Chapter 34 #2
“Micah for a boy. And Everly, if it's a girl.”
Something moves across her face, something like shock. Then she starts chucking every pillow off the bed, sending the remains of my elegant gift-wrapping flying. Lifts the duvet, searching. Scans the room.
“What are you doing?” I ask, genuinely confused.
With both hands parked on her waist, she asks, “Where are you hiding it? Your copy of God’s Gift to Baby Names?”
Ah. I smile to egg her on. “You know I’m a wordsmith.”
“Jameson!” Her voice turns scolding. “You did not just pull the two most perfect baby names out of your ass.”
“Wanna see what else I have up there?”
She pauses, lifting a brow. “Is that an open invitation?”
“Kidding. Absolutely not.” Little Miss Handsy pushed the envelope last week. In that context, No will never mean Yes. Not even a Maybe. “But is it too early to put in a request for a boy? If we create a mini-you first, I’ll be outnumbered.”
She gives my erection a playful squeeze through my jeans. “Hush. Or I’ll bless you with triplet girls. And Everly Trenton sounds so pretty. When did you come up with that?”
Truth is, I’ve sat with those names for years. At times, they’ve haunted me. And Gia senses some thought went into them. Just not how much.
“I thought of those names … a long time ago.”
Her grin falters, tenderness takes over her expression, and I know she sees me clearly in this moment, without the haze of great sex and greater music.
“I love you,” she says, her voice like smoke. “I love that I get to be the mother of your children.”
I can tell from the weight of the silence that follows where her mind has traveled to—a small reminder that Gia is a normal, jealous twenty-year-old.
It’s healthy for her claws to come out, and I never want them to retract fully.
To be clear, I encourage nothing. Flirty JC is a relic of the past. But for my own stupid pride, Gia's possessiveness is a good thing.
It means she loves me. Without that, I might as well pack up, move to Nashville, and be a goddamned country singer.
“So,” I scratch my chin, “your competitive streak is still alive and well.”
Gia shrugs, nonplussed. “I hate her irrationally. And always will. You can’t take that away from me.” She pauses, then adds, as a sweetener, “But I’m making an effort with Sawyer.”
“You two are finally bonding.”
“Like Crazy Glue.”
Shame for Sawyer. I suppose it's his destiny to have not one, but both of his brothers' girlfriends indifferent to his charms. And in the case of him and Gia, separation is a good thing.
Nice not to have to break up two heavyweights constantly going at each other.
Sawyer packed up for LA last month, living in my Hollywood apartment until he finds his perfect mansion.
And I’ve stopped asking about Jasmine King. That instant blank look he gave me when I mentioned running into her said everything about how much he hates discussing what happened.
Still … I’m keeping an eye on her.
Gia nudges me. “Hey, you.”
“What?”
She studies me. Knows every lie I tell myself. “Where you at?”
“You know, somewhere between totally in love and terrified.”
She smiles and plunks herself into my lap. “You’ll be a great dad. The best ever. Full respect, because not many guys would feel comfortable, or even step up, like you plan to. I’m forever grateful.”
I pluck the tiara from the rumpled duvet, tucking it into the crown of her hair. Her eyes, dark and shining, level on mine.
“Well?”
“It’s perfect,” I assure her. “Suits you to a T.”
Preening a little, she says, “I’m wearing it at our wedding. With the poufy skirt I mentioned.”
I ruffle her hair because I know she loves it, even though it once drove her crazy. “I’ll buy whatever dress you want, as long as you’re marrying me.”
Her arms loosely drape around the contours of my body and pull me into a devouring kiss. Tongues and torment, friction and rhythm, diamonds in my veins. Needing her as she needs me. I can smell that she’s wet where I need her to be, and no part of me wants to remain clothed.
But she pushes my greedy hands away, breaks our kiss, and I try to decipher the glint in her eyes.
“I have all sorts of ways to say thank you,” she says in her girly voice that means trouble, “but can we listen to the song first?”
I mock-groan. My song, the never-ending negotiation song. The master recording landed in my inbox while we were eating spaghetti in Burnaby. It was my mistake to tell her.
But I can negotiate equally hard.
“We listen to the song once,” I sound very much like a soon-to-be father, “and then I get to do whatever I want with you.”
