I shivered, and he slid an arm around my shoulders on our way back to the reception. Anything to do with providing, protecting, or mating, and Manning turned into a caveman. I loved how turned on it made him, but it also shone light on a truth I wasn’t sure I was ready to face—Manning would not accept anything less than a biological baby. What if I couldn’t give him that? What if I couldn’t give myself that? I wanted to raise Manning’s boy into the man his father was, or teach my little girl that she deserved to be treated with all the love and respect her father gave her.
As we rounded the side of the house, we were met with a chorus of suggestive oohs and aahs that made me blush. Normally, presumptions or interest in our sex life from anyone would bother Manning, but he just rolled his eyes and hugged me closer. He’d been in great spirits all weekend. I had to shake this feeling of what if, or I was going to cast a storm cloud over one of the best days of my life.
Kara, Henry’s daughter, stood near a picnic table swinging her newborn side to side in rhythm with the Black Eyed Peas. Her hair was coming loose from its bun, brown strands framing her face. Blue lay at her feet, her ears up as she watched the crowd.
“Lake wanted to meet the baby,” Manning said to Kara as we approached.
Kara smiled. “She’s asleep now, but it’s okay. She’s cuter that way.”
I peered at the rosy-cheeked little girl. “I’m glad you and your husband could make it,” I told Kara.
“Us too. I’d wake her up for you, but she’d make a scene. I haven’t stopped rocking her since we got out of the car.”
“Did you get to eat at least?” I asked.
“A few bites here and there.”
“We’ll have to get you some food.” I squatted to pet Blue. “I hope the dog wasn’t bothering you.”
“Not at all. She’s playing lookout.” Kara bounced as she spoke, pausing to blow a piece of hair out of her eyes. “Our dog does the same thing. When there are people around, she stands near the baby.”
“What kind of dog?” I asked.
“Lab mix. We got her from the pound a few years ago and weren’t sure how she’d do with a baby, but she’s been very protective.”
“They’re great with kids. I help our local shelter place animals, and Labs are always the first request by young families.”
Kara stretched her neck. “They’re easy, and that’s the best you can hope for with a newborn in the house.”
“Why don’t you let me take over,” Manning suggested to Kara, gesturing for the baby. “You look exhausted. Take a break.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Are you sure? It’s not as easy as it looks, trying to keep her moving without waking her.”
I stood, smoothing out my dress. “He’ll be fine. I can take you to get some food.”
“You two are angels,” Kara whispered, stealthily passing Abby to Manning. The newborn looked even smaller and paler in his arms, her pink bow and smooth skin soft against his bronzed forearms. “Thank you.”
He hardly looked up from the little girl as he murmured, “No problem.”
It was possible that the last baby Manning had held was Madison, yet he cradled Kara’s daughter with ease, swaying her side to side. He seemed to have forgotten we were even standing there, completely enamored by a little girl that wasn’t even his own. Kara’s daughter was precious, but I doubted I’d feel that same connection Manning obviously did unless she was mine. Then again, I’d never met anyone who loved as deeply as he did. Maybe Manning was enjoying himself, but I had no doubt he’d be forever changed holding his own child.
As I was about to turn away, Manning glanced up at me. I read what he didn’t say clearly in his eyes. I want one.
I quickly switched my attention to Kara. “Let’s eat,” I said to her.
Manning had wanted to work the grill tonight—probably because it would’ve gotten him out of socializing—but with over fifty guests, I’d convinced him to hire a local barbeque restaurant to cater. I took Kara to a buffet table of warming dishes, salad, and a meat station managed by the head chef.
“Thank you so much for the invitation to stay with you,” she said as I handed her a plastic plate. “We would’ve, but with the baby, it was easier to get a hotel.”
“I understand. I figured with a newborn it might help if we offered.”
“We appreciated it.” She served herself salad and passed me the tongs. “The ceremony was beautiful. Manning looked so happy during your first dance. He must really love you. Or Aerosmith.”
