But their mothers were watching. And the last thing she wanted was for them to start getting ideas about her relationship with Kevin.
Platonic.
That was the word she wanted cemented in their minds, not
wedding
or
bride.
When the guys got together to start loading the gifts into Kevin’s Jeep and whatever other large vehicles were handy, the knot eased up so, as the mother-to-be, she helped herself to a second slice of cake.
Paulie plopped down in the chair next to her. “You’re going to be sorry when the sugar rush hits the baby and it starts kicking the shit out of your bladder.”
Beth licked the buttercream frosting off her fork. “I don’t care.”
Paulie snagged a plate with a half-eaten slice abandoned by one of the kids. “I don’t either.”
“You kept your promise. Don’t think I didn’t notice.”
Paulie shrugged. “I promised you I wouldn’t give you anything else for a baby shower gift. I didn’t, however, promise not to give the baby a gift.”
She couldn’t remember seeing a gift for the baby with Paulie’s name on the tag. Whatever it was, though, it was too much after all the money she’d spent on maternity clothes.
“I’ve got some paperwork for you in my apartment. I set up a college fund for the little munchkin.” The amount she said made Beth gasp.
She opened her mouth to protest, but Paulie shushed her. “I know it’s a lot, but you and Kev? You’re my family. That kid’s my family and I like knowing that, no matter what happens, he or she’s going to get a solid start on life.”
Beth threw her arms around Paulie’s neck and tried not to cry. “Thank you so much.”
“You’re welcome.” She pulled away and swiped at what might have been a tear of her own. “Enough sappy stuff.”
“Okay. So, how are things with you and Sam?”
“All right, I guess. We’ve been spending a lot of time together. Having fun. He’s practically staying at my place now.”
“That’s really great, Paulie.”
She shrugged. “For now. We’ll see what happens when this job is over and it’s time for him to go back to Boston. He asked me to go back, to a fundraiser thing. I said no. Things have been a little awkward since.”
“But he’s still here.”
“Well, the sex is good.”
Beth groaned. “I need another piece of cake.”
“Don’t tell me you’re substituting sweets for sex when you’ve got a guy like Kevin watching you the way he’s watching you now.”
She didn’t let herself turn around and look for him. “We’re just friends.”
“Uh-huh. Looks like they’re passing out the baby shower bingo cards. Get ready to find out how cutthroat this family is when it comes to games.”
“I know they’re all pretty good at getting their way.”
“Kevin hasn’t yet.”
Beth shrugged and swallowed past the lump in her throat. “Sure he has. He wants a baby. He’s getting one.”
“He wants you.”
“Sure, because it’s a package deal. Instant family.”
Paulie shook her head and put a hand on her arm. “Tell me you don’t really think that.”
She was going to tell her she wasn’t sure what she thought, but Stephanie was there, giving them each a bingo card and then the games started. The moment for conversation was over.
But the thought remained, festering in the back of her mind as usual.
“It’s dead tonight,” Paulie said. “I’m taking a couple hours off.”
Kevin looked at the clock and shrugged. “Go for it. If we get slammed, I’ll call you, but I don’t think that’s going to be a problem. Oh, are you sure you don’t mind covering my shift Wednesday night?”
“Are you kidding me? Working the bar, imagining you sitting through a childbirth class? Gonna be the best night of my life.”
She was gone before he could ask her what was really wrong because she didn’t usually split when it was slow. More often than not, she’d pull up a seat and chat up whatever regulars were in the place.
He figured it out a mere five minutes later when Sam Logan walked in and sat in his usual spot. Paulie was avoiding the guy for some reason, and Kevin wanted to know why. After drawing him a Michelob, he walked over himself instead of handing the brew off to Darcy.
“How’s it going?” Sam asked casually.
“Can’t complain. And nobody’d listen if I did.” He set the beer down, then pulled out a chair for himself.
Sam cocked an eyebrow, but didn’t say anything. They’d exchanged some small talk, of course. Sports and the weather and topics along those lines, but they weren’t exactly friends.
May as well skip the song and dance. “What’s going on between you and Paulie?”
“Guessing if it was any of your business, you wouldn’t have to ask.”
Fair enough. “Paulie’s like a sister to me and—”
“And I love her.”
“Oh.” Well, that killed the
what are your intentions
question. “Is that why she’s avoiding you?”
“I’d guess she’s avoiding me because I asked her to go to some stupid party with me.”
“In Boston?”
“Yeah, a charity event.”
Kevin leaned back in his chair, trying to figure out where the hell he’d go from there. It’s not like the guy was mistreating her by inviting her to a party. And yet, he’d made her unhappy and Paulie was as apt to throw Sam out of her life as try to work through it. He didn’t think that would make her happy, either.
There was a fine line between looking out for a friend and sticking his nose where it didn’t belong. “Did you know her mother started having Paulie’s hair dyed when she was
four
because it was too red?”
“I know the Athertons personally, so that doesn’t surprise me.” Sam took a sip of his beer, then wrapped both hands around the frosted mug. “I wasn’t asking her to quit her job and go be a Stepford wife. I invited her to the most fun, casual event on the calendar. And I didn’t push when she said no.”
