by Linda Grimes
Did I ever. I loved him dearly, but Laura was welcome to his Neanderthal tactics. She was much better at dealing with his bossiness than I was.
“Forget about it,” I said. “This is so cool! Congratulations! Oh, my God—have you told Mom yet? She is going to freak.”
“Not yet. You’re the first. We’re still at the doctor’s office.”
Aw, that made me feel good. Special. Having a sister was the best.
“I think your brother has recovered enough to speak now—here he is.”
“Hey, sis.” Thomas’s voice was shakier than I’d ever heard it. But happy.
“I can’t believe I’m going to be an aunt!” I screamed, earning myself major looks—some indulgent, some annoyed—from my fellow passengers. I lowered my voice a few decibels. “This is the best news ever.”
“It is, isn’t it? I still can’t quite believe it—we weren’t even going to start trying until next year. We’ve been so careful—”
“TMI, Thomas!” Laura’s voice in the background. I thought maybe I heard a thwack, too. She probably hit him.
“Sorry, dear.” Thomas’s muffled reply was to her. He never called me “dear.” “We’re thrilled. I can’t believe I’m going to be a dad.”
I giggled. “Wait till Mom finds out she’s going to be a grandma. Things are about to get real, big bro. So, are you going call her next? Whatever you do, don’t tell her you told me first, or none of us will ever hear the end of it.”
“We’re heading up”—“up” being Manhattan, where my parents lived in an Upper West Side brownstone—“as soon as I hand off the baton at the office and we get a few things packed. We figured we better tell Mom and Dad in person, so I can catch Mom when she passes out. Besides, if we’re not there for her to hug, she’ll be on the first flight down. Want me to text you after we tell her, so you can get your ‘surprise’ on?”
“No need. I’m sure I’ll be able to hear her scream from here,” I said.
* * *
I was still buzzing with the good news when I walked through my front door and saw the roses. All thoughts of my brother’s impending daddy-hood flew out of my head. A dozen blooms, in as many colors, in a crystal vase on the hall stand, and more leading up the stairs, one on each step.
A smile stretched my face almost to the breaking point. I abandoned my carry-on and ran up the stairs, grabbing flowers along the way. “Billy?” I hollered. “Are you here?”
I pushed open the door to my bedroom. He was there all right, gloriously naked from the waist up, barefoot, and stretched out casually on his side across my king-size bed. He was propped up on one elbow, the most gorgeous, deep red rose clamped between his teeth. He waggled the dark eyebrows above his inky blue eyes, and fluttered his lush, black lashes.
I burst out laughing. “You look like the cover of a bad romance novel.”
He spit out the rose. “Yeah? Come here so I can rip your bodice. Now, wench! I’ve been waiting. If you’d been any longer, I might have been forced to start without you.”
I tossed the rest of the roses onto the bed beside him (the thorns having been thoughtfully removed by the florist—I’m not an idiot) and dove in after them, my heart near to bursting with laughter and love.
“If you’d told me you were coming, I would have made it a point to get here sooner,” I said.
“What, and spoil the surprise?”
He flopped back and pulled me on top of him. Kissed me until I moaned and begged him to hurry. When he let me up for air, I’d somehow lost my jacket, shirt, and bra.
“Damn, I’ve missed you,” he said.
“Prove it,” I said with a challenging grin, and tugged at the top button of his jeans.
With a wicked gleam in his eyes, he flipped me onto my back and slowly divested me of my ankle boots and pants. He left my lacy underwear—he was fond of removing that with his teeth.
After he took off his jeans and boxer briefs, he crawled back into bed beside me and planted a kiss on each of my breasts, lingering with his tongue until I was whimpering. If lingering were an art form—and I was pretty sure it was, the way Billy did it—he would be a virtuoso. He certainly made my body sing.
He paused, replacing his teasing tongue with both hands, cupping me, squeezing lightly. “You’re beautiful, Ciel. You know that, don’t you?”
“I know you think so,” I said. “And I’m happy you do.”
He nodded. “As long as you realize it. And while I appreciate what you’re trying to do for me”—he traced his fingers lightly over my chest—“you know it’s not necessary, right? You don’t have to enhance anything for me. You’re the sexiest woman I know exactly the way you are.”
I looked down at myself. Were my boobs bigger? They were. What the hell?
Shit. What was I doing? I shrank them back down to normal, mortified my subconscious would do such a thing.
Billy smiled reassuringly. “If you get off on changing things up, you know I’m ready and willing. I’ll even enlarge anything you want bigger on me.” He winked. “But I don’t ever want you to feel insecure with me, okay? Playing games can be fun, but I love you. As you.”
I didn’t think he was intentionally reminding me of my recent mix-up, but I felt guilty all the same.
“I love you,” I said, fiercely, clutching him to me. “I don’t want you to change anything for me.” It was true, too, every word of it. Losing him before, if only briefly, had about killed me. The thought of it happening again was too painful to contemplate.
He held me tightly. After a moment, he said, “Nothing? You sure?”
The teasing in his voice, coupled with a new pressure on my belly, made me pull away and look down. Ack! Billy, already generously endowed, had doubled his size. I scooted away from him.
