Dare Me, Part Two Dare Duet Sawyer and Billie: Unchained Attraction Series

by Shandwick, K. L.

  “Fuck me,” I blurted. “Sorry, you mean she’ll be like this for months?” My heart sank and ached simultaneously at the thought. Poor Billie looked so pale and fragile and I was partly to blame for this.

  “Well maybe, maybe not. But given your age and the multiple pregnancy I think we’ll be monitoring you very closely.” I glared at the doctor and almost growled at his age comment, but he was the expert and I knew there were higher risks of complications in older women. Tammy was thirty-eight and she had said no more, with three healthy girls she wasn’t willing to take the risk.

  The doctor went on to glean more information from Billie, such as her method of birth control, her OBGYN’s name and how her previous pregnancy had gone. As he listened, he casually turned off the ultrasound scanner and wiped Billie’s abdomen clean. I sat in a stunned silence as they spoke and heard Billie describing her pregnancy and Colby’s birth.

  As the news of the babies sank in, their voices faded and their mouths moved, but I heard very little as chaotic thoughts ran through my mind. Billie’s health came first, no matter what, and my heart clenched when I wondered what she might have felt inside right then.

  Thoughts then skipped to the future and how she would cope with two more babies, and Colby’s feelings too. Eventually when I could no longer suppress them, my own thoughts came, which were mainly ecstatic, but quickly swamped in concerns for my wife, Colby’s feelings in light of how James had felt when I was born, and lastly my commitment to my band.

  How could I reasonably walk away from the love of my life and leave her with the burden of three small people to care for and follow my other passion—my music?

  When the doctor stood and left the room, I pushed this last selfish thought to the back of my mind and stared in silence for a long moment, worried for Billie.

  Inside I knew this was a pivotal moment for us and that whatever came out of my mouth had to be the absolute truth and the best words I’d ever utter in support of her. It was one thing to have a plan, but this sudden change in our circumstances had taken the decision to have a child out of our hands.

  As touching as I’d wanted my sentiment to be, my mind was a fog of emotions which had been stuck in my chest. They quickly turned into words that burst out of my mouth unfiltered.

  “Fuck me, twins? Are you really okay with this? I mean … I know you said …”

  Billie held her hand up and spewed watery vomit into a bowl again, and my heart cracked. She was in no fit state to answer my question, and I felt helpless as I stroked her arm, because there was physically nothing else I could do for her.

  “Try and rest, we’ll deal with everything tomorrow,” I told her firmly. She nodded but retched again, and I knew there was no point in trying to tackle such a huge topic in her state.

  When she’d said she had wanted to have a baby I had felt it was a massive decision, especially as Colby was ten now. Inside I had felt overjoyed that she had thought about this, but the reality of her being pregnant, with not one baby but two, was more than either of us had bargained for, and I had to be sure this was what she wanted.

  I was worried and delighted in equal measure, but I felt that apart from keeping house, taking care of Colby when needed, supporting them both emotionally and financially, my role was more passive than active in Billie’s journey of pregnancy and giving birth.

  It wasn’t necessary to remind myself it was Billie’s body that had to take a hit for this to happen, and apart from the physical complications of a twin pregnancy, I had no idea how she felt about the unexpected surprise of having not only one baby, but two.

  A few hours after being admitted to hospital, I was relieved my girl was vomiting less, having been rehydrated and given a shot of anti-nausea meds. Fortunately, she looked more human and the color had returned to her cheeks, but she still looked little weak.

  Squeezing my hand, she gave me a weak smile. “What a homecoming, huh?”

  “Darlin’, I know we said for better or worse, but I never expected a baby boom and a fucking exorcism all rolled into one,” I joked, and she chuckled.

  “Please go home. I can see you want to stay, but I’ll worry less if you are with Colby than I will if you’re here.” The thought of leaving her tore my heart in two, but the last thing she needed was more stress.

