by Mari Carr
He returned to the living room with two glasses of wine, setting them down on the coffee table. “Damn. You really did have a rough day.”
“Look that good, do I? Personally, I blame the fucking Elf on the Shelf.”
He grinned, though clearly confused. “Why’s that?”
“Parents put those things out in December with the threat that Santa has eyes and ears everywhere in the home. So the little bastards get their shitty behavior out with me so they can look like angels at home. Next year, I’m putting an elf on the freaking bookshelf in the classroom in September and telling them my elf is the Head Elf and his word is law with Santa.”
“A dastardly plan. I like it.”
“Plus, today was the holiday open house, so all the parents showed up,” she called out as Colm returned to the kitchen. The two rooms were connected with an open island separating them, so she could still see him, still talk to him as he rummaged around for plates, forks, and napkins.
“Do you know how exhausting it is to smile and be pleasant all fucking day?”
Colm was grinning when he returned with the food. Rather than claim one of the empty chairs, he plopped down right next to her on the couch, bending forward to give her a quick kiss.
“It sounds absolutely terrible,” he said, commiserating just enough that she knew he was half serious, half teasing. Which for her was actually the right mix.
Somewhere along the line, they’d fallen into a nightly routine where they ate dinner together in the living room after work, watching the local news or some repeat of a sitcom, like they were an old couple who’d been married for a hundred years. Then, they either went for a walk along the waterfront or to the pub or…more often, straight to her bedroom, where they spent hours tangled up together doing the naked mambo before falling asleep, only to wake up the next morning for a rinse and repeat of the previous day.
Kelli would have thought such an existence would bore her by now, but the truth was, she loved it. Loved not eating and sleeping alone. Loved having someone to bitch about her day with. Loved listening to him gripe and groan about his.
“Two more days. Just two more days,” she said, picking up the plate of sesame chicken he’d dished out for her. “And then I’m free for two whole weeks.”
“Yeah. You are.” Colm started eating his Mongolian beef, falling uncharacteristically quiet. Typically, he was talking her ear off about work or his current case or sharing the latest in Caitlyn’s morning sickness saga. The poor woman couldn’t hold anything down until early afternoon. According to Colm, his cousin had discovered a completely new shade of green whenever he described Caitlyn’s complexion just before her mad dash to the office bathroom.
But today…nothing.
“You okay?” she asked, putting her plate down when it became obvious something was bothering him. He wasn’t looking at her, but he wasn’t watching TV either. Instead, he seemed very deep in thought.
Colm sighed. “What are we doing, Kell?”
“Eating Chinese?”
He gave her a “really?” look that confused her even more than his question.
“What do you mean?”
“What is this? Between us?”
Shit. She was suddenly sorry she’d asked. It was easy to just roll with whatever this was as long as they didn’t discuss it, or define it.
She’d sworn off men and dating back in October, and at the time, she’d meant that vow with every fiber of her being. She was tired of trying to find Mr. Right in a sea of Mr. Mehs.
Then Halloween.
Then the blackout.
Then Colm.
Since then, she’d switched onto autopilot, riding this wave as long as she could, even though she knew that eventually it would crash into the shore.
Looked like they’d just faceplanted into the sand.
“Colm…I don’t.” She swallowed heavily, not wanting to say the rest. She cleared her throat and dug deep for them. “I don’t think there can be an us.”
“I beg to differ.”
Colm was a lawyer. Which meant this conversation wasn’t going to end easily. And, of course, he’d hit her with this on a day when she was weary straight to the bone after a freaking exhausting day at work.
“Do we really have to talk about this now?”
“Yeah. We do. Because we’re out of time. Holiday break is here.”
She blinked, trying to figure out why he’d drawn that line in the sand…
And then she realized he hadn’t. She had. Her plans with Robbie had.
Although God only knew if those were still in effect. She didn’t have a clue if things between him and Brooke had stuck. If they had…well, she knew from her point of view, she wouldn’t like the idea of her new boyfriend donating sperm to an ex, no matter how innocent and platonic it was.
“I told you before this started that I was taking myself off the market.”
“We’re dating, Kelli.”
“No, we’re not. We’re having sex.” She was the queen of contrary, and she knew it. She wasn’t proud of it at the moment, but years of bickering with Colm had her working on instinct, used to saying white every single time he said black, right or not.
Colm rolled his eyes. “I’ve spent every night here for the last two weeks. I have two suits hanging in your closet, a toothbrush in your bathroom, at least three pairs of dirty socks strewn around this living room floor, and my beer is in your fridge. We are dating.”
She narrowed her eyes. “You insidious bastard.” There was no heat behind her words. In fact, her tone probably told him she knew exactly what they were doing. She just didn’t want to admit it.
“Every time I swing by the apartment for a change of clothes, some member of my family makes sure to ask how my girlfriend is.” Apparently, Colm wasn’t finished making his case. Typical.
She sighed. “I shouldn’t have let things go this far.”
Colm reached for her hand. “I know what you want, sweetheart. I know you’re worried about losing more time, time you need to get what you want, but can’t you give us just a little bit more?”