I snorted. We’d slow-danced to “Crazy,” possibly the worst wedding song in history, but Manning had wanted it. It’d been playing on our bus ride to camp in 1993, and Manning had later told me it was one of the first moments he’d realized how deep into trouble he was getting with me. Mostly because as a man normally in control, he couldn’t get himself out of trouble.
“Manning’s been happy in general lately,” I said. “I know he’s glad you and your dad could be here.”
“They have a great relationship. I think my dad would’ve loved to have him as a son-in-law if I’d been older when Manning had started coming around.” As we worked our way toward the meat station, she elbowed me. “Good thing I was only seven.”
Kara had a warm, nonjudgmental smile; the kind that put me instinctively at ease. “I met Manning when I was sixteen,” I confessed. I hadn’t said that to many people, and certainly not those I barely knew. Manning and I were married now, and while our age difference had once seemed like the world, it was now an anecdote of a hard-earned history nobody could take from us. “He wouldn’t touch me, but that only made me want him more.”
“I understand completely. I wasn’t going to say, but I definitely had a small crush on him from about ten to seventeen.” She giggled. “He was so handsome and mature and serious. Nothing like the boys I went to school with.”
“So serious,” I agreed. It made me laugh now to think of how tense Manning must’ve been when I was around back then. “How’d you meet your husband?”
“Work.” She shrugged, spooning mashed potatoes onto her plate. “Not nearly as exciting as stealing my sister’s ex-con husband.”
I laughed too hard at that. “Exciting is one way of putting it.”
I introduced Kara to the restaurant’s head chef, and he sliced us some steak and pork. The moment she and I stopped talking, I could almost feel Manning’s adoration radiating from thirty feet away. Part of me wanted to look back and glean some hope from the sight of him with Abby, and the other part worried it’d be an image that would haunt me more and more with each month my period returned. “What’s it like having a newborn in the house?” I asked Kara, both out of curiosity and to distract myself.
“It’s . . .” She half-laughed. “It’s as amazing as everyone says, and about as awful as nobody says. Everything you hear about—lack of sleep, shit everywhere, tension in your marriage—times it by ten.”
“It sounds like more of an adventure than anything.”
“It so is. Magical, too. That part you can’t really describe.” At the end of the buffet, we each picked a fork and knife from a pile of silverware. “What about you and Manning?” she asked. “I mean, not to add pressure. I know how annoying it is to get those questions, especially on your wedding day.”
Maybe it wasn’t just that Kara had an open, trustworthy face, but also that she was one of the few people in attendance who’d shown up for Manning. She’d known him before I had, and she cared about him. “Between you and me,” I said, “Manning and I are trying. It’s soon, but sometimes it feels like we waited our whole lives to get to this day. Life is short. We shouldn’t have to wait for the things we want anymore.”
“That’s so romantic,” she said, sighing. We set our plates and silverware on a high-top table to eat. “I can’t get over the way he looks at you. It’s every girl’s dream.” She forked some spinach leaves and grimaced. “I hope I didn’t scare you off the baby thing.”
“No,” I said. “I m
ean, I don’t know if we really grasp what we’re getting ourselves into. Admittedly, we didn’t think it through very hard. I only graduated a few months ago, and I’m about to start work . . .”
“Yeah, but there’s never really a good time, you know?” She nodded behind me. “I mean, seems like Manning might be thinking it through pretty hard right now.”
Thinking it through? As much as I hated to admit it, my dad’s words earlier made sense. Now wasn’t the best time for a baby. Was Manning having second thoughts, too? I turned, expecting to see Abby bawling in his arms and exasperation on his face. Instead, she slept soundly. His eyes were still glued to her as he held her against his chest.
I’d never seen Manning so gentle. So lost. He rarely let his guard down in public or took his eyes off what was happening around him—a side effect of his time in jail. He was a natural at this, probably more so than I would be. Then again, he’d done it before. He’d been old enough when his sister was born to help raise her.
“I think it’s safe to say he wants one,” Kara added.
A lump formed in my throat. “He does.”
