The Marriage Pact

by Dinah McLeod

  “There, now.” She gave my head a pat. “Get some rest.”

  * * *

  Despite my noble intentions and the pills I spit into the wastebasket, my eyes felt heavier than lead bricks and once I’d closed them, I lost the battle to stay awake. Once I slipped into sleep, my mind took the liberty of concocting an intensely vivid, wonderfully sensual dream. In it, I found myself face down over Brody’s lap. I didn’t have any of the nagging fears I had in waking life, even though my body was tensed with excitement as I waited for the first swat.

  “You want this, don’t you?” Brody coaxed, rubbing his hand over my bottom. “Come on, admit it.”

  “Yes,” I heard myself say, somewhere between a whimper and a sigh.

  “See? That wasn’t hard, was it?”

  I didn’t answer and wouldn’t have a chance to say much anyway as his hand came crashing down on my bare behind. It didn’t hurt, really, but it stung enough to make me gasp. I was trying to decide if I liked it or not when another landed, lighter than the first but building on the sting. They fell fast after that, one after the other until I was wiggling my hips—not sure if I wanted to get my butt out of spanking range or if I just wanted him to stop the foreplay already.

  “Be still, sweetheart.” He repositioned me and I could feel his knees pressing into my tummy that was already tight with delicious knots of anticipation.

  The next time his hand fell, it was harder than all the rest and I bucked over his lap. “Brody?” I gasped.

  Without answering, another scorching swat fell. It rang out in the room louder than a firecracker. Pop!

  I lurched up in bed, gasping. My body felt warm and tingly all over and I wanted nothing more than to sink back into my pillows and hunt down the rest of my dream. But the loud, insistent rapping continued and I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep again until I figured out what it was. Was that someone at the door?

  I stood on wobbly, unsteady legs and walked out of my bedroom, making my way toward the front door. My brain was in such a fog that it didn’t even occur to me that it was probably Brody, back to finish our discussion, until I’d already swung the door open.

  I wasn’t prepared for the bright stream of sunlight that hit me. Groaning, I covered my eyes and took a step back. It wasn’t until I was back in the soothing darkness of my house that I saw who’d dropped over for a visit. It was Becky, and she looked anything but happy to see me. In fact, the mixture of disapproval and disgust playing out over her features was enough to make me want to go back to bed and stay there until she’d thawed. Unfortunately, I was moving too slowly to get away from her just now.

  “Hello,” I managed, swallowing around the cottony feel of my mouth.

  “Well, hi there.” She gave an over-exaggerated wave, her voice falsely cheerful.

  “I, uh, I’m glad to see you made it back safely.”

  “Oh, well, gee, thanks. Can’t have been too worried though, since you didn’t answer your phone any of the eight times I called.”

  “That was you?” I blinked in surprise, my thoughts moving slowly. “I’m sorry, I was ignoring my phone. I mean, I wasn’t trying to ignore you, just Brody and I… well, we sort of had a fight…”

  “Surprise, surprise,” she chirped sarcastically.

  I put a hand to my temples; my head was suddenly pounding with all the anger she’d brought along with her. “Listen, Becky, I know we didn’t exactly leave things on the best terms—”

  “Queen of the understatement.”

  “But I’ve had some time to think about it, and I mean, you were right. I was awful and I am so—”

  “Oh, give me a break! You shouldn’t have to think about this, Shan! You should have known without question that it was a horrible thing to do to a friend. If you had thought about it, you would have bought a plane ticket and flown to Cancun to beg for my forgiveness on your hands and knees!”

  “Cancun? I thought you—”

  “Don’t change the subject, I’m too mad to tell you honeymoon stories right now!” she snapped.

  I was about to reply when I saw a blue blur out of the corner of my eye. Mom was dressed in a soft, baby blue sweater set and wearing her pearls, her brow furrowed with concern as she made her way toward us.

  “Becky, dear! How good of you to stop by!”

  Becky swapped her angry glare for a look of contrition as she allowed herself to be hugged and kissed by my mom. “Hey, Mrs. D.”