  “Okay, but I don’t want you to worry about anything. You’re right, I do want to stay, and I’d argue for this, but I know Colby will be upset when he wakes in the morning and knows you’re here at the hospital. I’ll be back first thing in the morning after I’ve dropped him off at school.”

  “Maybe if the sickness subsides, they’ll let me go home tomorrow,” she said, sounding more optimistic. Standing, I bent and kissed her forehead, promised to text her once I was back home, and left her, knowing she was in the right place with good people who were far more useful to her needs than I was.

  The hardest part of seeing Tricia when I got home was not being able to tell her about Billie’s condition. On the way home I felt excited, but the shine was taken away by the fact Billie was vomiting rings around herself. I also knew it was very early in the pregnancy and we hadn’t even discussed it properly. I had desperately wanted to, but she had been too damned sick to express what she really felt, so like a coward I avoided the issue until she felt better.

  I was about to go to bed when I remembered the meeting with James in the morning, and sent him a text.

  Me: Sorry tomorrow is off. Billie’s in the hospital.

  My cell rang immediately. “What’s the matter with her?”

  “Why the interest?” I knew my question sounded petty.

  “I’m coming over.”

  “Don’t—” I hadn’t finished my sentence before he hung up and I felt frustrated because this had been the kind of behavior I’d been used to from him in the past. He had never listened.

  Half an hour later, the door buzzer sounded and I lifted the handset on the wall and buzzed James up to our apartment. A few moments later, I watched him walk down the corridor and when his eyes met mine, I knew immediately there was something wrong.

  “Couldn’t this have waited until I had the time to spare?”

  “How’s Billie, what’s wrong with her?”

  “Food poisoning,” I replied, determined not to confide in my brother. “What’s this about?”

  “Let’s go inside,” he prompted. I was too tired to argue, so I stepped back into my hallway and he walked ahead of me into the sitting room.

  “Colby in bed?”

  “Where else would he be? Look, can we skip the twenty questions and just tell me what this is about? I’m tired and jet-lagged so if you don’t mind, I’d just like you to get on with it.”

  James looked at my patio sliders that led out to the loggia and without asking wandered over and opened the door. “Not here, come out here, I don’t want Colby to hear.”

  “What the fuck is it with you?” I asked still following him, but my patience was growing thin.

  When I stepped outside, he slid the door over so that it was barely a crack from being closed. “Remember you told me I should have come to you when Charlotte came on to me?”

  “This again?” I challenged, my temper had risen from the moment he’d hung up on me and by then it was approaching boiling point.

  “Yes, this. Answer me, Sawyer, because I need to know.”

  “Yeah, you should have,” I snapped.

  “Then, you know why I’m here now. This couldn’t wait. Not after the last time.”

  “What? Jesus, you’re talking in riddles now.” Pulling out his phone he opened a picture text and turned it toward me. When I looked at it my heart almost stopped, and I felt all the air leave my lungs.

  My heartbeat pounded in my mouth, pins and needles on my lips as I looked at the image on his cell. The female was unmistakable, I knew every single inch of her, and there was no mistaking Billie’s bare tits with a pearl necklace around her neck. A flashback of James with Charlotte on
his lap came flooding back and my temper rose to life in my head.

  “What the fuck?” I roared, as my wide eyes stared in disbelief at the picture and I shook my head. I may not have known Charlotte like I thought I had, but I had a hard time accepting Billie would have done something like this to me. Knowing he’d had possession of something this intimate in relation to my wife brought a cocktail of toxic, jealous thoughts through my mind. “How did you get this?”

  He shrugged. “You can see Billie sent it to me. Obviously, there’s no face, but it came from her phone.”

  Raging anger bubbled up from my throat and had been about to spew out of my mouth until I thought back to the game we’d played, and it suddenly clicked what may have happened.

  “Did you get this after Billie called you to pick up Colby from baseball that same day?”