11
Kara and I were still standing at a high-top table with our half-finished dinners, watching Manning with her baby, when Val strode over waving a plastic champagne flute at us.
“Who are we gossiping about?” she asked, then gasped as her eyes landed on Manning. “Look at him. He’s in heaven.”
“All right,” I said, turning forward again. I could’ve stood and stared at him the rest of the night, memorizing every breath he held, the way he hunched over the baby, warning others off. That was why I had to look away. “Let’s not make a spectacle of him.”
“Oh my God,” my mom squealed behind me. “Lake, are you seeing this?”
“I saw, Mom,” I said as she walked up. I checked over my shoulder, but Manning still hadn’t noticed he was drawing an audience. “Leave him alone or you might spook him.”
“He’s just so sweet.” She nudged me. “Meant to have a baby of his own in his arms.”
I turned to Val. She was an easy target, and it probably wasn’t fair to take aim, but I’d need big guns to get us off this subject. “You’ve been avoiding me lately. Why?”
My plan worked. Mom and Kara looked back at Val.
“What?” she asked. “How can I be avoiding you while standing in front of you?”
“Normally, you’re up my butt about everything from my relationship to my job to what I ate for dinner. Lately, you’ve been quiet on all fronts.”
“What’s left to say?” she asked, motioning around the yard. “You have it all figured out.”
“I don’t buy it. Where there’s no drama, you’ll invent it. You do that for a living.” Val was always working on some kind of script. She’d recently directed her third short film and it’d been picked up by a couple smaller festivals. I narrowed my eyes at her. “It has to be a guy. You’re seeing someone, and you don’t want me to know about it.”
She wagged her champagne at me. “It could be a woman, according to your sister.”
“Don’t change the subject.”
“Leave her alone, honey,” Mom said. “Maybe it’s an ex and they want some privacy.”
“Julian?” I asked myself, shaking my head. “No. Not unless you had a lobotomy. Although, if he moved back from Peru or wherever—”
“Portugal, and no, it’s not him.” Val tugged up her strapless dress as it sagged. “It’s not anyone.”
“It’s not?” I asked. “Swear on Gus Van Sant?”
“Do you even know who he is?”
“One of the directors you always talk about.”
“Don’t make me swear on genius filmmakers.” She sighed. “I don’t want to talk about this tonight.”
I got the acute feeling we were being watched, so I looked over Val’s shoulder. Ten feet away, Corbin ate cake, pretending not to listen. “Why are you spying?” I asked him.
Val looked over her shoulder, and muttered what sounded like “fuck” before she tipped back her head and finished off her champagne.
“I wasn’t,” he said, swaggering over in his normal Corbin way—confident but humble, a combination only he could pull off. “Just trying to enjoy my cake.”
Val’s jaw dropped. “How many slices have you had?”
“Only three.”
“You had a bag of M&M’s on the way over here.”
He raised his arms in exasperation. “Who are you, the dessert police?”
She laughed, shoving his arm. “If you think you’ll be tall and skinny forever, you’re in for a rude surprise.”
Their easy banter wasn’t unusual, but what tipped me off was the way Val blushed at Corbin’s flirtatious smile.
“You guys drove up here together?” I asked.
Her mirth vanished as if she’d just remembered I was standing there. “It made the most sense,” she said—or more like recited. “We both live in L.A., so Corbin picked me up on the way from Malibu. It really would’ve been silly to drive separately. With gas prices what they are these days—”
“Take it down a notch,” Corbin said out of the side of his mouth. “Overboard.”
I narrowed my eyes at them, recalling the way her expression had softened while smiling at Corbin during the ceremony. “Are you two sleeping together?”
“Lake,” Mom scolded.
“Are we—what?” Val scoffed. “Me? And Corbin? Who said that—what makes you think . . .?”
Though her squirming was a thing to see, and almost too good to put a stop to, I deadpanned, “Call it a hunch.”
Her entire face reddened and Corbin looked at the ground as we waited. Even Kara leaned in, seemingly interested in the answer.