“You put it right back the way it was, mister,” I said as sternly as I could while swallowing my laughter. “There is no way I’m letting that monster near me. God, I wouldn’t be able to sit for a week.”
He complied at once. “Come here, you,” he said in a voice just this side of a growl, pulling me under him and sliding into me in one smooth motion. His eyes, serious now, held mine as he began to move, slowly at first, then picking up speed until I moaned with my impending release. “You are what matters to me, Ciel. Not how you look. You.”
I toppled over the edge, staring into those eyes that never failed to mesmerize me, marveling once again at his ability to have me giggling one second and gasping with passion the next. He came seconds later, burying his face in my neck, gripping me tightly until at last we fell apart, holding hands and breathing hard, staring at the ceiling together.
A minute or so later—long enough for our heart rates to slow back down—he turned his head to me, a naughty glint in his eyes. “Of course, the package you’re wrapped in is an awfully nice bonus.”
I snuggled up to him. How did he always know exactly what I needed to hear? “Oh, you are good.”
“Huh. I guess it must be like they say…”
The grin in his voice made me smile. “And what exactly do they say?”
“Good things come in small packages.”
I cracked up. Yeah, he was the one. The only one, I assured myself. This time I got no argument from my inner buttinski.
* * *
Much later, completely satisfied, and naked except for the blanket (me) and sheet (Billy) wrapped around us like togas, we sat at my dining room table, munching on freshly delivered pizza. I picked the anchovies off mine and gave them to Billy, who happily piled them on his.
“I thought you liked anchovies,” he said with a suspicious twinkle in his eye. “Honest.”
“Eh. They’re okay. But not on Hawaiian pizza. They clash with the pineapple, and the ham is already salty enough. Which you knew when you ordered, because I explained it the last time we ordered pizza.”
“Huh. Guess I forgot.”
Yeah, right. Billy had the most obnoxiously good memory of anyone I knew.
“Bullshit,” I said. “You figured I’d give you my share of the anchovies.” I bit into a slice and made a face. I must have missed one of the little suckers. “Bleah. Too salty.”
Billy leaned over and kissed me. “Mmm. Salty is good. I like you salty.” His tongue played delicately over my lips.
I pulled away with a groan. “Stop! I’m hungry. For food now.”
“I can’t help it. Seeing you wrapped up in a blanket makes me think of the boat in Sweden. That was when I knew for sure I had to have you.”
I’d been wearing a blanket then, too, after an unintended dip in the Baltic Sea drenched my clothes (and almost drowned me, but I preferred not to dwell on that part). That little adventure had been the first time I’d started seeing Billy in a romantic light. And the beginning of all my confusion. Before then, I’d been safely and solidly wrapped in the cocoon of my unrequited passion for Mark. Was Billy intentionally reminding me my attraction to Mark was no longer unrequited? Was he fishing? Or was I being too sensitive?
“And now you do have me,” I said simply, willing him to believe me, because, God, I never wanted to hurt him.
After a pause, he smiled, seemingly reassured. He picked a piece of pineapple off his slice and put it on mine. “There. I’m atoning.”
For what? The fish or the fishing?
I chose to go with the least complicated path. Thank you, Occam’s razor, for shaving my conscience. “I gave you all my anchovies.”
“Yeah, but I love pineapple, so my sacrifice is greater. It balances out karmically,” he said.
“You’re such a saint. Honestly, I don’t know why you haven’t been canonized yet.”
“Merely a celestial oversight, I’m sure. But enough about me, fascinating though the topic is. Catch me up on you. How’d your lesson with Laura go? I assume that’s where you were between the airport and bed with me.”
“Laura! Oh, my God, I haven’t told you the news! She’s pregnant. Can you believe it? I’m going to be an aunt!”
Billy’s eyes got big. “Way to bury the lede, cuz.”
“Hey, it’s your own fault. I was going to call you as soon as I got home, but then I saw the roses, and you were there in my bed, all shirtless and sexy, and I hadn’t seen you in a whole week, and then you started kissing me, and then…” I shrugged. “I forgot.”
“Excellent excuse.” He grinned, and leaned over to kiss me again before turning his attention back to his pizza. “Hell, they aren’t wasting any time, are they? Unless maybe that was the reason for the blitzkrieg wedding your mom pulled out of thin air?”
“No, they only found out today. Laura called me from the doctor’s office. Apparently, they hadn’t planned to start trying until next year. Thomas was still in shock.”
“I can imagine. God, impending fatherhood would send me running for—” He shuddered almost imperceptibly, a strange cross between speculation and fear blooming in his eyes. “You don’t think … I mean, there isn’t any way…”
My latest sip of beer exited through my nose on the updraft of a cough. “What? No! No way. Jesus, Billy, don’t say stuff like that.”
He mopped my face with a napkin, pounding me—softly—on my back when my coughing fit continued. “Sorry,” he said. “Forget it, okay? We’re careful. So, Laura still gave you a lesson? Bet Tommy-boy wasn’t keen on that.”