She grins and, for once, miraculously, doesn’t counter.
“Deal.”
In the studio, Gia listens intently, and the shine in her eyes tells me something immense is moving through her. My song about our intense connection is pure grandeur, made more divine with her contribution. We both know we’ve created something extraordinary.
When the last chord fades, she’s breathing slow and shallow, her face inches from mine. “It’s so good, right? Our voices together.” She squeezes my hand. “Will you finally tell me the name?”
“You can't change it,” I warn. I might be a modern man letting my woman run the show, but I’d insisted on naming and publishing rights. If Gia wanted in on the writing going forward, she had to play the game like a pro.
“I know!” she says. “But I’m dying. The boys wanna know too. And Kayla. I promised I’d involve them in every decision.”
Gia pinky swore to be a team player with the band, and so far, so good. They all have a voice in songs and direction, even if Gia’s remains the loudest.
“In that case…” I let the moment build until she looks ready to kill me. “‘My Cherry Duet.’”
Her mouth quirks. The silence stretches so long, it feels like it's tugging on my bones. Did I make a misstep? In the low light, her eyes turn into a deep, dark ocean I fall straight into.
Then she grins. “It’s perfect.”
It really is. The mix. Our voices. The name. It had to be perfect because it reflects my love for her.
I wink. “As perfect as me?”
Gia hauls me out of the chair, laughing as she pins me against the wall, her body flush to mine. She loves this: keeping me on my toes. It’s her constant, her heartbeat, her purpose.
Forever unpredictable.
“I love you more than any song, you idiot,” she whispers.
Our mouths close over each other’s in a torrent of kisses, and we’re wild, lost kids, on fire and desperate.
Her hands are in my hair, the thump of her heart against my own.
We barely make it out of the studio before we’re stumbling down the hall, falling back into bed, my intended slow, careful process of destroying her quickly turning into something more feral.
Gia takes charge and rides me shamelessly, flexing to give me all the right pressure until every muscle releases and a white-hot flash of oblivion rolls through my body like electric thunder.
Nothing feels sweeter than her in this moment. Not spring, or the endless possibilities just around the corner.
Her feelings for me are not linked to a song.
They’re all about me.
How amazing is that?
After I return the favor and push Gia over the edge, she collapses into my arms and falls into a deep sleep. I lie in the dark, listening to the sounds of midnight and her soft breathing. Somewhere outside, down on the walkway, a woman laughs.
I like the sound of happy.
It feels good to have someone by my side with so much ahead of us.
Too much time was wasted, alone and restless, and yet so full of life.
Now we have inside jokes and code words.
Routines and rituals. I scratch Gia's back in the morning, knowing just where that unreachable spot between her shoulder blades is.
And she guides me out from the tumble of my chaotic thoughts that still swirl from time to time, chipping away at my years of self-protection, all the little things forced on me.
Growing up in a household that prioritized entertainment in the same way others value God, my love of music was always tangled with my father’s.
I had talent, that special ear, but I felt like I owed him to be the musical success he never was.
Killing my band was painful, but it also brought relief. To shrug off that pressure.
Now I make music without expectations, writing songs for the woman who leaves me flush with more feelings than I can pinpoint.
Stroking her tousled hair, I glance up at the ceiling. High above us, tucked into a corner, are the touchstones Gia snuck in. Two glow-in-the-dark stickers peeled from her old room and pressed into ours. Steady Saturn with its protective rings. A comet blazing beside him.
I smile, big feelings blowing up my heart.
The blaze of Gia—you can see her from space.
It doesn’t surprise me anymore how completely she dazzles me.
She was fierceness personified that night at the Troubadour, and I felt the beginning of something I had no way to explain.
I was helplessly drawn to her, the pull far beyond the passing fascination of other women.
She seemed to operate on a higher level than everyone else.
Up in the stratosphere.
My shooting star.
I pull her closer, breathing her in. The stickers wink down at me, and just before I drift off to sleep, the thought lands.
Tomorrow I'll tell Gia, and she'll absolutely call me an idiot.
Maybe throw something at me. But she is my version of heaven, and some things are worth saying, even if they're cliché.
Our love was written in the stars.