“Corbin,” I said. He glanced up. I’d had a few minutes here and there with him throughout the night, but ever the gentleman, Corbin kept excusing himself to give other people more time with me. “What are you hiding from me? And you have frosting on your face.”
He wiped his mouth with the back of one hand as he threw his other arm around me. “I’m hiding lots from you.”
I elbowed him in the ribs, and he winced. “Christ, Kaplan. I fractured that rib on my board last month. You just set the healing process back another few weeks.”
“Sorry,” I said, grimacing.
“It’s Sutter now,” came my favorite deep voice from right outside our circle.
Corbin, along with the rest of us, turned. Manning had drifted over, still swaying the baby, his eyes trained on Corbin’s arm around me.
“Right, right,” Corbin said. “It’ll take me a while to see her as anything other than a Kaplan.”
“Answer the question,” I told Corbin, only slightly giddier to uncover the truth than I was to see Manning’s reaction to it. “Did you and Val have sex?”
“You need to ease up on the doobies,” Corbin said as he mimed sucking on a joint.
“Getting high on her wedding day.” Val shook her head. “So sad. No restraint.”
Manning had stopped rocking the baby to stare at Corbin and Val, only his eyes moving back and forth. “Sex?” he asked. “You two?”
Before I could fill him in, Abby’s face scrunched as she raised her fat little arms. Like a ticking time bomb getting ready to blow, she twitched. “Manning,” I warned, but it was too late. She let out a wail that made everyone jump.
His eyes widened as he jumpstarted into swaying again. “Sh—I’m sorry,” he said to Kara. “I didn’t—I forgot—”
“It’s not your fault,” she said with a small laugh, reaching for the baby. “We’re overdue for a tantrum.”
Manning looked so crestfallen as he handed her over, I couldn’t help laughing. “I’m sure you can have her back once she’s fed,” I reassured him.
My mom touched Kara’s back. “It’s Abby, right?” she asked, beaming at the baby. “Is she hungry? Tired? Maybe she needs a diaper change.”
“All of the above,” Kara said. “It’s
always something.”
“Let me help.” Mom guided her away as she said, “Tiffany was the fussiest little thing . . .”
I turned back as Val tiptoed away. “Nice try,” I called after her. “If you don’t cop to whatever the story is, I’m going to make up my own version.”
Her shoulders slumped. She slowly rotated back around, as if operated by remote control. “Corbin and I did not have sex,” Val said loudly and coughed into her fist, “today.”
I blew out a laugh. “Liar. Why’d you keep this from me?”
Manning walked around the circle to stand behind me. “Isn’t it obvious?” he asked, placing his hands on my shoulders.
“Wait,” Corbin said to Val. “Are we doing this now?”
“I . . .” Val put her palm to her forehead. “I guess?”
“Thank God,” Corbin said, crossing the circle.
Val jumped back, pointing at him. “Don’t you dare pick me up. You know I hate it.”
“If by hate, you mean secretly love, then yes I know.” He wrapped his arms around her waist and spun her.
“My boobs are going to pop out of this dress,” she said as she wiggled and squealed. “Put me down.”
“No. I’ve had to keep this to myself for too long.” Corbin set her on her feet and puffed out his chest. “Valerie Kristen Jameson is my best friend and my girlfriend,” he declared loudly enough for people to look over. “If you don’t like it, deal with it.”
With a dramatic dip, he kissed her. She pretended to push him off but laughed through all of it.
I stood there blinking, Manning’s hands warming my bare shoulders. I had no idea what to make of it. My two best friends were kissing, and it looked strange and awkward and wrong. I didn’t like it.
Did I?
When Corbin righted her, Val cried, “You know I hate PDA,” and started to run away.
He nabbed her by the waist and brought her back in front of him, hugging her middle. “Get over it. After months and months of torture, I’m displaying my affection publicly tonight.”
“How did this happen?” I blurted. “Why? Why didn’t you guys tell me?”
Something in the Way: A Forbidden Love Saga: The Complete Collection Page 96
