One Wild Night

by Melissa Cutler

  Skye followed Granny June’s scooter to where Eddie was standing. When they arrived, she leapt off the scooter as spryly as someone half her age and wedged herself between Eddie and the person in line behind him, with a brash “Cutting in!” which would have been rude if it had been anyone other than the Briscoe Ranch matriarch.

  “Eddie, this is the girl I told you about. Skye, meet Eddie.”

  Smiling at Skye, he shifted his plate of food into his left hand and extended his right. “Skye. What a beautiful name to go with such a beautiful day.”

  It was a groan-worthy line, but somehow, Eddie made it work. Skye shook his hand. His grip was firm, his skin soft. “Nice to meet you.”

  Up close, she could see past his sun-protective gear to his nice, though slender, build and pleasing features. There had been a time when Skye might have been more nervous and demure while meeting a new, prospective romantic partner, but the spell had long since cured her of that. “Nice to meet you too. So tell me, did you find the perfect ear of corn yet?”

  His smile was more of a cringe. “Almost. Sorry to hold up the line.”

  “You’re serious about your corn. And sun protection, I see.”

  Granny June tsked her disapproval at that observation. “Ask him about being a doctor, for pity’s sake!”

  Skye wrapped an arm around Granny June’s shoulders and gave them a gentle, affectionate squeeze. “Leave us, old lady.”

  Granny June looked longingly at Eddie as though reluctant to be anywhere but in the middle of the action, then sighed with a nod. “You’re right. I’ll give you two some space to get to know each other. I’ll be right over there if you need me.”

  Eddie gave a good-natured chuckle when Granny June was out of earshot. “I like her. Young at heart. To answer your question, I like a good, charred ear of corn, lots of butter.”

  Skye held out her plate. “Since you’re the expert, why don’t you pick me out an ear too?”

  He took his time rummaging through the pile of corn to pick her out the perfect ear.

  “May I ask you another personal question?” she said while she watched him inspect ear after ear. “What’s with all the sun protective gear?”

  He set an ear of corn on her plate, angling it so it didn’t touch the beans or chicken. In truth, it did look like an exceptionally tasty ear of corn. “I know I look like a total dork. But I’d rather be a dork with sun flaps on his hat than a beet-red total dork, which is worse. And painful. My father never lets me live down that I inherited my mother’s fair Argentine complexion instead of his tough Puerto Rican skin. I’ve been living in upstate New York, so my skin’s not used to the Texas sun. Hopefully I’ll acclimate so I can ease up on the nerd fashion.”

  He handed her a bundle of plasticware wrapped in a napkin, then took one for himself. “Would you like to sit and eat with me? I’d love the chance to get to know you better.”

  She would have loved to claim otherwise, but she was charmed by Eddie Rivera. She liked the easy way he shared himself and talked about his family. He seemed totally grounded and comfortable with who he was. Unlike her.

  And unlike Gentry.

  Granny June was right. Eddie Rivera deserved a chance. Maybe Skye didn’t need to give up men for the rest of Lent after all.

  “How about that table in the shade over there,” she said, pointing to the literal opposite side of the picnic from where Granny June sat with a table full of old ladies, all of them watching Skye and Eddie with unabashed nosiness.

  “Aw, come on,” Eddie said. “What are the grandmas going to do for entertainment if we sit all the way over there?”

  “Oh, I’m sure they’ll come up with something. Like I always say, Granny June has a way of sniffing out trouble she can get into.”

  At the table, they settled across from each other, Skye more at ease every second.

  “I still can’t believe this Texas weather,” Eddie said. “In New York, some of the nights are still getting down to freezing temperatures. It’s only April 2nd, but it feels like summer.”

  “It’s April 2nd?” Time had flown by. Had it really been two weeks since she’d flown off to Nashville with Gentry? She would have sworn it was still March, but she checked her phone to find that Eddie was correct. Which meant that next week, on the ninth of April, it would be the anniversary of her miscarriage. Pain squeezed her heart, as fresh as it had been on the first anniversary.

