Chapter 14 Mabel #2
“Not in front of my niece,” she teases, then she pushes up from the couch and takes Teddy from Claire. “We don’t want to see those smoochy kisses, do we, Teddy girl?”
Claire rolls her eyes and peers up at Jonah. “I’ll stay for the first few songs, okay?”
Jonah grabs one of Claire’s stray curls and tugs on it, straightening it out, only to have it spring back up.
“You don’t have to, Trouble. Take her back to the lodge and get some sleep. I know you’ve been tired.”
Claire’s lips turn up into a small smile. “I’m fine. Just a few songs, and then sleep.”
Jonah traces his thumb over Claire’s jaw, then leans in for another kiss. The moment their lips touch, Sav playfully covers Teddy’s eyes, making her giggle again and grasp onto Sav’s fingers.
“Smoochy kisses,” Sav sings. “Eeeew.”
Jonah ends the kiss and turns a blank stare on Sav. “I’m flipping you off in my head.”
Sav pokes her lip out in a pout. “Ouch. That hurts, Papa Jo.”
Claire laughs and pushes on Jonah’s chest, leading him to the door. “Now out of the girl party, please. If I’m asleep when you get back, wake me.”
Jonah steps into the hall, and I catch him wink at her. “Not a chance.”
The moment the door shuts, I smirk. “You’re pregnant again.”
Claire’s eyes widen. “I am not.”
“You sure? Being tired is a symptom of pregnancy.” Sav tickles Teddy. “You want to be a big sister, Teddy Baby?”
“Being tired is also a symptom of jetlag, smart-ass.” Claire throws herself onto the couch, then shakes her head slowly. “Besides, could you even imagine? Another baby on tour?”
“So we’ll take another year or two off.” I hook a thumb toward Sav. “I’ve got pull with the label and can work something out.”
Sav grins. “I can also hire an au pair or something. We’ll need to do it anyway if Callie and Torren decide to spawn.”
I bark out a laugh. “I bet you could get Glory to do it.”
“Ah, yes, another nepotism hire,” Claire teases, and Sav waves her off with a roll of her eyes.
“Who is Glory?”
I turn to find Aurora looking totally lost, and I give her a smile. “Glory Bell is Callie’s younger sister.”
“And she would come nanny?”
Sav shrugs. “If we needed her, she might. She’s currently attempting the production assistant temp thing in LA.”
“Yeah, and Cal is not happy about it,” Claire says with a laugh.
Aurora’s eyes widen. “Why?”
“Because Glor turned down a basketball scholarship to do it.” Claire’s face turns pensive. “Honestly, I bet she’d be a great nanny.”
I fling my finger at her. “You’re pregnant!”
“I’m not! I swear.”
“But you’re not opposed to it,” Sav adds.
Claire gives us a shrug and smirks. “I mean, if Callie and Torren are going to do it...”
We laugh, but when I glance at Aurora, her expression’s tight and uncomfortable. When she catches me looking, the discomfort is wiped away and replaced with a bright, cheery, fake as fuck smile.
“What about you, Sav?”
The forced levity in Aurora’s tone has my smile flickering, but Sav is too busy snuggling Teddy to notice.
“What about me?”
“Do you have baby fever?”
The terror that passes over Savannah’s face has me snort laughing. She shakes her head and hands Teddy back to Claire.
“Take her. I don’t want to get infected.”
She’s so dramatic. Teddy giggles and Claire laughs, but Aurora looks shocked.
“What does that mean?”
Sav’s eyes flare. “My maternal instincts are nonexistent. My desire for a baby is at negative one hundred.”
“Oh. Well, that would change.”
“Trust me. It won’t. One of my favorite things about Ted is that I can give her back when she cries or poops. I’ll be on birth control until I die.”
Aurora’s smile fades and she shakes her head slowly. “Okay, but that would be different if it was your baby. Don’t you want to have a child with your fiancé?”
I can practically see Sav’s defenses shoot up, and the air in the room grows tense.
“We have one. Her name is Brynn.”
“No, of course. But I mean, you know, a child who is biologically yours?”
Sav glances between Claire and me before looking back at Aurora.
Aurora must not know that Brynn technically isn’t Levi’s biological child, either, or that she’s just stumbled on a topic that can get Sav extremely heated.
I can practically see the protective streak flashing like lightning in her storm gray irises.
“Biology doesn’t matter to me. Shared genetics or not, Brynn’s my kid, and I don’t want another one.
The thought of getting pregnant, growing a human, pushing that human out of my vagina, and then having to, like, feed it and change it and raise it and all that?
Hard pass.” Sav turns to Claire. “No offense.”
Claire laughs. “Zero offense taken.”
