A burst of abandoned laughter tumbles from her pouty lips, surprising me. This isn’t funny. Not by a long shot.
“I almost feel like I’m being punked,” she says, still smiling. “I expect some paps to crawl out from underneath the bed and snap some photos.”
“Paps? Punked?”
She reaches for a robe, and I finally break her gaze so she can slip it on. “Yeah, paparazzi. They follow celebrities around with cameras and take unauthorized pictures of them in their most ugly and awkward moments. Then, they turn around and sell said photos for a shit ton of money to the gossip rags.”
I scratch a hand down my fresh beard. It’s not nearly as long as it was, but it’s been growing in nicely since she left Wintervale.
“I’m unaware of these paper rags of which yer speak. What are they, exactly?”
“Magazines and newspapers. Mostly online. I mean the internet. I know you don’t have a computer but surely you’re familiar with the World Wide Web?”
I nod. I may be a bogger, but I’m observant of others in my clan. Some in Wintervale do choose to have the internet and computers to stay in contact with the normal world outside our belief system. Most have televisions and phones. I’m a lone wolf in my complete repudiation of electronics. I choose to lead by example.
“Do you have tickets for tonight’s show?” she asks, moving to stand in front of me.
“No…but I ‘av a feelin’ that me sister does.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Savannah
I still can’t believe that Ronan is standing right in front of me like some kind of figment of my overactive imagination. Hormones have been raging ever since I left Wintervale, and it’s hard to keep the tears at bay. The only thing that overcomes my sadness is my yearning to be with him again. And here he is, in the flesh. Except now, even though I’ve played this moment over and over again in my head, I’m not saying the things I rehearsed that end with me swept up in his strong arms. It seems I’ve been struck into a dumb mute who can only speak in generalizations about mundane subjects.
“I’m playing the castle tonight,” I say, a flush of emotion heating my face. When Caris called me to tell me that Ronan had agreed to come tonight to see the last stop on my European tour and possibly sing our duet again, I’d thought he knew what he was signing up for, which gave me newfound hope. Knowing Caris and her meddling ways, I shouldn’t have been so sure.
He looks so confused. “Oh.”
I sigh. “But I see that you thought otherwise. I’m sorry. It wasn’t my intent to pull the wool over your eyes when I extended the invitation to Caris.”
Understanding dawns and he groans. “I think I need to be protected from me meddlin’ sibling,” he says, moving to stand over by the glazed window. I feel the loss of his electric presence before he gets even a few feet away from my body. “I should find her right now. We should go.”
I bite down the instant protest that works its way up to my lips.
No, please don’t go.
I just wanted to see him one more time, to bring our two worlds together under the soft blanket of song. A middle ground where no one could get hurt. Except all I feel right now is pain. An ache so deep I might not survive its raging storm. My knees start to wobble as I realize how my best of intentions have gone completely off the rails. Even as my heart cries at my own stupidity, the truth is that I’d been a willing participant in shattering it.
“It would make me so happy if you would stay and sing with me tonight.”
It kills me to swallow my pride and make the request. Ronan’s back stays rigid, and I yearn to lay my hands on his shoulders to soften him. Either to me or to my request, I don’t care which. I only want to close the gap of distance between us. Only a few long weeks have passed. They were the longest of my life, but it’s not an insurmountable separation. So why does it seem like we haven’t seen each other in years?
He turns and spears me with a gaze that doesn’t say yes or no. It’s bland, and calm, and everything I don’t want or accept when all I want is to feel his passion.
“I’ll stay. But nay singin’.”
“I—”
He puts up a hand, and I realize I’ve pushed him too far. We’re both lost in the ghosts of the past, but that doesn’t stop me from wanting to engage in more memories. I stay quiet, holding my breath and watch as he walks toward me. His eyes sweep my body and his eyes widen as if he’s surprised.
“Savie, yer look exactly the same as yer did the day yer left.”