  With the twisted thinking of someone who was compelled to pick off a scab, she navigated to the calendar on her phone, just to see it written on there in the little square for April 9th. The entry read simply Lost.

  Because that was the only word that came to mind when she thought of that time in her life other than pain and guilt. Pain for the baby she’d never expected, that she’d never known she wanted—that she was denied knowing when she lost it at five weeks. And guilt, because God never did anything arbitrarily.

  She might not be a practicing Catholic any longer, but that was one lesson that had stuck. There was a reason she’d lost the baby, and a reason she’d caught Mike cheating on her the day she found out she was pregnant. She’d made some horrible choices, ones she’d accepted and tried to learn from so she could move on with her life—but once a year, on this anniversary, they were choices that she longed to forget. So that’s how she’d treated the anniversary: a day for her to get lost, in booze or out at a club with friends, anything she had to do to forget about the pain until the anniversary had passed.

  Not this year. It was time for her to stop running with the wolves once and for all. She was determined to let the day pass without succumbing to the urge to get lost, without her making any more decisions that she would regret. She just hadn’t realized it was coming up so soon until she looked at her calendar. The sudden awareness gave her an off-balance feeling, like the table was tilting one way while she was falling the other.

  She snuck another look at the calendar on her phone, reading the word lost one more time. Then another calendar entry caught her eye, one with a red font. It was the recurring note to herself of when her period was supposed to start. It’d been on the calendar for last Monday. Huh.

  “Whatcha doing?”

  Eddie. She’d forgotten that he was there. She blinked herself back to the present and realized she’d been staring absentmindedly at her phone, and probably for quite some time. Great first impression for the first guy who’d been prospective boyfriend material in a very long time.

  Except Gentry.

  Nope. Because he wasn’t boyfriend material in any way, shape, or form. And furthermore, she’d already decided she wasn’t going to think about him anymore. “Sorry, that was rude. I was looking up when Easter is. I thought I had more time.”

  Eddie bit into his ear of corn. “I know. This year is flying. It’ll be Easter before we know it, which is great for me since I gave up coffee. That’s been…” He shook his head, cringing. “But I guess that’s the point, right?”

  While he’d been talking, her gaze had slipped back to the calendar on her phone. Damn. Her period was a week late. That never happened. “Uh, yep. That would definitely suck.”

  Gentry had used condoms. They’d been so safe. Well, the first time they’d done it, in the club, he’d had a condom in his hand, but she couldn’t remember if she’d actually seen him with the condom on. He’d taken her from behind and then in reverse cowgirl. She scoured her memory for a clearer image, but that night had been a whirlwind and, even though she hadn’t had much to drink, she definitely had spots in her memory.

  “Earth to Skye. Are you okay?”

  Shit, she was flubbing this meet-up. “Yeah, sorry. Coffee would be torture for me to give up too. Last year I gave up listening to music in my car, which nearly killed me.”

  “That’s a good one. Brutal, but effective.”

  Of course, Gentry had used a condom in the club. He didn’t want to have kids and made a point to tell her that, to prove how incompatible they were. So,
really, she couldn’t be pregnant. Because Gentry didn’t want to settle down, and having a baby out of wedlock was against the very moral foundation that Skye was raised to believe. She considered herself a family rebel of sorts, but not like that. Not in any way that could ruin her life or her family’s faith in her.

  Holy hell. The picnic table started to tilt again. She gripped it hard and tried to ride out the spinning and the accompanying lurch in her stomach.

  “I’m not feeling so well,” she croaked.

  “I was just noticing how pale you looked. What can I do?”

  Nothing, unless you have a pregnancy test in your pocket. She stood up, swaying. “I … I think I ate something that didn’t agree with me. I have to go.”

  In an instant, Eddie was at her side, his hand on her elbow steadying her. “Where? I’ll help.”

  “No!” she snapped. “I’m sorry. Look, it was so nice to meet you, Eddie, but I’m afraid I’m going to get sick to my stomach, and I like you, so I don’t want you anywhere near me if I do.”