  As soon as I asked the question, I saw the deep frown he wore turn to confusion as he thought and eventually his eyes brightened. “Yeah, it was about a couple of minutes after,” he confirmed.

  “Fuck,” I spat, deleting the image and handing him his cell phone back. “She never meant to send that to you, it was an accident. I don’t believe she has any idea that she did.”

  James shot me another puzzled look and I knew I owed him an explanation. “We were messing around. I was bored and missing her. I figured I’d do something to keep us … you know, entertained.” I snickered and shot him a sheepish grin before I realized the effect the picture had had on James and cleared my throat.

  “I’m sorry on Billie’s behalf, and I’d rather you didn’t mention this to her. I’m sure she’d be mortified if she knew this happened. I’ll grab her cell phone the first chance I get and delete it on her end.”

  The relief on James’s face was immense and for the first time I saw the full effect of what Charlotte had done to his confidence. His once arrogant manner had completely disappeared and his vulnerability told me how much he needed to be believed.

  “That night when she called me to pick up Colby, I was really pleased she had trusted me with this responsibility, and I felt needed for the first time in a long while. However, the second that she sent the picture I felt devastated and fell into denial. It all felt too similar to what had happened before with you being away, and I imagined a scenario playing out where I had the potential to be the victim of someone else’s game again.”

  Hugging myself against the night air, I shrugged. “I’ll admit, I hated that Billie advocated for you with me in the beginning.”

  “From my point of view, Billie’s presence had helped us to take a huge step forward. She wasn’t part of our past like Charlotte was. I figured she was a person of influence, who could finally see the truth about Charlotte and me. Then I got the call and I felt excited that she had thought of me for the task with Colby, but holding that picture on my phone until you came home almost killed me.”

  “I know now why you couldn’t wait,” I said, and stepped forward. Reaching out to him I hugged him, my only emotion sadness and pity that he’d had this unnecessary setback. “Let’s go inside, it’s freezing out here,” I prompted, and led him into the warmth of the living room.

  “You have no idea what I went through when I brought Colby home and they insisted I stay for dinner. I initially refused, but Colby kept—”

  “Stop. It’s okay, it all makes sense now. I’m glad she had someone to call in my absence, and I need to thank you for stepping in and doing what I should have been here to do myself.”

  “I’m glad she supports you so you can keep doing what you love, Saw, she’s a rare woman.”

  “That she is. Thank you for insisting I know about this tonight, had you kept this to yourself and Billie discovered what she’d done, she’d have told me…”

  “And with my history…I get it. To be frank I almost called you when it happened, but I figured that may have put further pressure on you, what with you not being here.”

  “None of it matters now. However, you coming here shows me how important I am to you, that you drove here at this hour to get this off your chest. It’s demonstrated to me that I can trust you, and I figure over the coming years there’ll be many more instances when we may have to call on your help.” I took into consideration our growing family and the age gap between the children and knew this to be true. My mind flitted momentarily to Billie and how sick she was at the hospital.

  “What’s wrong?” James asked, and I knew immediately the strain of Billie’s condition was clear on my face.

  “Just worried about Billie,” I said, not wishing to betray her by disclosing the news we had learned before she was ready. My mind was spinning when I thought about this again, and because James had insisted on showing up, I hadn’t had time to digest the impact two tiny people would likely have on our lives in the future. If I couldn’t learn to trust him after this, then there was no hope for me.

  “Listen, it’s late. Why don’t you sleep here in one of the guest bedrooms, I’m sure Colby would love to see you in the morning, and it would soften the blow of his mom not being here.”

  “You mean it?” James asked, his eyes widening at my olive branch.

  “Yeah, I have a feeling I’m going to need you more than you know in the years to come. It’ll be nice to have my brother to lean on.”

  James sucked in a breath and for a moment looked as if he was about to cry.

  “You’re not sick are you?” he asked, his voice deep with concern.

  “Nah, quite the opposite. I’ve never felt stronger or more alive in my life.”