I wrinkle my forehead in consternation. Did he expect me to shave my head or get a tattoo since I’m the cray-cray city-dweller from L.A.? He’s going to be disappointed if he’s expecting me to lead some extravagant rock star lifestyle. At my core, I’m just a small-town girl from Northern California, and I’d never embarrass my mom by public drunkenness and promiscuity. For a Grammy winner, I’m tame. But I’m proud of my lack of a paparazzi driven reputation.
“Of course I look the same, Ronan. What were you expecting, pink hair and a nose piercing?”
He presses his lips and all I want to do is throw myself in his arms and kiss him. “People pierce their noses where yer from?”
I’ll leave out the part about lips and nipples and cocks and clits. I don’t think he can ingest that knowledge.
“Yeah, I guess a lot of them do. Especially, in the music industry.”
He reaches out to place his palm on my slightly rounded stomach, and I stop breathing as the room spins. There’s no way. I’ve kept the symptoms hidden so well I have it down to a science. He’s not a mind reader, and he’s not well-versed in picking up a woman’s subtle cues unless those signals scream ‘fuck me.’
But somehow, someway, he knows.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Ronan
Savie looks as if she’s seen a ghost.
The heat of the passion that runs between us warms my cheeks, and I’d love nothing more than to strip myself bare to relish the feel of cool air against my skin. This woman’s taken me so many places in a short time, I’ve gotten a slight case of whiplash. Mostly, she’s made me question myself and what I know. What I value.
Here I stand in a hotel, on the outskirts of a city filled with steel, concrete, and too many people for my comfort. Everything I hate. It’s noisy…not like the song of a bird or the neigh of a horse or the bleat of sheep, but screeching tires and rude townies. The sound blisters my ears until I want to put my hands over them to drown out the sounds.
Even though I want this woman more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my life prior to this day, I’m not sure I can afford the price I would have to pay to have her. I can’t imagine myself shopping in stores and eating out at restaurants. Being seen. Savie’s used to being on public display, but that’s everything I’ve tried to avoid my entire life. After some serious self-reflection, I’m not sure if it’s because that’s what I really want or because I’m avoiding stepping in to a bigger, better version of myself.
“Yer not with child,” I say, rubbing her stomach.
She inhales a ragged breath, and I can smell the arousal on her. My cock throbs and pulses, yearning and reaching for Savie. But I can’t do that until things are settled between us, because if I do, I’ll be wrecked beyond repair. I know the second I surrender to my feelings for her, I’ll never have the answers I need.
She gasps and brings her hands to her belly. “Why would you ask me that?”
“’Cause the night afore the festival performance, Declan brought a publication to my cottage and yer picture was on the cover, so ‘twas. The headline indicated that yer were ‘avin’ another man’s child. I was angry that yer deceived me.”
Her mouth falls open, then works up and down for a few soundless moments. “Ronan, that was a tabloid. The stories inside aren’t true. They’re sensationalized to sell magazines. If you thought I would deceive you in that way, why didn’t you ask me about it?” As I watch, her face grows hard as she pushes her hair
from her forehead. “So that’s why you made my last days there so horrible? Because of a stupid magazine?
“I—”
She pokes me in the chest. “Do you know what you put me through?” She pokes me again. Harder. “Hell, it would have been better if you had yelled at me. Anything. Getting mad, closing me out and walking away wasn’t right for either of us.”
“So, yer are not with child?” I demand, grabbing her wrist and holding it tightly.
This is the last point at which I want her to escape me. This conversation is too important. Something’s been banging around in my head ever since she left. Savie doesn’t need a man. She’s strong and independent. Money means nothing to her because she prints her own. The fact that I’m not in a position to protect her or provide for her isn’t lost on me.
But maybe, just maybe…she wants me.
“I am.”
My grip tightens. She is pregnant? I feel like I’ve been punched in the gut. What game is this that she plays? “I don’t understand.”
