by Marilyn Lee
“In love with me? No. We’ve never even kissed. He likes the idea of being in love with a woman he considers older, but he is not in love with me. And I think you know I’m not in love with him. I like him, but that’s as far as my feelings for him have ever gone.”
“Well that’s not enough! He needs more.”
“There’s no more for him to need!”
“Don’t you care that he’s eating his heart out for you?”
She sucked in a breath. “I would never want him hurt, Paul, but I have never done anything to hurt him. You can’t say the same about how you’ve treated me.”
“What?”
“Do you even care one little bit how I feel? Or am I just an easy lay for you?”
“No!” I closed my hands around her arms and stared down at her. “No! You can’t think that!”
“What else can I think? You come here and fuck me—without a condom again.”
Oh hell no. We were not going there! “I came to talk. You’re the one who pressed the sex issue. Not me.”
“You’re a full-grown man, Paul. Why pretend as if I forced myself on you? Regardless why you say you came, you came and had sex with me—twice and then you tell me Mark is in love with me. Did you fuck me to get me to agree to date him?”
I hadn’t planned to fuck her at all, but I knew she wasn’t in the mood to hear or believe that. And I couldn’t blame her. I hadn’t done much to portray myself in a positive light since we met. “No, I didn’t. I just came to ask you to please go out with him again.”
“No!”
I’d been so sure I could talk her into it that I didn’t behave very well when I couldn’t. “Why can’t you? You said you’d do anything.”
She crossed her arms over her breasts, as if she was trying to hold the pain inside. “Anything except that, Paul. I can’t.”
“You mean you won’t.”
“Fine. Use whatever words you want. I won’t and if you knew my situation, you wouldn’t ask me to.”
“Please, Marlena. Can’t you just go out with him a few times and then let him down gently?”
She shook her head. “No!”
“Why the hell not?”
“You’re an ass.” She started to turn away.
She looked angry but sounded hurt. I caught her hand and turned her back to face me. “I’m all he has and when he hurts, I hurt.”
“That’s great but what happens when I’m hurt? You seem to be fine with that.”
I squeezed her hand. “I’m not all right with hurting you.”
“I think you are and that sucks because…”
“Because what?”
She sucked in a breath and shook her head. “Because I’m pregnant.”
“I don’t care about that!”
“Oh God, Paul. You…don’t?”
“No! All I care about is…” I blinked. “I…wait. What did you say?”
She sighed, shaking her head. “Nothing.” She tugged at her hand.
I tightened my grip. “What did you say?”
“Nothing that will matter to you.” She bit her lip. “How could I have been so stupid with you?”
“Are you serious?”
“It’s not something I’ve ever felt the need to joke about, Paul.”
Oh fuck. “Pregnant? You’re pregnant?”
She nodded.
I stared at her, stunned that I’d fucked up again. I hadn’t learned anything from getting Brenda pregnant all those years ago and having to marry her.
She pressed a hand against her lips. “Go ahead, Paul. Ask.”
“Ask what?”
“Who the father is.”
I frowned. “Unless you sleep around, I’m the father.”
“I don’t sleep around!”
Then I was the father. I was silent while I tried to process that reality and the fact that this time I wanted the baby. And the certainty that Mark was going to be crushed. It couldn’t be avoided now.
She put a hand on my arm. “Please, Paul. I need you just as much as Mark does. And so will our baby. Please.”
What could I do? No matter what choice I made someone I loved was going to be hurt. While I was torn between Mark and Marlena, there was no hesitation where the baby was concerned. Boy or girl, the baby would need me—just as Mark had when Dan had dumped him on me.
“I need you, Paul, but if you can’t be there for me, I’ll walk out of your life and never look back. I want our baby to have a father, but I can do this alone if I have to.”
I believed her but damn if I planned to give her a chance to go it alone.
She lifted her chin and stepped away from me, a determined look in her eyes. “With or without you, the baby and I will survive and thrive. If you want to be a part of our lives, fine. If you don’t, it’ll be your loss. Not ours. We’ll be fine—with or without you.”
Damn if I didn’t fall a little more in love with her at that moment. I cupped her face in my hands and stared down into her eyes and lost the last piece of my heart I still retained. “There is no way in hell I’m going to allow you and our child to live happily ever after without me right at your side.”
“Why not?”
“Why do you think? It has something to do with a word that begins with a capital L. It sorts of sounds like…love.”
“Sort of sounds like? Sort of doesn’t work for me, Paul.”
“Ok, it sounds just like love.”
“It does? Are you sure because I can’t deal with your fucking me one moment and then asking me to go out with Mark.”
“I never expected or even wanted to be in this position again. But yes. I’m sure. I love you. I fell in love with you the first time I saw you in the supermarket.”
“What supermarket?”
I frowned at her. “So you didn’t even notice me?”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
I told her of my reaction the first time I saw her.
She smiled. “Oh, Paul. I didn’t notice you then, but I knew the moment we met I wanted to be your woman.”
Things would have been so much easier had we actually met in the supermarket. Then Mark wouldn’t have felt betrayed as he was bound to feel when he learned the level of my deception. “Good because I am so in love with you I’m about to burst.”