“How much more, Colm? My chances of conceiving after my next birthday go down to something like twelve percent. Plus, the risk of birth defects and miscarriages increase. I don’t have more time.”
They hadn’t talked about her desire to have a baby since Halloween. He’d mentioned it briefly after the football game a few weeks earlier, but she’d dismissed it out of hand. After that, they just let themselves fall into this relationship—keeping it all surface-y, easy, only paying attention to the fun stuff, while pushing reality away.
He reached out and took her hand, giving it a gentle squeeze. “I get it.”
She shook her head. “No. I don’t think you do. I was an only child, Colm, and it sucked. I always wanted what you and Paddy had. A sibling, someone to play with, fight with. This isn’t going to be a one-time thing for me. I need enough time…”
“To do it twice.”
She smiled sadly. “A family of my own. I want it so badly. I ache for it. And I’m not going to be an overbearing mom, like mine is. My kids are going to pick out their own clothes when they’re little, even if they don’t match. They can put all those ridiculous colors in their hair in high school. I’m not putting up a stupid daily chore chart or badgering their poor teachers when they don’t get the lead in the play or an A on an essay or—”
Colm tugged on her hand, pulling her close enough that he could wrap his arm around her shoulder and place a kiss on top of her head. “You’re going to be an awesome mom. And I know Barb was a bit much…”
Kelli lifted her head and narrowed her eyes. “A bit?”
“But you realize all that overprotectiveness was done out of love, right?”
“Of course I do.”
“Although I do think you’re right to dial it all back a notch or thirty. Remember that time she made Miss Rivers cry when you didn’t get the solo in ‘Time to Say Goodbye’ in ou
r choral concert?”
“Oh my God. Poor Miss Rivers. I felt so bad for her.”
She and Colm laughed at the memory.
Colm sobered up first. “So, more time is out of the question.”
He hadn’t posed that like a question, but she nodded just the same.
“Fine. Call Robbie and tell him no thanks. We’ll stop using the condoms and—”
“Oh my God, no. Please stop right there, Colm. I can’t…we can’t…”
It was never a great idea to tell Colm he couldn’t do something, and she realized her mistake the second she saw the set of his jaw. He was stubborn and tenacious when he got something in his head. It was why he was a great lawyer.
She needed to cut him off at the pass. “Think about it,” she continued quickly. “We’re at the beginning of this…”
“Relationship,” he supplied.
She might not want to say it, but that didn’t change what it was.
“Fine. Relationship,” she conceded. “This is the honeymoon phase. All lust and fun. You and I have both been here about a million times.”
“No, we haven’t.”
She considered that. Considered the last few weeks with Colm. He was right again. Neither of them had ever gotten quite this far. Their past relationships had never moved from dating and the occasional overnights to instant shacking up, which was definitely what this felt like.
“Okay,” she said, trying to find her next argument. “Regardless of that, we both know lust fades. And the next phase is the one where someone walks away.”
“I’m not walking away, Kelli.”
“Everyone walks away, Colm.”
“Is that what you really think?”
Was it? Kelli didn’t know how to respond to that because until those words flew from her lips, so certain, so…
Oh God.
Bitter.
She’d sounded bitter.
A few thousand concrete bricks came crashing down on her head as she struggled to catch her breath, to think of some joke, some way to shove off the crushing weight on her chest before she suffocated.
It took a minute before she found her voice again. “I just don’t think it’s a good idea for you and I to…” Her words faded to nothingness…because she didn’t know what else to say.
She wasn’t sure what Colm saw in her face, but given how well he knew her, she figured he could tell she was silently freaking out.
And because he was a good man, he dropped that argument. Sort of.
“So use me as the sperm donor. Pretend I’m the orthodontist in Iowa.”
“You want to gift me with sperm?” she asked incredulously.
“Why not?”
“You know why not. Colm, I didn’t ask you originally for the same reason I didn’t ask Paddy. Neither one of you would ever walk away from a kid you helped create. Besides, we don’t live six states apart. We see each other. All. The. Time. You’re going to see my baby a lot because I want your family to be a part of his or her life.”
“You keep talking about this relationship like it’s already over. Like we’re going to erase the last month, rewind the clock, and go back to bickering and giving each other a hard time.”
“If we were smart, that’s exactly what we’d do.”
She didn’t miss the disappointment in his tone when he said, “You know better than that, Kell.”
He was right. She did.
“We’re not those people anymore. We couldn’t be those two again if we tried.”
“Colm—” she started.
“This is the new normal, Kelli. This. Right here. Right now.”
She shook her head, searching desperately for some way to counter his claim, to prove him wrong, but she couldn’t come up with a single thing. Which scared her even more.
Why was her gut telling her this wouldn’t work? Was she really that jaded? That convinced forever didn’t exist?
“Why are you shaking your head?” he asked. “What part of this is so hard for you to accept?”