She brings my hand down to her stomach. “I’m not pregnant with another man’s baby, Ronan, because I’m pregnant with your baby.”
A wave of confusion rolls over me and my ears buzz as my vision blurs. I need to sit down but no chair is handy. Instead, I just stare at her until I find my voice. “’Tis impossible?”
Savie doesn’t say anything, just lifts her eyebrows.
“And yer left me? Yer just left me behind without knowin’ I was becomin’ a da?”
She snaps her hand away from me, and I reach out to grab it again. She’s not running away from this conversation. She’s not running away from me.
“I didn’t know back then. I would have told you, Ronan.”
Her words ring flat and lifeless. Like lies.
“When? When would yer ‘av told me? When yer were safely back in the US, and I couldn’t do anythin’ about it? That’s cowardly.”
Savie hisses in a breath, every muscle in her body tense and rigid. “Are you calling me a coward?”
I loom over her, using the full force of my height to push her backwards until she’s doing a backbend over the bed. Anger pulses through my body, radiating out my limbs until I’m shaking. She’s not going to do this to me. She will not keep my child from me.
Most of all, she will not keep herself from me. Not one fecking second longer.
“I don’t know what I’m sayin’,” I tell her honestly. “I don’t understand my emotions. I feel happiness and sadness at the same time.” I grip her even tighter. “I fear I could lose myself within yer, Savie. Who I am, ‘tis important to me.”
“I’d never let that happen,” she says in a rush, rubbing the inside of my wrist with her thumb. It’s just like we’ve never been apart and everywhere Savie touches, I burn. “Who you are. That’s what I love most about you.”
“Love?” I say, worried about the strength of that one word.
I know how much I missed Savie while we were apart. I know how much I want to protect her and make her happy. Then it hits me. The way I feel about the baby already growing in her womb is the way I feel about her. It’s love. It has to be. The prophecy has come to pass.
It’s real.
“I love yer, so I do.”
The moment the words leave my lips, I know they’re true. They feel so right. I’m silent another moment as I look at our hands intertwined, becoming one. Her touch is pure support and it gives me a measure of calm, knowing I could never lose my identity.
Without ever breaking eye contact, I press Savie into the mattress until my body covers hers. Wrapping my arms around her waist, I tighten my hold, making sure she’s settled gently into the middle of the bed. She’s not only my lover, she’s the mother of my child. I don’t take that information lightly, and her health is going to be my top priority from now until we take our last breath.
I crawl onto the bed after her, straight up the middle of her body. Savie lays flat, parting her legs to allow me more room. I groan and settle in between them. Her smell overwhelms me, and I have to taste her. I haven’t yet, and it’s kept me awake nights because I’ve never done it before. In the past, women have clawed their way to me to take care of every single one of my needs and I’ve never been very concerned about theirs.
Until now.
Slipping a hand down in between our bodies, I cup her hot sex. “I want yer, Savie. I want to know how yer taste.”
“Oh,” she moans, grinding against me. “Yes.”
My fingers slide under the waistband of her lacy panties, flirting with her wet heat before I run a finger up her center. The wetness flows over me, and I go straight for her throbbing clit. I delight in her moans and twisting body, as if she can’t get close enough to me. And I want nothing less than her complete surrender to my hands and mouth, because freedom lives inside the release of control. Someday, Savie might learn that lesson.
Fisting her hands in the down comforter, Savie finally stills. I lick her once and she jolts at that first contact. The more she moans and writhes, the more I love tasting her. I’m in complete control of her body.
“Ronan, I…” She drops off as she swivels her hips.
I lift my arms up from my place between her legs and open her further for my probing tongue. After finding the hard nub of her pleasure, I take it between my lips and suck. In response to the chorus of moans coming from Savie, I increase or decrease my pace, letting her lead me.
Rotating one hand, I push a finger inside her slick channel, and she lifts her hips in response. I press her back down and concentrate on circling her clit with my tongue, holding her as still as I can for the onslaught.