  He tugged her in the direction of the restrooms at the entrance to the resort’s Winter Wonderland Garden. “I’m a doctor. That kind of thing doesn’t faze me. Let me help.”

  Shit, he wasn’t going to make this easy on her. “But it does me. Please, I’m going to handle this on my own.” She shook herself free of his grip. “Call me, maybe?”

  Okay, she was channeling Carly Rae Jepsen now, but whatever. She took off across the lawn as fast as her legs could take her. She felt Eddie’s eyes on her and shook her head. She’d been on dozens of dates lately, but this was the first time she was the one who was the crappy date and not the guy. Unbelievable. After she took a pregnancy test and discovered that there was nothing to worry about, she’d get his number from Granny June and call him to apologize.

  In her car, she sped along the twisty road to the highway and pushed the pedal to the floor. She wouldn’t dare buy a pregnancy test in Dulcet. It’d get back to her family before Skye made it home to take the test. So instead, she headed to a drug store three towns over, where she was certain not to know a soul.

  An hour later, she pulled into her garage. It didn’t look like anyone else was home, not at her house or her parents’ house across the street. Thank God for small favors. She did have three texts from Gloria, wondering where she was before deciding that Eddie must had been such a dud that Skye had skipped out on him, as she’d done with so many other men.

  She took the tests out of the drug store bag and stuffed them into her purse, just in case someone was home that she hadn’t anticipated, then crept through the house into the bathroom. When Gloria and the kids had moved in, Skye gave up the master bedroom and had relocated to the bedroom on the ground floor so Gloria and her kids could share rooms on the same level. She’d also given up a private bathroom. She’d never minded before, but now, she wished she could lock herself into a suite with a bed and attached bathroom for the rest of the night under the guise of food poisoning and check out of the world for a while.

  In the downstairs bathroom, she ripped open the pregnancy test and sat on the toilet. It took more than a minute to rouse her body out of shock and fear to pee on command. Then, in the following the two minutes while the test developed, she flashed back to the last time she’d taken a pregnancy test, only three months into her marriage to Mike the Mistake.

  She’d been so young. A child, really. But she hadn’t been scared while she’d waited to read that test because she’d been married and in love, because she thought she knew exactly how her future would unfold.

  Anger at the memory felt like fire sitting at the top of her throat. It stung her eyes. How dare this happen to her. How dare her desires betray her—again. All she’d wanted with Gentry was one last thrill, a fling with a hot guy whom she had great chemistry with. Was she not even allowed that? Every time she stuck a toe out of line, she was punished for it.

  Bracing her hands on the rim of the sink, she looked in the mirror. She wasn’t twenty anymore. As she’d reminded herself over and over the past two weeks, she was a grown-ass woman and it was time for her to start acting like one. She had enough money now and a home to call her own. If she was pregnant, this baby would be the most loved baby in the world. She would privately endure the shame of her sin without projecting it to her child. And she knew in her heart that Gentry, the man who’d told her outright that he never wanted to settle down or have a child, would still do the honorable thing and pay child support. She’d bet he’d want to be in the child’s life, too, even if only a little bit.

  She shook her head to clear it. She was getting ahead of herself.

  She heard the garage door open, then slam shut. Children’s chatter and laughter reverberated through the house along with the stomping of feet. Shit. This was the last thing she needed right now. As stealthily as she could, she locked the bathroom door.

  Footsteps sounded in the hall. “Skye? Are you in there?”

  It was Gloria.

  “I’m in here.”

  “You okay? Mom said you got food poisoning, which explains why you didn’t return my texts.”

  It was so tempting to lie to Gloria and run with the food poisoning story, as she’d planned to, but Gloria was the one person in the world who knew the truth about what Skye had gone through after leaving Mike. Skye hadn’t told her sister right away, but she’d confided her story of grief to Gloria in the months after Ruben’s death, on the night of Teresa’s birthday, the first one since his passing. After the party and the kids had been tucked in, Gloria had crumbled in Skye’s arms and the two had spent the night talking and trading secrets.

