  “Okay, Maggie, it’s time,” the doctor says, popping her head up. “You ready to meet your daughter, guys?”

  Maggie grips my hand so hard I swear she’s going to crush the bones. Her jaw sets, and she nods. “I’m ready.”

 
I can tell the moment it’s about to happen. Something happens to her belly—it moves, clenches with each contraction, but as Maggie starts to push, with grunts, howls, and a bunch of other noises I never knew my girl could even make start pouring out of her. Her face turns purple with the effort, and we’re both screaming and moaning together, again and again, until all at once, she deflates and a baby’s cry cuts through the thick hospital air.

  “Oh God, oh God!” Maggie’s crying, over and over again, her eyes glazed and unfocused as she looks around. “Go, Will. Go get her.”

  But I’m already up and moving to the end of the bed, where the nurses are cleaning our little girl and wrapping her in a loose cloth while the doctor finishes up with Maggie. When women tell you birth is a war zone, believe them. I will respect the hell out of my girl for this for as long as I live.

  “Take off your shirt,” one of the nurses says, then starts when she actually gets a look at who I am.

  “I’m sorry, what?” I’ve had a lot of inappropriate fans over the years, but this one takes the cake.

  Behind me, Maggie laughs. She actually laughs, after all she’s been through, after being in labor for almost twenty-four hours, looks like she’s been through a major battle, and still hasn’t had a chance to see this person she’s been growing for the last nine months.

  I turn around, hands on my hips. “Seriously, Lily pad?”

  She winces a little, but doesn’t stop giggling. “No one in here cares about your abs, Baker.” She point at the baby. “It’s a bonding thing. You’re supposed to hold her skin to skin. So strip down and get our daughter so I can meet her, will you?”

  My jaw drops, but she’s not joking. Vaguely, I remember something about skin on skin and bonding hormones our birth coach mentioned, and then it takes me exactly four seconds to rip off this stupid monkey suit and accept my daughter, who’s cooing like a dove, against my bare chest.

  She’s warm. Tiny, not even as long as my forearm. She has a full head of thick, dark blond hair and skin like a sunset. She’s the most beautiful thing I have ever seen in my sad, sorry life.