Chapter 38
“Who’s here to show off their kitty?” Sutton said to the line of pet owners funneling into the First Baptist meeting hall.
“From the post-O glow, you’ve recently shown off your kitty,” Jo said from the line for large animal signups. So far it had been a cow, two llamas, five horses, and a temperamental emu.
“Is it that obvious?”
“Gurl! You looked like you’ve been tossed over a hay bale and barely lived to tell the tale. Not that I’m judging. I could use a good screw in the stables. I’ve always found tack rooms sexy.”
“Tack room? Isn’t that just where people put their saddles and equipment?”
“Ah, you’re forgetting the harness and reins. It’s a little kink of mine.”
Sutton kept her expression neutral, though she wanted to grin. She knew a man with a kink of his own. A man who liked to kneel and take instruction—and the afterglow of ordering him around still simmered low in her body.
“I’ll file that away for a rainy day,” Sutton said.
“Is that confirmation that you did the deed?”
“I am neither confirming nor denying that we had sexy-time.”
Jo made a face. “You need a damn intervention if you’re using words like sexy-time.”
“What would you call it?”
“Sex. Fucking. Screwing. Getting railed. Riding him like he’s late to the starting gate.
Letting him rearrange your insides. Doing the horizontal hokey-pokey.
Bumping uglies. Slap-and-tickle. Playing hide-the-salami.
Dropping your panties for the D. Mounting up and shouting ‘Yee-haw, take me, cowboy.’”
“Dear God,” Sutton muttered.
Jo shrugged. “Vocabulary is important.”
Sutton shook her head, still reeling from Jo’s verbal onslaught. “Why exactly are you in a drought? You’ve been on, what, six dates since I moved here?”
Jo rolled her eyes toward the ceiling like she was consulting a higher power. “Nine. And every single one of them was allergic to adventure. They want polite kisses and missionary with the lights off. Not one of those men wanted me to drop to my knees and take off their belt with my teeth.”
Sutton choked on a laugh. “Maybe because that sounds like a workplace injury waiting to happen.”
“I sign liability waivers in my sleep. I want a man who worships confidence. Who wants a little danger. Someone who doesn’t flinch when I say bite here.”
“And you don’t think that has anything to do with the sexy Coast Guardman who’s been home on medical leave?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You mean the one who stood ten feet away this morning at the donations table and pretended he wasn’t watching you like a heat-seeking missile?” Sutton pressed.
Jo crossed her arms, cheeks going pink. “He likes community involvement.”
“He likes you, Jo.”
Jo scoffed like Sutton’s statement was laced with judgment and edges. “He likes hazard pay and ocean rescues and public bicep flexing. He does not like women who know their way around a belt buckle.”
“You nearly snapped your own neck sneaking looks at him.”
“That was me stretching,” Jo snapped. “Neck flexibility is vital. Anyway, we haven’t spoken in eight years. We’ve mastered pretending the other doesn’t exist.”
“Could’ve fooled me. His eyes damn near combusted when you reached for the donation sheet and your bra strap slid down your shoulder.”
Jo groaned. “That was literacy, not longing. Literacy.”
“Uh-huh. So he’s the reason for the drought.”
“I’m temporarily selective.”
“That’s not a drought,” Sutton teased. “That’s waiting for your Coast Guard to dock his boat in your harbor.”
Jo snorted but didn’t deny it. “Well, my dock isn’t open for just anybody to slide into my harbor. Especially men who live in fatigues.”
Sutton laughed—right up until she noticed Vivi drifting toward them like she’d been hit by lightning and hadn’t finished processing the strike.
Vivi stopped in front of them, eyes wide and unfocused.
“I have news,” she whispered. “Or more like a secret. And you can’t tell anyone.”
Sutton straightened. Secrets she could handle. Hell, she was a professional at compartmentalizing. She could lock something in a vault and swallow the key. Her entire romantic life currently depended on keeping her mouth shut.
Jo leaned in, suddenly alert. “Secret about what?”
Vivi swallowed hard. “I’m late.”
Sutton lifted a brow in confusion. “We’re just getting started. There’s plenty of time to help setup and plenty left to do.”
Vivi looked from one to the other—panicked, hopeful, terrified. “Late late.”
It took half a second for understanding to hit. Sutton’s breath caught and Jo’s eyes went huge.
“Oh,” Sutton said softly.
“Ohhh,” Jo echoed—followed quickly by, “Holy shit.”
Sutton found her voice first. “Does Boone know?”
Vivi shook her head, eyes glossy. “Not yet. We’re not even married. This wasn’t the plan.”
Sutton squeezed her arm. “Neither was Lynlee. But the universe decided it was her time—and mine. Plans get shredded all the time. Families don’t have to make sense to anyone but the people in them.”
Jo tipped her head toward the sky. “Pa-lease. Boone will be over the freaking moon. That man would happily tattoo Property of Vivianna across his chest if you asked. The second he hears the word baby, he’s gonna build a crib, a bassinet, and probably a damn treehouse.”
That earned a breathy laugh from Vivi. “You really think so?”
“He’s already halfway obsessed with you,” Jo said. “Give him a kid? He’ll ascend. Tell him a-sap. Preferably before your uterus graduates to the second trimester.”
Sutton smirked. “Jo means tell him before you make yourself sick worrying.”
Vivi nodded, though the nerves remained.
Then Jo’s curiosity flared—blunt as ever. “Speaking of babies. Sutton, what happened to Lynlee’s father? You’ve never really said.”
Sutton went still. Not defensive, just preparing the truth. She didn’t tell the story often because people loved to turn it into some kind of cautionary tale or juicy gossip.
“She doesn’t have a father,” Sutton said. “Not in the usual sense. I signed up to be a surrogate. The plan was to help a family in need and walk away with some money to pay for med-school.”
“And?” Jo asked.
“And the lab screwed up,” Sutton said bluntly. “They used the wrong sample. A sperm donor instead of the father’s sperm.”
Vivi’s hand went to her chest. “Oh my God.”
“When the intended parents found out the baby wasn’t biologically theirs, they backed out,” Sutton continued. “They cut ties and wanted nothing to do with her.”
Jo cursed under her breath. “People like that shouldn’t get goldfish, let alone kids.”
Sutton didn’t disagree. “So I had two choices. Carry her to term and give her up for adoption, or put on my big girl ponytail and be her mother. And I knew what it felt like to be left behind, and I wasn’t doing that to a child.”
Neither Jo nor Vivi spoke. They just listened, as if wanting to really hear what Sutton was saying.
“I decided she was mine. Not because of biology, but because she deserved someone who wouldn’t disappear on her.
I brought her into this world, and I wasn’t going to hand her over to strangers.
I became a mom at nineteen and, yes, it was terrifying and messy, and I was all alone,” Sutton said.
“And I have never, not for a single second, regretted that choice. Not even when life gets so complicated it’s hard to see the light at the other end.
Not even when she threw peas at my face. Lynlee is the best thing I ever did.”
Jo blinked hard, fighting tears she’d deny later. “God, Sutton. You make the rest of us look like emotional toddlers.”
Vivi sniffed and swiped at her eyes. “Boone is going to be fine. He’s going to be better than fine.”
Sutton nodded. “Yeah, because love isn’t about a blueprint, it’s about showing up.”
“Speaking of showing up,” Jo said. “When are we staging a baby announcement intervention?”
Vivi laughed, watery but real. “Soon.”
Sutton squeezed both their hands, making a circle of friendship and love.
Life didn’t follow plans, but sometimes it led exactly where it needed to.