  Gloria had taught Skye what it meant to lean and let others help her in her time of need—and it was time for Skye to give her the chance to return that gift. That’s what sisters were for. She unlocked the bathroom door and opened it a foot.

  Gloria peaked her head in. “Don’t get puke on my new bathmat. That was the last blue one Costco had.”

  Though Skye didn’t have the guts to look her sister in the eye quite yet, she held up the box that the test had come in. “Can you put a movie on for the kids and come back?”

  Gloria’s was silent for a beat. Then, “Yes. Absolutely. I’ll be right back.”

  Skye slumped on the toilet seat lid, her head in her hands.

  She could read the test before Gloria returned, but she wanted to wait so she could lean on her sister. Besides, reading them promptly when the two minutes were up wouldn’t change the results. She either was or wasn’t pregnant with Gentry Wells’ baby.

  Chapter Eleven

  A minute later, Skye, who still sat on the toilet, her head in her hands, heard the bathroom door open, then close, then lock as Gloria rejoined her and flipped on the exhaust fan to mask their words in case the kids decided to listen in.

  Gloria knelt on the bathmat and hugged Skye’s knees. “Oh, shit, sis.”

  “Yeah.”

  “You’re going to have a baby. I’m … I don’t know what to say besides oh shit.”

  When her sister said it like that, fear started to edge out anger again. “I don’t know if I am or not. I haven’t looked at the result yet.”

  Gloria sat up straight and smacked her hard across the legs. “What? You got me going crazy and feeling awful for you, but you don’t even know yet?” She smacked Skye again for good measure.

  Skye held her hands out to defend herself. “I couldn’t look by myself.”

  Gloria was on her feet. “Don’t be a baby. Just get it over with nice and quick. Like getting a bikini wax. Want me to look first and tell you?”

  Only Gloria would compare a bikini wax with reading a pregnancy test. “No, I should be the one to do it. Hand it to me.” If she were adult enough to get pregnant, she was adult enough to read her own damn test result.

  On the other hand, it took a village to raise a kid, didn’t it? There was no harm putting that philosophy into practice from conception. When Gloria held the test
out to her, Skye jerked her face to the side and stared at her shoulder so she wouldn’t see the result. “On second thought, you look.”

  With a tsk, Gloria turned away from Skye and looked at the test. “This guy, the country singer, you like him?”

  At Gloria’s tone, at the question, Skye’s heart sank. She was pregnant. “He’s a great guy.” Would he still be, once he learned he’d gotten her pregnant? What if he had no interest in raising a child? Or worse, what if he refused to believe it was his?

  But as soon as she thought the questions, she realized it didn’t matter. She was tough enough to raise this baby alone. And, really, she wouldn’t be doing it alone. She knew without a doubt that her family would always be there for her. As much grief as they’d given her about divorcing Mike, the whole family rallied around her, and not only Gloria, who’d been her rock during those tough first months. Her mom had rehired her for her old job at Polished Pros, she’d been invited to move back home with her parents until she’d gotten back on her feet, and Mama Lita had helped her find her fire again. She’d never wanted for love—and her baby wouldn’t, either.

  “Mm-hmm. If he’s such a great guy, has he called you or texted you since that weekend?”

  She supposed it was Gloria’s sisterly right to interrogate her, and, honestly, it was keeping Skye from freaking out, so it was hard to mind. “No. But we’d agreed to go our separate ways, so I didn’t expect to hear from him.” Though it would have been nice. It would have been more than nice to know the night they’d spent together had meant something to him too. “But I guess I’ll be calling him now to tell him the news.”

  How did one say something like that over the phone? Something that was going to change both of their lives forever. She wasn’t ready to be a mom. For all her distant dreams of motherhood and starting a family, that dream was not to be a single mom knocked up by a famous musician during a one-night stand. All she’d wanted was to fall in love with the right guy and make good choices for a change. Choices she could be proud of, and that her mom could be proud of too. But in her mind she could already see the look of betrayal in her mom’s eyes.