Chapter 14
Under normal circumstances, I never would have done it.
No matter how many books I read or true crime documentaries I watched to distract myself, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Beau and I had done in the bathtub.
Only my pregnancy journal saw my confession of self-betrayal. I had promised that Beau would never access me again, but I couldn’t resist.
I blamed my indiscretion on the unfortunate timing of my vibrator dying and my nearly unmanageable pregnancy libido…
and the fact that Beau had barged into the bathroom with a look of crazed concern in those pretty blue eyes.
What woman would have told him to leave?
He wasn’t wearing a shirt, his tattoo gave him a certain edge, and his gray sweatpants showcased just how big and hard he was because of me.
Despite being a frequent rider of the dick carousel in the past, I was certain I wouldn’t have just invited any man into the bathtub. Beau was the father of my babies, he was…safe, somehow. I was used to him. Maybe living with him for nearly two months had just dulled me to his presence.
My senses hadn’t dulled to him, though. If anything, I noticed more of his little quirks.
Sometimes I would catch him pacing and muttering to himself in French.
He had a scar on his lower back from a Christmas decoration falling on him.
His hair curled at the nape of his neck when he had gone too long without a haircut.
If he stood in front of the window in the late afternoon, the sunlight made his blonde eyelashes glow.
I realized I was getting in too deep when we watched the “Murder in the Heartland” documentary.
I hadn’t wanted to leave bed, so Beau found the remote to start the miniseries.
He made a snide comment about my macabre taste in entertainment, but then silently stood at my bedside and watched the first twenty minutes of the initial police investigation.
I was too eager to rub it in his face that I had a superior taste in entertainment, so I invited him to get in bed to watch it with me.
It wasn’t until we were three episodes into our binge that I realized what I had done.
Not only had I been spending more time with him, I was enjoying it.
Except when Beau brought me food in bed, we ate every meal together.
We drove to every doctor’s appointment together.
I had even ventured downstairs to join him in the gym a few times when I had a burst of energy.
I hadn’t even tried to find contract work to earn my own money because I was just so damn comfortable. My constant fatigue made it easy for me to snuggle into the mattress and be at peace with being taken care of, but comfort was a trap.
If I let a man feed me, I gave him the power to starve me.
Also, I had a lingering suspicion that Beau only tolerated me because of the babies.
He had never liked me before and I certainly wasn’t his type, so there was a real chance Beau was going to discard me once I gave birth.
I couldn’t trust him to still make me pancakes in the morning, or debate me on endless “who-done-it” theories, or flash me that cutting little smirk when he thought he had won an argument.
“Until I know what he wants,” I had written in my pregnancy journal, “I can’t trust him at all.”
And I wouldn’t know until the babies were born.
So, as I’d always done, I mentally prepared for the worst. No more bathtub forays. No more stalking him on socials. No more relaxing in bed where our shoulders almost touch.
Even during my 20-week anatomy scan where lying on my back made me feel like I was slowly drowning on my own lungs, I had refused to grab Beau’s hand for support.
But the pain and discomfort of the ultrasound had been worth it. Other than the fact that the twins were measuring a little big thanks to their six-foot-two father, Dr. Ornelas confirmed that my babies were absolutely perfect.
Even better, I found out that Twin A was my daughter and Twin B was my son.
After the appointment, Beau and I had faced-off across the kitchen island, negotiating names. I wouldn’t budge on last names and he also dug his feet into the mud on the issue.
Only after hours of debate did we reach a compromise—I would choose first names and he would choose middle names, with either of us having veto power if the names didn’t roll off the tongue or wouldn’t look good on a resume.
The last name issue was tabled to keep us—OK, to keep me—from burning the house down.
Whether they would bear the name Adams or Fontaine, we at least knew what to call our babies.
Our daughter would be Annie Cherie and our son would be Brady Louis.
Ashley had lost her mind when we told her the good news. She gave me the biggest hug, covering my entire front in sawdust, and promised that she would throw us a huge baby shower in Miss Kaye’s house as soon as the renovation was finished.
Even though I trusted Ashley to come through on showering me with gifts, my nesting instincts had kicked in and I wanted to go shopping.
I had Beau drive his truck to the city in case I saw something on sale that I wanted to haul back. Only when Beau and I walked through the sliding doors of the store and I was assaulted with the sight of heart-shaped mylar balloons and legions of flowers did I realize it was Valentine’s Day.
Beau, on the other hand, didn’t appear to notice.
We walked past dozens of frantic husbands buying armfuls of gifts and camped out in the baby section of the store.
I let Beau get lost in the pastel clothing racks while I studied the more important baby gear to figure out what I wanted to add to the registry.
The choices were dizzying, but all my prior research from online blogs and Ashley’s tried-and-true expertise had helped me narrow down what I wanted.
Even though I had perused the aisles for cribs, double strollers, carseats, and even sheet sets, Beau only happened to find me when I was comparing breast pumps.
He gave a discerning eye to the row of display models and wrinkled his nose. “Please tell me you aren’t looking into these torture devices to save money. You know we can afford formula.”
His use of “we” made my skin crawl.
“My boobs, my business,” I said plainly. I took a wearable pump off the display shelf and examined it. “The Aspen model 9 is nice. I can just pop these into my bra and pump while I work.”
