Chapter 45
Forty-Five
“You broke the bed?” Remy’s in pure awe as she lifts her mug for Rue to pour coffee. “Does Mom know?”
“I heard the whole thing,” Mom shouts from another room.
I grin before firing back with, “Just paying you back for all the times we heard you and Dad.”
“My God,” Remy says. “What’s gotten into you?”
“She’s besotted,” Mom hollers.
“I am not besotted,” I argue.
Rue snorts gesturing with the coffeepot. “Mom loves that word. You want coffee?”
I fully judge her. “Do you even care about egg quality?”
She rolls her eyes and returns the pot to its home before taking a slurpy sip. At my look, she gives me a too-wide smile. “It’s no London Fog, but it’ll do.”
“Who cares about that?” Remy says over her mug. “What does this mean?”
“Means he screws better than he mows,” I tell her. “I almost applauded. What would your weird author call that?”
“A damn good time,” she says instantly. “But I don’t mean the sex, I mean everything else.” She sets her mug down and runs a hand through her hair. “Does this mean you’re—” Her eyes bounce to Rue then back to me. “Staying?”
I take a sip of my beetroot juice; it’s fucking gross. “I don’t know.”
My I don’t know makes it sound much simpler than it really is.
It’s been one week since the bed breaking.
On the surface, it’s business as usual. He’s mowing, I’m at the vineyard.
Nancy has settled in nicely to her new house.
Eventually, Addie will start taking a bus to her after school, but since she loves the vineyard so much, she’s still coming there for me to take her home on days she doesn’t have rehearsal.
Only we don’t go home until Gavin gets off work and comes by the shop.
Then we have dinner together with my mom and play a board game.
Starting next week, the tasting room will be open on Thursdays and Fridays for the rest of October to test business without Nash being the sole driver of the customer base.
I’ve been working to get that ready, finally finding two people I could hire in good conscience: two housewives looking for something to do now that their kids are grown.
They reminded me of Mom, though I’ll never tell her that.
With me in there working alone midday all week, Gavin has stopped by on his lunch breaks to check on things at the shop or push my panties to the side.
Usually both.
Only on Wednesday, it was us out at the shop, him telling me he was working on the house side again. He showed me two sample slabs of marble he was debating between for the kitchen counter and asked for my opinion.
“Why now?” I asked, tracing the white slab with my fingertips. I knew it wasn’t the money.
“Timing’s right.” He kissed me, setting the slab off to the side. “And maybe I need to start thinking about the future.” His hands wrapped around my waist. “Or found someone who reminded me this is what I want.”
It was the perfect time for me to tell him I still don’t know.
For me to say we’re moving too fast, and I haven’t figured out how this works or where his barndo fits into all that.
Only instead of saying any of that, I wrapped my arms around him and we dropped to the unfinished concrete floor.
It wasn’t a bed-breaking fuck; he made love to me right there in the middle of construction debris with concrete scraping my back and dust clinging to my hair.
“I lava you, Reese,” he whispered as he rocked me.
I dug my fingernails into his back and cried as I came.
Followed by the unfortunate sound of the ocarina and a nasally, “I love it when I’m right.”
With Gavin’s bare ass up and me naked beneath him and nothing hidden by the midday sun filling the room, I glared at Banyan. “Do you knock?”
He cocked his chin, staring at us—interlocked—and said, “Door was open and the sweet song of euphoric pleasure called my name, Fire Lady. No knocking required.”
Gavin simply laughed, told Banyan to get the hell out, and when he obliged, finished what he started.
It was after that I realized that even though on paper none of this makes sense, for reasons I don’t have the words for or a proven formula to support, this is where I want to be.
Despite the money I’ll lose and how uncertain it is, I can’t walk away from this.
Him. He is the thing I didn’t believe existed but does.
I’ll run the vineyard and make it thrive and turn Nancy’s house into an inn or short-term rental, then I’ll raise my kids—our kids—in the place I imagined I would when I was teenager.
