24. Sloane #2
She’s followed by Bella, who immediately dumps her shoes in the hall and surveys the room like she’s looking for crime scene evidence.
“Where’s Olivia?” she asks, as if the baby isn’t attached to my body.
I do a dramatic Vanna White sweep to indicate the infant carrier. “Currently crowd surfing. Want to hold her?”
Bella blanches. “I’ll admire from a distance.”
“She’s in the Angel phase,” Eden calls, making air quotes. “Just don’t get between her and a pacifier, or you’ll lose a finger.”
Becca is already uncorking the wine and setting out glasses, never mind that it’s a Tuesday and the only cheese we have in the house is Kraft singles. She sits next to Eden on the couch, places a hand on her knee. “What’s the latest in the English Drama Department?”
Eden launches into the abridged version of the tale, all while Bella paces the perimeter of the living room, occasionally pausing to inspect our childproofing efforts.
The two of them are a walking “Good Cop/Worse Cop” act. Becca listens, nods, pours more wine, and then, when Eden is out of gas, says, “You know you’re still the favorite, right?”
Eden rolls her eyes. “They just don’t want to miss out on time with my Gran and Grandad before it’s too late.”
“Which is a valid excuse,” Becca agrees. “But don’t forget, you are their Golden Child. They’ll be back to visit every six months, and in between, you’ll get seventeen ‘care packages’ of tea and biscuits.”
I watch the way Becca’s simple logic thaws Eden’s dramatics. She makes it sound so boring, so survivable, that Eden has no choice but to laugh.
Olivia starts to fuss, so I take her to the kitchen and try to rock her back to sleep with a combination of motion, soft curses, and the scent of leftover coffee.
The walls are thin enough that I can still hear the conversation in the other room.
Bella is telling a story about her own mother’s passive-aggressive war with her neighbor, and Eden is giggling—really giggling, the way she only does when she’s three glasses deep and feeling safe.
It’s a sound I haven’t heard in a while.
Becca slips into the kitchen, carrying her glass and the juice box. She watches me for a minute. “You seem…tense.”
“That obvious?”
She takes a long sip of wine. “You’re a hundred degrees hotter than normal.”
“Is it the shirt? I did laundry today.”
She laughs. “No, I mean you are literally glowing. Like, sex-starved, desperate-wife glowing.”
I almost drop the baby. “Jesus, Becca.”
Olivia makes a grab for my earring and yanks, hard. I yelp, which makes Becca snort into her glass.
“Okay, maybe I’m losing my mind,” I admit, whispering so the others can’t hear. “I haven’t wanted anyone this bad since the first time we hooked up. But it’s not the right time. Eden is fragile. I don’t want to bulldoze her.”
Becca gets serious, which is rare. “You’re not bulldozing. You’re married. You have a baby. If you want your wife, go get her. Just…be gentle.”
I want to tell her that “gentle” isn’t in my vocabulary right now, but the words won’t come.
She leans in, and for a second I think she’s going to hug me, but instead she just pokes my arm. “Go. We’ll get out of your hair.”
I laugh, and it feels like the first real breath in hours. “Thank you, Becca.”
She winks. “Go get your woman.”
By the time I get back to the living room, Eden has rearranged herself so she’s lying with her head in Bella’s lap, legs sprawled across the back of the couch, and she’s telling an elaborate story about the time her mum was arrested for shoplifting a tin of treacle. Bella is enthralled.
Eden sees me and smiles, the kind that makes my stomach do the floor-drop thing.
“Did you hear the part about the security guard and the fire extinguisher?”
I shake my head. “You’ll have to reenact it for me later.”
“Oh, I will,” Eden says, with a look that could launch a thousand ships or at least a really enthusiastic bar fight.
Becca stands, stretching with a yawn. “I have to work tomorrow.”
Bella finishes her wine, makes a show of checking the bottle for dregs, and then says, “We should do this every week. I feel like I lost three years of stress just sitting here.”
We all kiss and say goodnight. I lock the door behind them, turn, and find Eden standing at the edge of the living room, arms crossed, bare feet digging into the carpet.
She’s looking at me so intensely I think I could orgasm on the spot.
I shuffle over to her, peeking at Olivia, who is fast asleep in her bassinet.
We stand there, toe to toe, for a heartbeat. I want to reach for her, but I also want her to make the first move, just this once.
She must sense it. She slides her hands under my shirt and finds my skin, warm and shivering. “I know that look, Bishop. Are you really ready?”
“More than,” I say, because there’s no point pretending anymore.
She grins, sharp and wild. “Good.”
That’s when I realize Eden has been waiting just as long as I have. She hasn’t made a move because she needed to know I was ready.
We don’t make it to the bedroom. We barely make it to the couch. She pushes me down, crawls onto my lap, and for a minute the rest of the world drops away. There’s just her. Her hands, mouth, tongue, all of her pressing down on me like we’re the only two people left in the state.
She tastes of wine. We get tangled, lose track of whose shirt is whose, and in the rush I manage to elbow a throw pillow onto the floor and nearly take out the baby monitor.
Somewhere in the distance, Olivia starts to fuss, but I don’t care. I want Eden, all of her, right now.
She pulls away, just for a second, breathing hard. “If you want to stop—”
“Don’t you fucking dare,” I say, and yank her back in.