Chapter 29 #2
“He’s my new bestie,” Dan said.
“Well, that’s a relief,” Grant replied. “I’m finally rid of you.”
“You wish.”
They greeted hundreds of people in the theater before heading across the street to the after-party in a hotel ballroom.
Stephanie was there waiting for them and got to meet the rest of the team behind the film. Charlie had stayed home on Gansett Island with his new wife, Sarah, happy to leave the limelight to Grant and Steph.
Dan made a fool of himself over Flynn, who was a good sport about it.
“What a night,” Kara said to Dan as he drove them home hours later. “It’s so nice to see Stephanie getting such praise for how she refused to give up on Charlie. And Grant for writing such a beautiful script.”
“I know. I hope he’s ready to add another Oscar to his shelf.”
“That’d be so deserved.” Kara yawned for the hundredth time since they’d left the party thirty minutes ago. “I’m going to sleep for a week when we get back to Gansett.”
“You can’t sleep for a week in August. The launches have been so busy that the guys will be out for blood if you abandon them anymore this summer after a three-week honeymoon.”
“Ugh, don’t remind me.” She had about four weeks remaining until her summer season running the launch service in North Harbor came to an end and she could relax until spring.
“What’s up with you being so crazy tired all the time?”
“That’s what happens when I try to keep up with you.”
“Seriously, Kara. You’re freaking me out with all the sleeping. That’s not like you.”
“I don’t know.”
“Is it possible, you know, that you might be… well, pregnant?”
Kara laughed. “As you well know, it’s more than possible.”
“Do you think you are?”
“Could be. It would explain a few things.”
“What other things besides being tired?”
“My boobs hurt, my clothes feel snug and I’m hungry all the time.”
“Kara! When were you going to tell me you’re pregnant?”
“As soon as I confirmed it.”
Dan glanced in the rearview mirror before sliding across three lanes on the 5 and taking the next exit.
“What’re you doing?”
“Finding a pharmacy to get a test.”
“We can figure it out when we get home to Gansett.”
“We’re figuring it out right now.” He drove faster than he should have through a commercial area and took a hard right turn into a pharmacy parking lot. “Lock the doors when I get out.”
“Yes, dear.” Kara watched him go, sinfully sexy in the tuxedo he’d worn to the premiere, eating up the sidewalk with his always-impatient stride, which was even more so now that he was on a mission to find out if she was pregnant.
She giggled to herself, imagining her famous husband buying a pregnancy test. It’d probably be all over the news that she was pregnant before they knew themselves.
He returned ten minutes later carrying a big bag that he passed to her when he got in the car.
Kara looked inside and burst out laughing when she saw he’d bought no fewer than twenty tests. “We only need one.”
“I want to be sure.”
“I don’t have enough pee for twenty tests.”
“What do you need pee for?”
Kara lost it laughing again. “You have to pee on the stick to take the test.”
“For fuck’s sake.”
“How can you be thirty-eight and not know how a pregnancy test works?”
“Because I’ve never come close to being a father, until now.”
“Don’t get your hopes up. I might just be anemic or something.”
“My hopes are up,” he said as he drove toward the beach.
“You’re driving too fast.”
“I’m in a hurry.”
“Slow down, or I’ll withhold my pee.”
“That’s gross, Kara.”
“Slow down, Dan.”
He downshifted the BMW but didn’t slow down all that much.
“I was thinking that we should name our first child Dylan,” Kara said, “whether we have a boy or a girl. What do you think?”
He glanced over at her. “That’d be perfect,” he said, visibly moved. “Thank you for honoring my brother that way.”
“I wish I’d known him.”
“I do, too. He would’ve loved you, but not as much as I do. It’s still amazing to me…”
“What is?”
“How everything is so much better since you found me and saved me from myself.”
Kara laughed at how he described their meeting. “Is that what I did?”
“You have no idea.”
“You did the same for me. I thought I’d never want to take another chance on love, and then there you were in your pink Oxford shirt and your ridiculous loafers, making a complete ass of yourself on a daily basis trying to get my attention.”
“Um, hello, I was being totally serious, and you just insulted me.”
“Did you or did you not make a complete ass of yourself trying to get my attention?”
“I brought you Diet Mountain Dew. Do you know how hard that is to find on Gansett Island?”
“Answer the question, Counselor. Did you or did you not make a complete ass of yourself?”
“I refuse to answer the question on the grounds of self-incrimination.”
“Save your legal mumbo jumbo for someone who doesn’t know all your BS.”
“My ‘legal mumbo jumbo’ is in hot demand. In case you missed it, Oscar-winner Flynn Godfrey just played me in a movie. And, if I may add, he did a good job, but he couldn’t quite capture the sexy devil Dan Torrington really is.”
“For fuck’s sake,” Kara muttered. “Do you ever get tired of listening to yourself talk?”
“Nope, not really, and neither do you.”
“Yes, I do. I’m officially tired of hearing you talk about what a sexy devil you are and how Flynn Godfrey played you in the movie.”
“I can’t help that they had to get the handsomest guy in Hollywood to play me in order to do me justice.”
“Shut up, Dan.”
“Make me, Kara.”
Thankfully, they arrived at the house, and she was saved from having to take drastic measures to shut him up while he was driving. He came around to help her out of the low-slung car and steadied her when she wobbled on the ridiculous heels she’d bought for the premiere.
“In case I forget to tell you later, you were a total smoke show tonight, babe. That dress is fire.”
“This old thing?” Kara glanced back at him as he followed her up the stairs to the door.
Tiffany had helped her find the perfect dress for the premiere, and Kara had never felt sexier than she did in the clingy black dress that was far more daring than she normally would’ve chosen for herself.
Tiffany had that effect on her—and many others.
“That old thing has had me sporting wood all night.”
“Honestly, Dan.”
“Honestly, Kara.” He put his arm around her from behind and pressed his hard cock to her back to make his point. “Been dealing with that since the first second I saw you in that dress.”
“That long?”
“That long, so hurry up and go pee on a stick so we can do something about my stick.”
She didn’t want to laugh at that because God forbid she should encourage his juvenile humor, but she couldn’t contain the laughter.
He thrust the bag of pregnancy tests at her. “Do at least three of them. I want to be sure.”