Kevin accepted the water bottle Darcy handed him with thanks, then started picking at the label. “She doesn’t want to go back there.”
“Didn’t ask her to move. Just one night.” Sam slouched in his chair, looking less like an arrogant trust-fund baby and more like a regular schmuck having his heart broken. “I can’t let her walk away from me again.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to tell the guy to be patient, but he couldn’t spit out the words. He had enough experience with trying to be patient and it sucked. Royally. And, as far as he could tell, it didn’t get a guy anywhere but frustrated.
He’d seen the effect his teasing about the chocolate cake had on Beth at the baby shower but, as usual, she’d resisted caving to what he knew she felt as badly as he did. And they were back to square one. Neighbors having a baby while one of them slowly died inside.
Sam scowled at his beer. “I think this is where you give me some lame shit about being patient and, if it’s meant to be, she’ll come around. And I say, right back atcha.”
Kevin laughed and twisted the top off his water. “How ’bout them Red Sox?”
“Beckett looked damn good the other night. And Papelbon’s in good form.”
“Keeping us in first. Yankees coming up. Should be a helluva game.”
Like real men did, they spent the next hour talking sports, both pretending they weren’t upset by the fact they had no clue how to make their women happy.
***
Airport chairs weren’t the most comfortable seat for a pregnant woman, but Beth wanted to spend every last minute she could with her parents before they got on a plane back to Florida. They’d be flying back when the baby was born, but she was going to miss them in the meantime.
When her father went off in search of coffee, her mother’s expression turned serious and she rested her hand on Beth’s knee. “Honey, Kevin seems like a very nice young man.”
And here it came. “He is nice. One of the nicest guys I’ve ever met, actually.”
“Mary told me he wants to have a relationship with you, but that you’re insisting you only want to be friends.”
“It’s complicated.”
“Love usually is.”
The word hit her like a wrecking ball and, going to miss her or not, she was tempted to get up and walk away. “There’s no love, Mom. We had a one-night stand. He collects women’s numbers on cocktail napkins, for goodness’ sake. And I would never have seen him again if I hadn’t gotten pregnant.
“We were done with each other and a defective condom doesn’t change that. We had no future together before, so therefore any future we have now is only due to the baby and I don’t want to spend the rest of my life knowing that.”
Her mother squeezed her hand, but didn’t say anything. She probably knew Beth well enough to know there was more.
And there was. “I was going to Albuquerque. That’s where I was going to go next, but then I met Kevin and I was stupid enough to sleep with him and now everything’s different. My entire life is different and upside down and I’m tied to him forever because he’s going to be a great dad.
“He overwhelms me and I’m already so overwhelmed I don’t know what to do. I can’t think straight when I’m around him, but what we do will have such a huge effect on the baby’s life. And I just don’t want to spend my life wondering if Kevin really wanted me, or if I was just the first woman to give him a child.”
Pouring her guts out was exhausting and, when her mother pulled Beth’s head to her shoulder and stroked her hair, she didn’t resist. For once she didn’t feel smothered. Just comforted. “You’ve always been independent. And stubborn about it. You were only four years old when you told me you didn’t need me to tuck you in anymore and you could do it yourself. I could never make you understand it wasn’t whether or not you could do it. It was about sharing those last few minutes of your day with you. You have a way of not letting people in.”
“If I let him in any more than I have, I’m going to fall in love with him and there’s no going back from there.”
“I think you’ve both fallen in love a little already.”
Beth closed her eyes to will the tears away. “We’re okay right now. We’re friends and, as long as it stays the way it is now, we’ll stay friends. But if we think we’re in love and get married, what if someday he realizes he was more in love with the idea of a family than with me? Or what if I realize I only thought I loved him because he’s such a great guy and I’m not sure I could go through this without him?”
“At least you’ll have tried.”
“And if we fail, it’ll be ugly. Love doesn’t end amicably and I don’t want us to hate each other. I don’t want that for the baby. I want her—or his—parents to be friends.”
When she opened her eyes, she could see her father coming, trying to balance two paper cups of coffee and a bottle of water. A waiter, he wasn’t. Straightening, she swiped at her face, not wanting to look upset.
“Take it slow if you need to,” her mother said. “Just don’t close yourself off to him completely.”
“I can’t,” she muttered. “He won’t let me.”
Her dad handed out the beverages and Beth took a long drink of water, hoping to knock the last of the lump out of her throat. She was tired and uncomfortable in the chair. Plus, she hadn’t slept worth a damn since Kevin, the rotten bastard, had whispered naughty things in her ear about chocolate cake and licking sticky frosting. He’d done that on purpose, hoping she’d get so wound up she’d fall back into bed with him.
Instead she was just wound up with no intention of falling back into bed with him, which meant staying wound up. Payback was a bitch though and, since he’d insisted on being her birthing partner, she was going to have the satisfaction of watching him suffer through childbirth classes. If anything would kill the mood, that would. She hoped.
Much too soon, it was time for her parents to go through security and they each wrapped her in long, lingering hugs. She kept the tears back by sheer willpower, but it wasn’t easy.