  “Look at you, you beautiful girl.”

  I winced, praying she’d snapped out of the funk she’d been in earlier. My thinking was too muddled just now to do damage control. I just needed her to act normal, at least until I could get Becky out of the house. That was what I needed. Please, Mom, I prayed. Please.

  “Now, Shana here tells me you’re about to get married.”

  Crap. I officially wanted to sink into the floor as Becky looked my way, her gaze shrouded in confusion.

  “I got married over a week ago, Mrs. D. You were at my wedding.”

  “Was I?” Mom asked, tilting her head to the side. “Are you sure, dear? Maybe you only dreamed you—”

  “Mom, why don’t you go watch some TV and I’ll bring you some lunch? I think we’ve got some chicken salad, your favorite.”

  She turned to me, her eyes bright like any child who’s been distracted with a treat. “That sounds lovely, dear.” She smiled once more at Becky before shuffling out of the room, the conversation forgotten.

  At least I was prepared for the wide-eyed, open-mouthed shock on Becky’s face. I’d seen it coming the moment Mom had opened her mouth. “What…”

  I bit down on my lip, hard, waiting for the anger. It might be slow to come, but once it did, it would become a tidal wave of furious she’d use to drown me.

  “Shana, your mom…”

  “I know,” I muttered guiltily, feeling the familiar crush of shame.

  “But she… what…” She looked at me helplessly, her eyes begging for me to explain.

  “I wanted to tell you,” I said, lamely. “I just… Mom’s been… unwell.”

  “Unwell,” she echoed. “In what way?”

  “She forgets things sometimes… a lot of times, actually.”

  “What’s wrong with her?”

  “Come on, Becky, I called and told you about the diagnosis years ago.”

  “I mean, I know you did, but when we talked you never, ever… or your brother. You two have just been, what? Keeping it a secret? Is that why your mom hardly goes out anymore? You just keep her locked up here unless there’s something she would be missed at?”

  “Becky!” I gasped. “Of course not! What—”

  “And what about my wedding? She was fine.” It sounded more like an accusation than a question.

  “It’s not predictable,” I said, feeling defensive. “She has good days. She has OK days. This is one of those.”

  Becky’s eyes rounded another inch. “You mean she gets worse?”

  I sighed. This was why Jonas and I hadn’t wanted anyone to know. We’d wanted to avoid the constant barrage of questions from well-meaning neighbors, the looks of abject pity. We’d wanted to protect her from that, because on her good days, she would see it and despise herself for being the cause of it. If our motives were just a little selfish, well, who could blame us?

  Becky took my silence for the answer she wanted. “I can’t believe you just didn’t tell me!” she exclaimed, her voice registering somewhere between a gasp and a screech. “I—we—we’re supposed to be best friends!”

  I drew back in surprise at the outrage that colored her face. “We are! I was just thinking about you, Becky. I—”

  “Not likely,” she snorted.

  “Becky, please, try to understand!” I begged. “You were dealing with all the stuff from the wedding and I just—”

  “I would have made time for this! For you!” Her green eyes were glaring daggers my way and I was afraid I’d be impaled by one any minute.

&n
bsp; “I know, but I was trying to… I just wanted you to have a good time,” I finished lamely.

  “How can I look back at those memories with anything but… you lied to me!” she shrieked, her hands clenched into fists at her sides.

  “No,” I shook my head. “No, I didn’t lie. I just—”

  “First, you run out on the most important day of my life, and now I find out you were lying to me the whole time! Who are you?” She spat the words at me angrily.

  “Come on, Becky, calm down, let me—”

  “No, you calm down! You just—you’re not who I thought you were. Period.”

  I was starting to lose my cool composure. All this yelling wasn’t good for my headache. “Look, you’re not being fair. If you’d just—”

  “You want to talk unfair?” she interrupted, hand propped defensively on her hips. “OK, let’s. How’s this for unfair: I have opened up to you every time I’ve had anything going on in my life, shared every secret. And you never return the favor! My God, you’ve been holding onto feelings for Brody for what now? Fifteen years? I’ve talked and talked to you about it, but you never could admit to still having feelings for him! Maybe if you had, none of this would have happened!”