  “Well good, because I don’t do sick people,” he joked and hugged me again.

  When my head hit the pillow, I’d expected to pass out, what with the early morning flight from Las Vegas to Newark and it being almost 1:00 a.m. by the time I crashed into bed. But with all the events of the day, and the worry of Billie being in the hospital, I knew I was likely to be in for a sleepless night.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “How are you feeling?” I asked, as I pushed the hospital room door open and my eyes immediately met Billie’s.

  She nodded. “Getting there. I’ve only been sick twice and not for the past two hours.” I felt relieved by her reply.

  “Has the doctor been back to see you yet?” I asked.

  Rolling away from me, she reached over to her nightstand and grabbed something from it before I could see what it was.

  “Open your hand,” she ordered, and I held my palm out flat in front of her.

  When I realized she’d had another scan, I felt annoyed they hadn’t waited for me, but I relaxed a little when she explained this had been done primarily by transvaginal scan for them to remove the IUD contraceptive.

  They had then gone on to date the babies, and it had appeared she was seven weeks into her pregnancy with a confirmation of twins.

  “You see these two areas here?” I nodded and glanced briefly at her.

  “They’re not identical,” she explained.

  “That’s good because I need to be able to tell them apart.”

  “Well, they could both be boys or girls or a boy and a girl.”

  “They’re boys,” I told her categorically.

  “Or girls,” she reminded me again.

  “You’re really okay with this?”

  “You asked me to take some time and think more about us having a baby and I did. In fact it’s all I’ve thought about since I came home. I haven’t changed my mind, Sawyer. Despite all the sickness, I’m excited for them now.” I heaved a sigh of relief and leaned forward and kissed her temple.

  Billie went on to tell me the doctor had been surprised she hadn’t shown symptoms sooner with her carrying twins. I felt disappointed I had missed the scan and the opportunity to see them again on the screen, but the picture Billie gave me was a small consolation and the first real tangible evidence that our babies were real. We had decided not to know the sex of them, electing to wait, which added to the excitement of it all.

>   Taking the small photograph my wife handed me from the scan, my eager eyes stared intently as my brain dissected the grainy image that almost looked otherworldly. Two little misshapen peanuts or beans floated around in the middle of a black hole, surrounded by what I would best describe as echoes radiating away from it. Sonic waves I supposed.

  I couldn’t stop staring at the images and compared it to the cool slow-motion videos I’d seen of bass sounds vibrating over a beaded surface. It had always fascinated me how sounds could create good images. Holding the picture in my hand, I choked when the enormity of the miracle we’d been given sank in. They were my future children.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “Better. Not totally, but much better than yesterday. My throat was killing me after throwing up so much.”

  I nodded. “I hate being sick, but I hated seeing you vomiting more. I wish I could have done this for you.” Snatching the image out of my hand, she laid it on the bed and lifted my hand to her face. Leaning into it she stared into my eyes.

  “You are everything to me, Sawyer Wild.” Turning my palm upward, she pressed her mouth to the center of it and as soon as she placed her kiss, I slid my hand around her chin. “Come here, Mrs. Wild, I need to tell you how much I love you and congratulate you on our fabulous news.” Tenderly I pressed my lips to hers before she pulled her head away.

  “Colby?” she asked, and I nodded.

  “He’s good. James took him to school for me this morning, and he’s picking him up again this afternoon.

  “James?”

  “Yeah, you’re right. Life is too short to hold grudges, and I get most of what happened wasn’t his doing. I found it incredible he’d stayed with her so that I wouldn’t take her back. Anyway, I feel nothing but malice for her now after the way she treated us both. My priorities are right here in this room, and Colby of course.”

  Although she was pale, her smile still managed to reach her eyes and I felt confident about the babies because we had weathered some pretty significant shit, and we hadn’t even been together a whole year yet. All I had hoped was that the following months went smoother than the last.