Kelli wasn’t sure if she was shaking her head at him or at herself, suddenly not liking all the hard facts hidden in shadow he was thrusting out into broad daylight. “Dammit, Colm. It’s only been a month. That’s way too soon to—”
“To what?” Colm interjected, rising from the couch. He was frustrated, and that emotion, suddenly wafting off him in waves, fueled her own aggravation. She stood too, refusing to give him the power position. They were standing toe-to-toe, facing each other down.
This stance, between them, was as familiar to her as breathing.
Colm waved his hands in the air. “Why do we need months or years to know what this is? Jesus, Kell! You know me. You know every fucking thing there is to know about me.”
“You’re not being practical,” she countered.
“No. You’re not thinking.”
She narrowed her eyes, but before she could call him to task, he continued.
“What don’t you know about me that you think is suddenly going to change this thing between us? Have you seen me in a bad mood in the past?”
“Of course I have. You were a complete pain in the ass all through puberty.”
“Are my bad moods going to be a deal-breaker for you?”
“No. Of course not, but—”
“What about my temper?”
“What about it?” she asked.
“Is it too much? Do I ever scare you?”
She scowled. “Don’t be ridiculous. Of course not. I have a way bigger temper.”
He nodded. “You’re right. You do. And it’s not a deal-breaker for me. What about work? Do you think I’m a workaholic?”
“You work long hours sometimes, but no. You’re not a workaholic.”
“So my job isn’t a problem for you?”
“No, but—”
“I’d ask you if you had any concerns about us in the bedroom, but we both know I’m more than capable of giving you mind-blowing orgasms every single night.”
The old Kelli was digging deep for some way to wipe the cocky grin off Colm’s face, but the asshole was right. Again. Sex was never going to be an issue for them. Unless it was the fact neither of them seemed capable of getting enough.
“Do you think I’d be a good father?”
His question knocked the breath from her—because it wasn’t even something that required thought. “You’d be…an amazing father.”
He’d been gathering a pretty good head of steam until that response. Her answer seemed to calm him down a bit, and he smiled. A charming, sweet, wonderful smile.
“What don’t you know about me, Kelli, that you haven’t learned in the last thirty years?”
The answer was simple.
Nothing.
And yet, she couldn’t give it to him. Couldn’t admit it.
“Can I…can you…give me some time?” Kelli couldn’t think with him standing so closely. And she desperately needed time to gather her thoughts, to come to grips with some issues—that bitterness; that unexplored fear of Colm leaving her just as her father had, which she hadn’t realized was there—before she gave him an answer.
Colm studied her face for a moment, then nodded. “Sure. What do you need? Five? Ten minutes?”
She laughed, loudly, leaning forward until her forehead was pressed against his chest. “God, you’re a cocky son of a bitch,” she said, between giggles. “A pain in the ass. A thorn in my side.”
Colm wrapped his arms around her, his cheek pressed to the top of her head, swaying gently, until she managed to contain her mirth.
“I just need a little bit of time.”
He sighed, the sound letting her know he didn’t want to give it to her.
But…she did know him. Knew him well enough to know he’d give it to her anyway.
“Okay,” he said at last. “But I’m telling you right now. I’m not staying away for long.”
“I know that. I’ll call you very soon. Honest.”
He c
upped her cheeks and kissed her, and she marveled over how he could pack so much into just one kiss.
One kiss.
Pleading.
Passion.
Possession.
And a promise that he was coming back.
Soon.
Chapter Fourteen
Colm returned to the pub…begrudgingly.
He’d put up a hell of a fight back at Kelli’s, and she’d still asked for more time. He’d had the last two weeks to prepare his case, to come up with what he’d considered an ironclad argument. He knew Kelli’s only defense would be the fact they’d only been a couple less than a month.
So he’d started a list of all the ways he could counter that argument. And he sort of thought he’d nailed it.
Until she’d looked at him with those sad, scared blue eyes and asked him for time to think.
He’d always thought himself made of pretty stern stuff, able to stand firm when he knew he was right, but dammit if she hadn’t slayed him with one look.
She could have asked him to build a space shuttle and fly her to the moon with those eyes, and fuck him if he wouldn’t be googling for a way to buy rocket fuel right now.
“What are you doing here?” Padraig asked as he dropped down onto a stool at the bar.
“I live here.”
Padraig didn’t respond to the sarcasm. Instead, he poured Colm a pint of Guinness and slid it in front of him.
His twin waited until Colm took a long swig, sucking down nearly half the beer, before he started the questioning. “What did you do?”
“Why do you assume I’m the one who fucked up?”
Padraig grinned. “I don’t assume anything. It’s you and Kelli. I had a fifty-fifty shot either way.”
“I told her we were dating.”
Padraig gave him a funny look. “She didn’t know that?”
Colm grimaced. “It’s Kelli. She didn’t want to know that. Even though she did.”
It spoke to the level of Padraig and Kelli’s friendship that he not only understood that ridiculous statement but found it amusing. “That’s my Kell. She’ll always go down swinging.”
Colm narrowed his eyes. “Thought we’d already determined she was my Kelli.”