  I narrowed my eyes into thin, angry slits. “If you think you can blame this on me, if you think you can turn it around—”

  “Hey, I’m just putting the blame where it belongs. You’re just a grade-A secret keeper, aren’t you? First, denying your feelings all these years for Brody, now your mom. What else aren’t you telling me? Did you even go to medical school?”

  We’d never, ever fought before and this was getting nasty quick. Instead of doing the responsible, mature thing and backing down, I snorted a laugh at her. “That’s rich, coming from you. You want to say this is my fault? I left your wedding because you couldn’t come clean to me about Brody!”

  “If you’d just told me that he—”

  I heard a throat clear behind me and I whirled around, eyes still narrowed. I caught sight of Brody, leaning against the door. We’d been yelling so loud I hadn’t even heard him let himself in.

  Becky saw him too, and glared at him just as fiercely. At least I could rest easy knowing she didn’t reserve those murderous looks just for me.

  “OK, Becky, I’ll take it from here.” He was calm and collective in the face of her glaring fury and I felt a surge of pride in him. Few people could stand up to Becky.

  To my surprise, she nodded and my respect grew. No one that I knew of had stood up to her and won. She turned to me with one last piercing glare. “I’m sure you will.” Without another word to me, she walked toward the door and Brody opened it for her.

  He didn’t look at me until she’d gone and by then I was already starting to fall apart. When she’d left, she’d taken my anger right along with her and without it all I had was regret to stand on.

  “I was just dropping by to make sure you were OK.”

  “I’m not OK,” I admitted, meeting his eyes. He was at my side in seconds and caught me when I began to slide down on my unsteady legs. “I’m not OK,” I said as I buried my face into his shirt and began to cry.

  “Shh. It’s going to be OK. I’m going to take care of you, I promise.”

  “Can you m-make her… forgive me?” I asked, my voice muffled against his chest.

  “No, honey, but I can talk to her, if you want.”

  “I doubt it’d do any good.”

  “I could talk to Seth.”

  I pulled back and looked at him, wiping tears from my cheeks. “I didn’t really know you knew each other.”

  “Come on, everyone knows everyone here,” he said, stroking me lightly under the chin.

  “I know, but…”

  “Out with it,” he murmured in my ear, making my toes curl. “What do you really want to ask me?”

  “Why did Becky want you to be his best man? It was because of me, wasn’t it?”

  “A little vain there, aren’t you?” he asked, his tone light as he brushed a lock of black hair behind my ear. “As it happens, Seth asked me.”

  “I know that,” I scoffed. “But only because Becky asked him to.”

  “She tell you that?”

  “No, but…” I trailed off, furrowing my brow. What was he saying? Was it possible I could have misunderstood everything?

  “I see. So you jumped to a conclusion and thought, what? That Becky had been trying to set us up? Come on, Shan. She knows you better than that.”

  “But I thought…”

  “And why wouldn’t he choose me?” he continued. “I mean, I took him to a strip club for his bachelor party, bought him a lap dance and filled him up with as much beer as he could drink. I even own a suit. That makes me the perfect best man.”

  I knew he was trying to make me laugh, but it didn’t work. My mind was still trying to fit the pieces of the puzzle together. “So, if he really asked you, then why…”

  Some of the laughter left his face and he suddenly seemed a bit uncomfortable. “Uh, I think that’s something you should talk to Becky about.”

  “She won’t talk to me,” I pointed out reasonably.

  “This isn’t really something I can—”

  “Is everyone keeping secrets from me?” I demanded, turning away angrily. I would have stomped off, too, if not for the restraining hand he put on my shoulder.

  “That’s a little bit hypocritical, don’t you think?”

  My shoulders slumped in defeat. So he thought so, too. “How much did you hear?”

  “Enough.”

  “And you think she’s right… to be angry at me?” I held my breath as I waited for him to answer, my eyes trained on his face. What I really wanted to know, what I didn’t have the courage to ask, was whether or not he was mad at me.