I can feel the force of her release when her thighs clamp down hard around my head, and she pushes her backside into the bed. I hold my tongue still, letting the pulses of her orgasm sweep her away. After she stills, I plant one final kiss on the inside of her thigh and snake up her body so I can hold her tight.
I’m never, ever letting her go.
Epilogue
Savie
The pain overtakes my body in a sweep of cramping agony that I can’t even describe. They told me it would hurt. Shit, every woman since the dawn of time has a horror story about childbirth involving epidurals, pooping on themselves, and screaming at their doctor to fuck off.
I try in vain to focus on the love I’m going to feel once my baby greets this earth, but I fail as a moan of torment overtakes my body. I squeeze the strong fingers that hold my hand. He whispers encouragement into my ear, but I’m not hearing the words. The only communication piercing my consciousness is my body’s, and it’s clearly saying ‘kiss my ass’ as it contracts into a squirming tornado of pain.
“Yer doin’ great, Savie,” the midwife says, poking and prodding at me. I never thought I’d be okay with a posse of strangers staring at my hooha but Ronan insisted that if we had a birth ceremony, our baby would be blessed beyond measure. Right now, all I want to do is smack him in his handsome face. His gigantic cock is never coming near me again. As I resign myself to a life of only giving him blow jobs, another scream rips through me.
I’m worried about the state of my vocal chords after this. They’re my bread and butter and they might be wrecked beyond measure. What if I pop a blood vessel?
“Yer never looked more beautiful,” he says, his lips pressed against my temple.
Really?
My sweat-soaked hair twines around my neck and face. This might be the first time in my adult life I’ve ever been in public without mascara. Looking like a hot mess is new to me, and I don’t like it. I growl and dig my fingernails into the tender flesh of his palm. He doesn’t waver.
“Are you kidding me right now?”
“I would never joke durin’ somethin’ as serious as the birth of our first son.”
First?
That he’s remaining rational makes me hate him even more. Even though I know as soon as it’s over, I’ll love him again, right now I want to let the negative emotion
course through my body right along with the pain, bringing him right down into the physical torture with me.
“Yer an inspiration, love,” Caris says from my other side. Truth be told, she’s been more of a comfort to me than my own husband. There’s something about the softness of another woman and a friend during a shit storm of uncomfortable new sensations that I can’t even begin to describe.
“Tell me again why I married him!” Another sound tears from deep within my core. I don’t even recognize my own voice.
Caris places a cold cloth on my forehead and clucks her tongue. “Now, now. He’s not so bad once yer get past his ugly mug. And he loves yer. More than anythin’. And he’s goin’ to love this wee one just as much. Right, lunkhead?”
Ronan gives my hand a tiny squeeze for confirmation. I stare deep into Caris’ eyes and see nothing but love and support shining back at me. I don’t know what I ever did to deserve being welcomed into the fold as if I’ve always belonged, but I’ll take it. The only thing missing from this picture is my mom. No matter how much I begged and pleaded, she wouldn’t brave the almost eleven-hour flight across the ocean. Like me, she’s a poor flyer.
I promised I’d bring baby O’Farrell home for a visit as soon as the doctor clears us to fly. I may have agreed to this midwife crap to please Ronan, but my baby will be a patient of the top pediatrician in the United States. Besides, our home base is our house in L.A., and we’re only going to keep Ronan’s place for vacations and important religious holidays. He’ll never give it up as long as it’s near and dear to his heart. He built it with his own two hands, and is home to so many important rituals and ceremonies, it’s got sentimental value.
He’ll have to compromise on the modern amenities, though. Even if he chooses never to embrace technology, that doesn’t mean I have to blindly follow along. I’m going to have Wi-Fi in his cottage if it’s the last thing I do. I can live without a TV, but I’m not giving up my cell phone or internet. Even for him.
Solstice Song Page 19
