Chapter 24 Kari
TWENTY-FOUR
KARI
I stared out the window into the night. The city lights blinked below, little beacons in the dark. It reminded me of Christmas lights strung for miles in every direction. I could see why Cane and Jada loved this place—it felt like you were above the world, secluded from all the problems.
Except for the ones you brought there yourself.
Cane sat on an ottoman in front of the fireplace, his forearms resting on his knees. He watched me like a caged animal that he wanted to approach, but was afraid it would bite.
I sat on the couch across from him, wrapped up in a yellow blanket and nestled into Jada’s throw pillows.
“You going to tell me what’s going on?” my brother-in-law asked me.
I shrugged. “I don’t know. Max and I just had a little...disagreement and I just don’t know what to do.”
His lips hinted at a smile. “Remember the first time you met me? Not the night at Max’s, but the night we went to the bar?”
I nodded.
“And you ordered the third margarita? And I told you not to drink too much because I couldn’t guarantee your safety if you did?”
I nodded again, a smile touching my lips at the memory.
I thought he was an arrogant asshole. I wasn’t completely wrong, in retrospect.
But when he drove my car home to make sure I didn’t drive, I knew he wasn’t a complete dick.
Cane and I have always shared some sort of understanding—two black sheep that just “got” each other.
“What did you tell me, Kari?”
“I told you I would do whatever I damn well pleased.”
Cane smiled. “That’s what you should do right now.”
“Whatever I please?”
“I think you need to do whatever you want to do. I don’t know what to say. I rely on Max for this kind of shit. The fact that someone is asking me for advice is kind of scary.”
“Don’t think I don’t know that,” I muttered. I watched the lights blink again, wondering which light was Max’s. “I feel like I’m holding him back, Cane.”
“How do you figure that?”
I turned to face him head on. I wanted to say this bluntly, to get a true reaction out of him. “Look around. See all of this? This is what Max deserves.”
Cane shrugged. “I agree.”
“All of this—is something that I can’t give him.”
“What do you mean? Of course you can.”
I took a deep breath. “When I was a little girl...” The words caught in my throat.
I took a deep breath and started again, summoning the courage to hear the words out loud.
“When I was a little girl, I had an operation. It wasn’t anything serious, really, but there were a few complications. One of them was excessive scar tissue.”
Cane watched me intently, his blue eyes tender.
“I had to have another surgery when I was a teenager. Alice stayed with me in the hospital because Dad didn’t know what to do,” I laughed sadly.
“Anyway, to make a long story short and to avoid telling my brother-in-law details I’m not comfortable sharing about my anatomy, I was told that I most likely wouldn’t be able to have kids. ”
The realization shone in Cane’s eyes and he put his head in his hands briefly. He pulled his head up and his eyes back to me. “Fuck, Kari. I’m sorry. I had no idea.”
“Of course you didn’t. How could you have? But here’s the thing—I got pregnant by a miracle a few years ago and I lost the baby.”
Tears welled hot in my eyes and I didn’t even fight them. They spilled down my cheeks and onto the blanket.
“There’s a good chance that if I did want to try having a baby, I couldn’t carry it.
And feeling that pain of losing a child.
..” I hicupped through the tears, trying to keep my voice down so I didn’t wake Jada.
“I can’t do it again, Cane. I can’t. It’s the most painful thing in the entire world.
It’s enough that I don’t even want to try. ”
I pressed my face into the blanket and tried to get control of myself. Cane sat next to me and pulled me into his chest. He rocked me back and forth and just held me. I cried enough tears to fill a hole, but not one as deep as the crater in my heart.
Finally, I pulled away and wiped the hair stuck to my face out of my eyes. “I’m sorry,” I sniffled. “I’m just not used to talking about this.”
“Why?”
I shook my head. “I’ve never admitted this out loud to anyone except Max the other night—not even Jada. So please, don’t say anything. I’ll tell her, but not until later. Until she’s feeling better. It won’t do any good now, anyway.”
“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”
“I don’t want to sort through all of that, okay?”
He released a breath. “I’m glad you told Max.”
“Yeah, thanks to Sam. She somehow started dating my ex and brought him to dinner a couple of nights ago.”
Cane stood and walked back in front of the fireplace, his jaw working back and forth. “Do you think that’s a coincidence?”
“How could it not be?” I asked, dumbfounded.
“It’s Samantha. I put nothing past her. Where’s Max now?”
“Home, I guess.”
We watched the flames dance in the fireplace for a while. “If Jada told me she couldn’t have a baby, it wouldn’t matter to me.”
I raised my eyebrows. “Really?”
He shoved his hands in his pockets and turned to look at me.
“I love your sister. And yeah, the fact that we are having a baby—a human half me and half her—is beyond unbelievable. But really it’s just icing on the cake.
Because with or without a baby, it’s Jada that I want to spend my life with. I can’t live without her.”
“I’m so glad you found each other.”
“Yeah, me, too,” he laughed. “But the point is this, this...condition of yours, or whatever you want to call it, it isn’t a deal breaker.
I see why you would feel like you are holding Max back.
I get it. But looking at it from his perspective, it’s his call, Kari.
And I know Max better than Max knows Max and he doesn’t give a shit. ”
“You think?” My breath caught in my throat at the tiny bit of hope creeping into my chest.
“I know. I’m always right, you know,” he winked.
“Sure you are.” I leaned back against the couch, mulling over Cane’s words. “You really think I’m not being selfish by being involved with him, knowing what you know now?”
Cane gave me the smile that, if he could, he should patent. It was cocky and thoughtful, juvenile, yet wise beyond his years. It was just Cane. “It would be selfish for you to keep your love from him. He needs it, Kari. He needs you.”
“I need him, too. That’s the problem. I need him so much that if he ever left me like Blaine...”
“Whoa, back up. He left you when he found out you were pregnant? You’re joking right?”
I shook my head, a little wary at Cane’s tone.
“And he’s in the Valley?”
“Stop it,” I warned him.
He laughed angrily. “Who the fuck does that? Did he know about your medical issues?”
“Yeah and that’s another problem with Max. He doesn’t get why I told Blaine and I didn’t tell him.”
Cane turned and faced me, his face solemn. “So, why didn’t you?”
I blew out a breath, trying to find the words to explain it.
“It’s a lot easier to tell someone when they don’t want kids and you’re both kids yourself.
The weight of ‘family’ and ‘children’ isn’t the same.
” I played with the tassels on the edge of the blanket.
“And I didn’t love him like I love Max,” I said softly.
“Max is a man. He means so much to me. I didn’t want him looking at me like I was diseased or flawed or half the woman that other women are. ”
“You’re serious right now?”
“Of course I am.”
He stroked his chin. “I guess I see your point. If I couldn’t have kids, I don’t know how that would feel, as a man. But I can tell you how it feels from this side of the coin—it doesn’t fucking matter.”
“Maybe it does, maybe it doesn’t. But now that he knows the truth, I want to give him the chance to walk if he’s going to.
If you’re wrong and this is a deal breaker for him, I want to give him the opportunity to walk away now before things get messier.
That’s why I left tonight. We were having a disagreement anyway.
It gives him a chance to walk scot free. ”
“He won’t walk. Mark my words.”