“We’ll be back when it’s time for the baby,” her mother told her. “But if you have any problems at all, just call. We’ll come as soon as we can.”
“I’ll be fine, Mom. You met Kevin’s family. Even if I wanted to be left alone, I wouldn’t stand a chance.”
“Take care of my grandbaby,” her father said gruffly and then he wisely pulled his wife away before both women could dissolve in puddles of hysterical sobbing.
When she couldn’t see them anymore, Beth turned and, after a trip to the ladies’ room for a pit stop and quick cry, she walked out the front entrance of Manchester’s busy airport.
Kevin was there, down the curb a bit, leaning against the Jeep. He smiled when she saw him and she shook her head. “I don’t think you’re allowed to park here.”
“Yeah.” He opened the door for her. “The guy started to tell me that, but he got distracted by Red Sox tickets. Seems his son’s sixteenth birthday happens to fall on a night we’re playing the Yankees.”
“Do you just carry sports tickets around with you?”
“Only if I think I might need them.” He closed her door and walked around the front of the Jeep.
Once they were out of the parking lot, he looked over at her. “I thought it might be hard, your parents leaving. Didn’t want you stuck being emotional with some strange cab driver.”
“Why do you have to be such a nice guy?”
He flashed his dimples at her. “You’ve met my mother. Too scared not to be.”
It made it so much harder to resist him, though. “Thank you.”
“You know what would cheer you up?”
Licking frosting off his stomach before having hot and sweaty and sticky sex?
“Ice cream,” he said.
“Strawberry?” Not nearly as good, but better for her in the long run.
His grin was on the wrong side of naughty. “Not chocolate?”
“No chocolate. Strawberry.”
“With hot fudge? And whipped cream?”
She couldn’t help laughing. “No. Just plain old strawberry ice cream.”
He looked like he was going to say something else, but then he just smiled. “I know just the place.”
***
Kevin was ruined. No way in hell was he going to have a normal relationship with a woman’s vagina ever again.
Shit. He was even using the word
vagina.
He was totally, irretrievably ruined as a man.
Even if his balls should ever relax and leave the shelter of his body, he was pretty sure they’d beat a fast retreat next time he encountered a…vagina. He needed to scrub that word—and the instructor’s chipper voice—out of his mind. Or drown it out with a beer. Or tequila shots. Hell, he’d take the whole bottle.
“Are you okay?” It didn’t sound like Beth was even
trying
to hide her amusement.
“No.” The instructor’s voice bounced around in his mind like a rabid, chatty chipmunk. Vagina. Dilation. Effacement.
Mucous plug,
for chrissake.
“Do you want me to drive?”
He shook his head and forced himself to loosen his grip on the steering wheel. Having to drive was the only thing keeping him from curling up in the fetal position.
Fetal. Baby.
Vagina.
Dammit.
And Beth was laughing at him. “You’re the one who bullied your way into being my birthing partner.”
“I’m the baby’s father,” he said through clenched teeth. “I have to be there.”
“I was going to ask your mom, actually.”
It was on the tip of his tongue to bail. His mom being her birthing partner was the best idea he’d heard in a long time. She was a woman. She’d given birth to four kids of her own, raised one daughter and had five grandchildren. Certainly she couldn’t be a stranger to the workings of the…female body part that couldn’t be named.
That would be a huge step for Beth, too, as far as accepting she was a part of his family. Who was he to stand in the way of progress?
“No,” he heard himself respond. “I want to be there for you. I just hope, when the time comes, I’m closer to your head than your feet.”
She laughed, long enough and hard enough so he started keeping an eye out for places with public restrooms. Hopefully she’d make it home, but the woman had to pee more often than a toddler on a road trip.
“That was just a movie. How are you going to survive the live event?”
“Drunk?” Like he wished he currently was. “Let’s change the subject.”
“Okay. Have you thought about names?”
“You told me it was bad luck to pick a name.”
“That was before. So if it’s a girl, what would you think about naming her after Paulie? You’re so close and she’s been such a good friend to me.”
“She hates Paulette, but Paulie Kowalski? Sounds weird, and I’m not sure I can handle two Paulies in my life.”
“She told me her middle name is Lillian and she kept it when she changed her name because it was her grandmother’s name. It means something to her.”
“Lillian’s a bit old-fashioned, isn’t it?”
“I was thinking Lily.”
Lily.
He liked that. “Lily Ann, instead of Lillian?”
“Lily Ann Kowalski. I like it. What if it’s a boy?”
Since he’d been wondering for the last few weeks how to broach the subject of the baby’s last name, it was a huge relief to hear her say it straight out. He wasn’t sure if she’d want the baby to have her last name because they weren’t married, or if she’d want to hyphenate it. Hansen-Kowalski didn’t really work for him. “How about Carl Yastrzemski?”
“Carl Yastrzemski Kowalski? What the hell kind of name is that?”
“I can’t believe I even let you in my bar.” How did he end up with a woman who knew absolutely nothing about sports? “Yaz was only the greatest left fielder ever. A Red Sox icon.”