He let out a short sigh. “You don’t have to work, you know.”
I cut him a glare. “I want to work.”
Beau shifted the green basket full of clothes from one hand to the other, but still gave me a little smirk. “Well, I suppose it would be a tragedy for society if you were no longer around to bully Herringbone.”
Finally, he was starting to see things my way.
The basket of clothes caught my eye and I reached down to pick up a blue sleep-and-play with brown puppies on the feet.
I shook my head as I held up the little footed onesie. “No, these have snaps. Ashley said we will hate ourselves unless we go with zippers.”
He rolled his eyes as I inspected the rest of the clothes he picked. I silently approved the texture and design of a few pieces, but recoiled as soon as my fingers touched slippery crimson fabric.
I yanked two tiny Lindsay University jerseys out of the basket. “Absolutely not. Put these back, or better yet, burn them!”
He snatched the jerseys back. “Every Fontaine has gone to Lindsay dating all the way back to my great-grandpa Louis! You won’t deny the twins their legacy just because you prefer obnoxious orange!”
I scoffed. “Fine. You can put my precious babies in that ghastly crimson on your weekends.”
“My weekends?”
“That’s how it works when parents share custody,” I explained. “Once I move out of the manor and start working, you get every other weekend and a big block of time in the summer when they start school.”
A muscle feathered in his cheek, but his eyes stayed cool. “And when they’re too young for school, Miss Lawyer?”
I swallowed. “Well…you wouldn’t get them overnight until they’re three—especially if I’m breastfeeding.”
He cut a cold glance to the shelf of pumps. “So that’s why you want to do it.”
“That’s not why,” I protested. “Did you know that breastmilk can strengthen a baby’s immune system—”
“Bore someone else with your titty trivia,” Beau said as he walked away. “Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to purge my basket of all your dreaded snaps.”
I hissed out a breath as I watched him disappear behind the aisles, but turned back to add the Aspen model 9 to my baby registry app.
Beau could be as pissy as he wanted—Annie and Brady needed their mother. I would never keep the babies away from him, but I had to be independent, I wanted to be independent.
Did he expect that our arrangement was going to end differently? That I would suddenly turn blonde, wear Lindsay crimson, and become the perfect Fontaine wife that stays at home all day to take care of the babies?
If he did, he was delusional. We were always meant to part ways after the babies were born. Besides, we weren’t even together!
I didn’t suck his dick because I liked him, I did it to prove a point—he couldn’t control me.
Listening to him whimper as I made him suffer was just an unexpected bonus.
I leaned against the shelf to take some pressure off my aching back as I scrolled through my registry list. I wasn’t going to register for double of everything—Beau could put in some work to figure out what diaper bags or other bullshit he wanted for his house.
What he did with the twins on his time was not my problem. He could dress them in Crimson Knight onesies with snap-fasteners if he wanted. Nothing he would do in that creepy manor would have anything to do with me or my life.
I finished adding the last item to my registry and looked for Beau. When I found him, the pile of clothes in his basket had only gotten taller. I was too tired to go through his likely ill-informed selections, so I merely waddled to the front to check out.
Beau batted my hand away when I tried to use my child support card to pay for the clothes, but I rebelled by buying myself a chocolate bar.
He pulled the truck around to the front of the store so I wouldn’t have to traverse the parking lot. When I climbed into the passenger seat, I caught a burst of red in the rearview mirror. I turned around and my heart skipped a beat when I found a vase holding a dozen red roses in the backseat.
I blinked, wondering if I had imagined it, but no—the flowers really were there. He must have snuck away and bought them while I was adding items to the registry.
Not counting the construction paper and glitter cards that everyone in fourth grade had put into my decorated shoebox, I never had a Valentine’s Day gift from a boy before.
“It’s tradition,” Beau explained as he drove out of the parking lot.
Heat crept across my cheeks. “W-what’s tradition?”
Beau reached behind him and grabbed two teddy bears, one pink and one blue, and set them on the center console between us. “My parents always got me gifts on Valentine’s Day, so I wanted to get gifts for the twins. The flowers are for you, technically, as a thank you for carrying them.”
I glanced at the flowers in the rearview mirror. For the twins. Just a thank you.
“Oh, right,” I breathed. “Who could forget Valentine’s Day in middle school when your parents sent a limousine to take you to lunch.”
He let out a short laugh. “That was a fun year—something I’d like to repeat with my own kids. Provided Valentine’s Day happens on my weekend, of course.”
I folded my arms on top of my belly and looked out the window. “We would alternate holidays, you know.” I sighed softly. “But I’ll let you have Valentine’s Day every year.”
I caught his little smile out of the corner of my eye. “Always a pleasure negotiating with you, Counselor Adams.”
I grabbed my green water jug out of the cup holder and took a big sip, letting the cool cucumber banish the heat that had built in my cheeks.
Tears fogged my vision as I stared at the passing buildings. I used to be so tough, but I cried over everything lately—lasagna that was cold in the center, losing the drawstring in my pants, or the sight of my mom’s ashes on the nightstand.
God, I wished I could just talk to my mom. Maybe she could make sense of what I felt.
Slowly, I picked up the pair of teddy bears and crushed them to my chest as I looked out the window. Hopefully, Beau would believe I was crying over the memory of my mom and not because the roses in the backseat were only technically for me.