And if the vineyard goes south, I could consult.
It’s a way to stay in the PE world without staying in the PE world.
I can do that work from anywhere, travel as needed.
Hell, the Rutledge Group would likely keep me busy enough I wouldn’t have to market myself at all.
Like starting a business from scratch where the scratch is a gold-plated foot in the door.
But Gavin called it when he said I needed to keep my appointment—I need to hear all my options—about everything—before I decide, even if I already know my decision.
I’ll go to the appointment next week, then I’ll go back to Chicago and tell The Family I’m done.
I want to leave on good terms, and I want to do it in person.
And, fine, I kind of want to see if there’s any regret over sending me on this little hiatus flashing across Trish’s face when I share the news.
“What about the baby?” Remy asks, pulling me out of my head and back to the kitchen.
“I had my bloodwork last week and exam yesterday,” I say, choking on my next sip. I’ll be sure to tell my unborn child about the measures it took to bring them life. “And I meet with the doctor next week to go over everything. And then . . .”
With this, Mom’s in the kitchen. “Then what? You finally put an end to this nonsense?”
Probably, but she doesn’t need to know that. I’m not committing myself into a corner until I know all the options.
“It’s not nonsense that I’m forty and don’t want to be an old maid like Rue when I’m pregnant.”
Rue scoffs. “Because forty is so much younger than forty-two.” She rolls her eyes. “Numbers, so tricky.”
“And maybe I don’t want to wait,” I add.
“I’m ready now, I want this, and—” All three of them open their mouths to argue but I talk over them.
“And it’s not about work. I want a baby.
You all have babies, and I’m a hell of a lot better equipped than you.
” They mumble their objections. “And,” I say louder, “I can admit that I care about Gavin. I might even—” They inch forward in anticipation.
“Really like him. But I have to be pragmatic. I can’t just throw one plan away because he’s . . .”
“Perfect for you,” Mom finishes, putting a kettle on the stove.
I roll my shoulders. “I was going to say unexpected.”
“And you love him,” Remy adds.
“Will you stop saying that?” I snap. “I’ve barely known him two months, I can’t love him in that amount of time. Statistically speaking it takes women three months to fall in love.”
Remy pours herself another cup of coffee. “Way to make romance sterile.”
“Well maybe if you would have—” She stills, and I swallow my Darren-driven snark. “It doesn’t make sense.”
The kettle screams as Mom says, “Rue fell in love with Nash in about three minutes.”
Rue nods. “A little longer than that, but not much.”
“I’ve always wanted to model my love life after the woman who lied about her husband dying for nearly a decade.”
Rue throws a grape at me. “Bitch.”
“You haven’t only known him two months,” Mom corrects, settling in a chair next to me. “You knew him when you were kids.”
“Gross, Mom.” I make a face. “Him being seven doesn’t count as knowing him. That makes me sound like a freak.”
Mom bats her hand at my semantics and bobs her tea bag in the hot water.
“Not that you’re asking me,” Remy says, “but I think you should wait. I think you and Gavin are perfect—you smile more now than you have the first forty years of your life.” I can’t argue, it’s practically permanent.
“And you might be in denial about loving him, but he loves you. And he’s not a man with commitment issues.
You tell him you want a baby—” Her brows raise.
“I’d bet every -gasm I can think of that he’d give you one ASAP. ”
I do not tell them he already has nor that I’ve imagined what it looks like if he did.
Him in the hospital, holding my hand—I bet he’d flip that hat backward as I scream obscenities and push his future son or daughter into the world. Part of me would want it to be a boy, just to see him with a son.
I can see him singing songs and telling bad jokes with a baby in his arms. See me leaning against him on the couch as Addie recites every line from Overboard and a baby sleeps on my chest.
I can see it all. With him.
It sends warmth rising from my womb to my ribs.
“Well—” I raise my glass of beet juice. “It’s a good thing I didn’t ask your opinion.”