Tears filled her eyes and spilled down her cheeks. “I didn’t think this would turn out well for me.” She bit her lip. “What are we going to do about Mark?”
“He’s going to be crushed,” I admitted.
She sighed. “I don’t want him hurt, but I’ve always been upfront with him, Paul. We never kissed or held hands or even hugged. I thought I’d made it crystal clear to him that I all I had to offer him was friendship. Since we liked so many of the same things, I thought it would be all right for us to be friends.”
She was a little delusional if she thought any man worth the name wouldn’t have fallen at least into lust with her. But I could see the thought of hurting Mark distressed her.
“What are we going to do about him?” she asked again.
“I have to do what I should have done a long time ago—tell him the truth and hope he can forgive me.”
“Oh, Paul. How can I help? Can we tell him together?”
I could imagine how well that would go over with him. “Thanks, but this is something I have to do alone,” I said and drew her back to the carpet.
She cuddled close and we lay together, kissing and caressing each other gently. I spent the night. I was revved up knowing my baby was growing inside her that I couldn’t keep my hands off her. We made love well into the wee hours. Then I had the extreme pleasure of holding her close while she fell asleep in my arms.
In the morning, we had a shower, made love, and then had breakfast in bed. Then of course, I had to fuck her again. After a nap, I left her to go see Mark. I wasn’t looking forward to our meeting. Admitting my betrayal was going to be one of the hardest things I’d ever had to do.
When we faced each other at my house, I could almost feel a wave of hate from him. And I didn’t blame him a bit.
He shook his head. “What the fuck, Uncle Paul? You went behind my back and slept with my woman?”
“Look, Mark, I know you’re hurt and angry—and rightfully so. But let’s not revise history. She was not your woman. You told me yourself the two of you were just friends,” I said lamely.
He stared at me. “And you think that makes what you did all right?”
I sighed. “No, I know that doesn’t, but—”
“But nothing! I don’t know you. I don’t want to know you.”
He started to push past me and knocked away the hand I stretched out to stop him. “Get out of my way!”
“Mark, wait. Let me explain.”
He turned at the door to glare at me. “What the hell is there to explain? You were the one person I thought I could trust to never let me down. But I was wrong. You’re worse than Dan. Even he wouldn’t have stooped low enough to fuck my woman.”
Having him compare me to Dan pissed me off but I forced myself to contain my anger. Although I felt the comparison was unfair, I understood where he was coming from. “I know you feel betrayed—”
“How the hell could I not?”
“I’ve already admitted you have a right to feel that way, Mark, but we still need to talk.”
“I can’t trust you so I don’t want to talk to you or be around you. As far as I’m concerned, you’re as dead to me as Dan has been for the last six and a half years!”
He couldn’t have hurt me anymore if he’d stabbed me directly in the heart. I staggered back and sank down onto the floor, knowing that I’d lost him. Still I tried to make him understand. “She’s pregnant. What would you have me do?”
“Why the fuck did you sleep with her when you knew how I felt? What kind of sick shit is that, Paul?”
Paul? Oh, hell. He’d lost all respect for me and I couldn’t blame him. I wish I could say that I felt in time he would come around, but I didn’t believe that. Still, I hoped that one day he would be willing to forgive me.
I wanted to hold off the wedding in the hopes that Mark would come around but after two months of beating my head against the wall of his refusal to talk to me, I did what I had to do. Marlena and I were married in a small civil ceremony.
Our daughter Lalisa was born four months later. Since Mark had refused to speak to me or come to our ceremony, I was delighted when he showed up at the hospital just after she was born.
At first I was afraid he’d only come to heap abuse on us. Then I watched him standing at the nursery window staring in at Lalisa, I knew the thought had been unworthy of him.
He immediately became a doting older brother and rarely missed a week without coming to see her at least once. During those visits, he was super polite to Marlena, as he’d been since he learned of our relationship. She often told me after his visits that she almost wished he’d less polite and snap at her since so she wouldn’t feel so guilty.
Not that she had any real reason to feel that way but I found her in tears twice after his visits. When I asked why she said she hated that he was hurt and that she felt as if she’d destroyed my relationship with him. But that’s not a sentient either Mark or I shared. We both knew I was the one who had done that. I was the one Mark blamed for hurting him and rightly so since I was the one he trusted never to hurt him. So he continued to ignore me and rebuffed all my efforts to make amends. And damn that hurt.
For the first time in my life, I was seriously in love with a woman and I absolutely worshipped and adored Lalisa. But I felt as if a vital part of myself was missing. Strangely, I hadn’t realized how important having Mark’s love and good opinion was until I’d lost them both.
All I could do was hope that once he met a woman and really fell in love—as I was with Marlena, he’d finally understand why I found it so impossible to walk away from her. Once that happened, I hoped he’d forgive me and we could work on restoring our relationship.
I’d almost given up all hope of that ever actually happening, but it finally did. It took over five years but one day when Lalisa was five, Mark showed up at our door with this gorgeous brunette in tow. Noting the way he looked at her, I knew the moment I’d spent five miserable years longing for had arrived.