“I am baby free by choice. The universe did me a solid with Brynn because she’s practically a miniature adult. I’d be a shit mom to anyone else.”
As if to prove Sav’s point, Teddy shouts Shit! and Sav grins.
“See? I’m a much better fun auntie.”
I turn back to Aurora, expecting a smile, but instead she looks lost. Confused.
Almost scared. Like the foundation beneath her feet is shifting, and she doesn’t know how to keep her balance.
Her expression changes as she mentally grasps for something, anything, to ground her.
I’d help if I could, but I can’t. I don’t know how.
“I don’t...I mean...” She swallows and fidgets with her fingers. “I mean, doesn’t Levi want you to have his baby? What if you regret not having a baby, and then it’s too late? That’s what everyone wants, right? Isn’t it? It’s what everyone should want. Right?”
My eyes widen, and I dart my attention between the two of them.
Sav’s jaw is tight. Paps love to shout these types of questions at her.
Sav, when will you start a family? Sav, do you plan to get pregnant?
Sav, will you be putting music on hold when you become a mother?
It’s her least favorite topic, tied only with anything questioning her sobriety.
Her answer is always the same—No comment—and then she rants to us afterward about how she’d much rather tell everyone to fuck all the way off.
Right now, though, I can tell she’s considering her response carefully.
Aurora is not the paparazzi, and she’s not trying to get a headline for a gossip mag.
As the silence stretches, Aurora wrings her hands in her lap. Her cheeks go red, and I want to reach for her. Rub her back or hold her hand. Anything to help ease the embarrassment crashing through her.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “That was far too personal and very out of line. I’m so, so sorry.”
“No, it’s fine,” Sav says. She looks from me to Claire, and back to Aurora, then she leans in and softens her voice.
“Aurora, Levi wants what I want because we’re a team.
I love my life and my family just as they are.
We both do, and we don’t want to change it.
I’m fulfilled. I’m happy. I won’t regret my decision to not have a baby. Ever.”
Aurora scans Sav’s face, then drops her attention to her lap. She nods and forces a smile.
“Right. Of course. I’m...I’m happy for you.”
The way Aurora folds in on herself has me moving on instinct. I sit beside her on the couch and put my hand on her knee.
“Hey. It’s okay, all right? Everyone is fine.”
She nods again. “Okay.”
I squeeze her leg lightly. “Sav’s fine. Aren’t you, Sav?”
“I am,” Sav says, but I don’t look away from Aurora.
My chest aches with the need to comfort her, and my mind swirls with questions.
With theories. Nothing about this makes sense yet, but I’m certain of one thing.
Aurora isn’t happy. She’s been shoved into a box and told what to want.
How to act and think. And from what I can tell, she’s outgrowing that box, and she’s terrified.
A familiar chiming noise grabs my attention, and I reluctantly look away from Aurora to Sav. She’s already scrolling on her phone.
“Did the Caveat boys do something stupid, or are you stalking someone new?”
I ask the question to lighten the mood, take some of the attention off Aurora, but I’m curious, too.
Sav has internet alerts set for all of us, so she gets notified about any new media stories.
Recently, she’s also been setting alerts for bands she’s considering signing to her label.
Anything other than positive news about Heartless is rare these days, but the way Sav’s face contorts as she reads her phone screen has me sitting up straighter.
“Shit. What did they do?”
I’m half expecting her to tell me Ezra and Crue got arrested, but then Claire glances at the phone screen, too, and they both look at me with pity.
“What? What happened?”
I’m reaching for Sav’s phone before either of them says anything.
Did the tabloids find out about my birth mother?
Did someone overhear my conversation with my lawyer?
I hold my breath as I flip the phone over and take in the article on the screen, then all the oxygen leaves me in one violent woosh.
Pictures of my girlfriend are plastered all over a popular gossip blog. They’re blurry, obviously taken from a distance, but it’s not hard to see what’s happening.
Kat is locked in a passionate kiss with Kaz. Hands and lips in a tangle, I can’t tell where she ends and he begins. I blink several times, but the images don’t change. They just become more real.
“I’m so fucking sorry, Mabes.”
I drag my eyes from the screen to Sav’s face.
Her expression must mirror mine. Shock and pain, but there’s anger there, too.
Anger I wish I could feel. It would be better than this.
This throbbing heartache. This violent, stabbing sense of betrayal.
I can almost taste it, copper and blood-like on my tongue.
Just once, just fucking once, I’d like to be first. I’d like to be enough. I don’t think that’s asking too much.
I manage a tight smile and push to standing, handing Sav’s phone back to her as I grab mine from the couch cushion.
“Excuse me, guys. I have to make a call.”