  “I don’t really think she’s mad, Shan. She’s hurt right now. She feels like you don’t trust her, and believe me, that hurts. But I really think if you give her time, she’ll come around.”

  “So, what do you think I should do in the meantime? Stay in and wallow?”

  He barked a laugh. “Well, there’s that, I guess, or you could always go talk to her. Without the yelling, I mean.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Look at you, the advocate for hugging it out all of a sudden.”

  “Yep. I’ve become a real peacekeeper since you’ve been away.”

  “Somebody has to keep the Dawg fans and the Gators from killing each other,” I quipped.

  “Tough work,” he agreed with a nod. “Especially since I’m a secret Gator fan. But shh—don’t tell anyone!”

  I giggled despite myself. No matter what was going on, Brody could always make me laugh. It was one of the things that made him such a good friend.

  “Feel better now?”

  His eyes were sympathetic and loving all at once and I felt butterflies begin to flap their wings in the pit of my stomach. When he extended his arms to me, I didn’t hesitate. I walked right into them, snuggling into him when he pulled me close. I already knew that my body fit into his seamlessly, that the intoxicating smell of his skin and the steady rhythm of his heart would comfort me immensely.

  “Now, see?” he whispered, stroking my face. “Like two pieces of the same puzzle, just like old times.”

  Just like old times, I echoed silently. “Brody?”

  “Hmm?”

  “Did you know?”

  “About your mom?” His cheek pressed into the top of my head and with his other hand, he caressed my hair. “Yeah. Some of it, I mean. The things Mom told me.”

  I laughed aloud at my stupidity. She was Mom’s oldest friend, of course she would know and it was only natural she would pass it along to her son. How had I really thought I was fooling anybody? “Why didn’t you say anything?”

  “I didn’t want to rush it. I wanted to wait until you were ready to tell me.”

  “Are you mad at me?” The minute the words left my mouth I cringed at how vulnerably girlish they sounded.
<
br />   Brody pulled back to look at me and I immediately missed the warmth of him. “No, Shana, I’m not mad. And Becky shouldn’t be, either. You were just doing what you thought was best for your mom. She just wishes, like I do, that you’d let us help you.”

  I dropped my eyes and fidgeted. “I know. I just… I thought I could handle it.”

  “We all need help sometimes, baby.”

  “I know, I just… I’ve never been great at asking for it.”

  “Oh, yes, how well I know.” His eyes twinkled at me. “I guess that’s something I’ll have to help you with. If you want, that is.”

  I met his eyes, wondering at the meaning underneath his words. Did ‘helping’ mean more spanking? I was too embarrassed to ask him and blushed just thinking about it.

  “Looks like you have something you want to ask me right now.”

  “Nope,” I lied, flushing hotter.

  “I see…”

  “So, you’re really not going to tell me what happened with you and Seth?”

  “Changing the subject. Wow, you really must want to ask me something.”

  “Brody…”

  “OK, I’ll play along. Let’s forget I mentioned it. Hey, speaking of, I have an excellent way to forget. Wanna see?”

  I’d just nodded my head when he pulled me toward him and lowered his mouth to put a kiss on my lips that made time stand still. I wrapped my arms around his neck, standing on tip-toe to return the embrace, hoping to make time hold for just a little longer.

  Chapter Nine

  Brody left me with orders to go see Becky the next day, his words underlined with the promise of a spanking if I didn’t. It was enough to tie a girl in knots and make her wonder why she liked it so much.

  I went, as ordered, carrying a bottle of her favorite wine and a hunk of expensive cheddar that she couldn’t get enough of. Maybe if she saw the peace offerings, she wouldn’t slam the door in my face. Georgia manners dictated that she at least say thank you and if I could get her to say that much, maybe I’d be able to keep her talking. My odds were only fifty-fifty, though. Becky didn’t like to live by the rules.

  She was surprisingly subdued when she answered my knock and although she didn’t say a word, she left the door open and walked away. Taking this as my cue to follow her, she led me past the hallway crowded with sealed boxes and into the living room that was just as full.