Mark was in love and ready to forgive me and let me back in his life. Two years later my eyes filled with tears when Mark placed his son, Paul in my arms and told him I was his grandfather. Damn. That’s right. He named his son Paul Crawford Morgan. I would have died a thousand deaths for that sweet moment. But thankfully I didn’t because finally, everything was right in my world. I was married to the woman I loved more each day, I had a beautiful, healthy daughter, and I had my son back. And a grandson. Life didn’t get any better than that.
The End.
Beauty Is Alisha Hoover? Excerpt
© 2011 Marilyn Lee
My mother used to say that beauty is as beauty does. But, being male, I never bought into it. A woman was either good to look at or she wasn’t. If she wasn’t, her chances of getting a man to stay around long enough to see how beautiful she was on the inside were slim to none.
Like most men, I like beautiful women. I like dating them, being seen with them, and making love to them. But my mom had also instilled a sense of fairness and compassion in me. My dad used to say that such qualities could easily get a man in hot water.
I always thought I’d landed half-way between both my parents’ viewpoints. I knew beauty wasn’t everything or even the most important things in a serious relationship and I knew being too touchy-feeling could land my ass in romantic trouble with a woman I didn’t want to get serious with.
But I tended to think mom had it more right than dad by a hair or two. That’s how I landed in trouble with the last woman I ever expected to want to know personally. Alisha Hoover.
Mom would have been proud of me while dad would have thought I’d lost my mind. I probably had but by the time I realized it, I was in too deep with her with no way out that would allow me to keep my heart in one piece.
My date with Alisha Hoover was definitely going to be a one-shot deal with no repeats. Though she seemed nice enough, she wasn’t exactly the type of woman that made a man want to see as much of her as he could. Although she had beautiful dark skin and eyes, it would take a ton of make-up before she could even be considered “cute.” And after working with her for three years, I saw no evidence that she possessed any womanly guiles needed to attract and keep a man’s interest.
Still, after listening to the guys at the canning plant where we all worked making bets on the odds of her having a date for the annual company picnic, I felt a little sorry for her.
So she didn't have many assets beyond her skin and her eyes. That was no reason to be unkind. I didn't join them in making fun of her but I didn't say anything in her defense either. But when I looked up to see her standing in the doorway, I realized that she’d heard everything they’d said.
I saw a hurt look in her dark brown eyes before she turned and rushed from the floor. I suppose that’s when I decided to ask her to the company picnic. I was between girlfriends, having recently broken up with Debbie after three years of exclusive dating. Deb was pretty and witty, but outside of great sex, we had very little in common. And I was getting to the point where I wanted more than that in a relationship.
I signaled the foreman that I wanted to take my afternoon break and followed her. I found her in the lunchroom. I entered slowly, trying to give her time to compose herself.
She sat at a table in the back, her head bent and her shoulders shaking with silent sobs.
Call me a sucker but I hate to see a woman cry. Especially one who’s crying because someone has been unnecessarily unkind to her.
I walked over to the vending machine. I pretended not to notice her wiping furiously at her face as I got a soda.
I took several gulps from the can before turning
and acting as if I were seeing her for the first time. “Hi, Alisha.”
She sniffed, but didn't respond.
Why was she ignoring me? Damn, did she think I'd joined the rest of those knuckleheads making fun of her? To my surprise it bothered me that she might think I’d said unkind things about her behind her back. I tried again. “Hi, Alicia.”
She sucked in a breath and finally answered. “Hi, Craig.”
I sighed. Tears did nothing to improve her nondescript looks. I almost changed my mind, but I told myself one afternoon wouldn’t kill me. And it might make amends for what she'd obviously heard said about her. “Going to the picnic next weekend?”
She gave me a hurt look that strengthened my resolve. “No!”
She spat the word out as if the company picnic was the last place she wanted to be.
“Why not?”
And she gave me a cool look. “You know why.”
Of course, I knew why, but it wouldn’t do to admit it. “No, I don’t.”
She shrugged. “No one’s asked me, not that I want to go anywhere with any of those so-called men on the floor.”
Well, damn. She had a temper. Who knew? I didn't admit it then, but looking back, I realized her slight show of spirit intrigued me. That and the sudden realization that she had a nice rack. It wasn't overly large or perfectly shaped like the store-bought brand but it was nonetheless pretty nice. A man with the ability to look beyond surface beauty could spend many a happy hour with his lips wrapped around one of those babies.
Trying to appear casual, I gave her a quick assessment. She was a few inches above average height which is to say she was about 5’5’’ or 5’6”. She wasn't fat. But she also wasn't bone thin. Cuddling with her might not be too much of a trial. And not every woman could be supermodel pretty.
And though women had always seemed to find my wavy dark hair and blue eyes attractive I wasn't exactly George Clooney. But I kept myself in shape, I wasn’t ugly, and I've never had a problem getting the woman of my choice to go out with me.
“What a coincidence, Alisha. No one’s asked me, either.” I shrugged, trying to look casual. “Maybe we could go together?”