“No, she sent Mark as a substitute,” I said, under control again, keeping it breezy. No biggie, right?
A small muscle contracted in Billy’s jaw. “Mark? Guess he thought it would be a good opportunity to go over your NASA job? Two birds with one stone.”
I shrugged, and forced myself not to look away from Billy’s eyes, holding back a blush. “Not so much. You know how he is with the need-to-know bullshit. Whatever’s going on with the photographer, apparently I don’t need to know.”
Billy nodded, looking at me thoughtfully. “The spook give you a good workout?” he asked, not an inkling of innuendo in his voice or eyes. So why could I still feel it?
“He went all drill sergeant on me,” I said, squelching my stupid guilt. “And here I’d been thinking Laura was tough.” I shoved some pizza in my mouth and concentrated on chewing.
Billy put his slice down, and took mine from me. He dropped it beside his.
“Hey, I’m not finished!” I mumbled, chewing faster.
He took me by the hand and led me back upstairs. “Neither am I,” he said, a determined gleam in his eye.
* * *
I woke to a jarring clash of cymbals followed by my mother’s voice saying, “Answer your phone!”
Gah. Ringtone hell. Odds were ten to one Billy helped Mom install it on my phone when I wasn’t looking. Great in the sack or not, I might have to kill him.
The cymbals crashed again. “Answer your phone!”
Was it my imagination, or did the recording sound more insistent that time?
Thomas and Laura must have told her the news. I pried my eyelids open and looked at the clock beside my bed. They’d made incredibly good time. Maybe if I didn’t answer she’d give up and call Auntie Mo to lord it over her instead.
Auntie Mo was Billy’s mom. Well, stepmom. (Not that it makes a bit of difference, except to cement the whole cousin issue with Billy as Absolutely Not Perverted.)
Crash! “Answer your phone!”
I sighed. Nothing could douse the sleepy afterglow like a conversation with my mother. Billy had left me practically radioactive when he’d had to skedaddle back to his job; the glow was finally calming down enough for me to relax into the land of Nod. Frankly, after the two workouts I’d had—professional with Mark, recreational with Billy, both physically exhausting—I really needed some shut-eye.
I stared at the phone, debating whether I could get away with ignoring it.
Crash! “Answer your phone!”
I yawned until my jaw cracked. Oh, hell. She’d keep trying every five minutes until she got through. Mom was nothing if not persistent. I reached for the phone.
“Hey, Mom. Wow, great news, huh?” I said, thinking, in my groggy state, a preempt would be a good idea. Maybe if Mom found out I already knew, she’d hang up fast and call someone who didn’t. “Welp, gotta run—”
Yes, I know I told Thomas not to let on they’d told me first. Trust me, all of us Halligan siblings are accustomed to the view from under the bus. It’s a survival mechanism that kicks in when dealing with our mother. Thomas would no doubt claim I’d wheedled the news out of Laura. Since Laura is a saint in Mom’s eyes, she wouldn’t get in trouble over it. So really it wasn’t as much of a betrayal as it might appear.
“Ciel Colleen Halligan, how could you say such a thing? It’s terrible news. And how did you hear about it? I just found out myself.”
“Um, Thomas told me,” I said, scrubbing my face with one hand, trying to chase away the residual sleepiness. Regardless of Laura’s immunity from Mom’s wrath, she hadn’t been in the family long enough for me to throw her under the bus. Besides, sisterly solidarity. “I’ve never heard him so happy,” I added. “Wait a second—why aren’t you happy? You’re supposed to be thrilled.”
“You think I’m some sort of monster?”
“Of course not,” I said. “I would never think—”
“And how did Thomas find out?”
“Well, how do you think? Laura told him.”
“Laura? Why on Earth would she—oh, my God! The CIA is involved?”
Okay, what the hell was going on? “Mom, let me talk to Laura for a second, okay?”
“Why would Laura be here? She’s working, and so is Thomas.”
Uh-oh. “Mom, what did you call to tell me?”
A heavy sigh came through the line. Mom composing herself. “It’s Aunt Helen. She’s dead.”
Crap. A picture of Aunt Helen popped into my head and gave my heart a squeeze. Elderly, frail, and unable to sustain a decent aura for longer than fifteen minutes at a time anymore. We all loved her dearly.
&n
bsp; I took a breath and leavened my voice with a hefty dose of sympathy. “I’m so sorry. It’s not entirely unexpected, though, is it? Given her age and all,” I said.
“She was murdered.”
“What?”
“Somebody used a stun gun on her in Central Park, then stabbed her while she was still twitching.”
Thanks for the visual, Mom. “What kind of fucking sicko does that?”
It was a measure of how upset I was that I let “fucking” slip out while talking to my mother. It was a measure of how upset she was that she let it pass without a comment about God punishing me right away.
“How could the police know such a gruesome detail anyway?” I added rapidly, in case she was only pausing to frame an adequate threat of heavenly retribution.
“There was a witness. He was too far away to get a good look at the guy’s face, but he definitely saw the stun gun, and then the stabbing. Which I wouldn’t know, except Junie Sorensen volunteers at the library where the wife of the police officer who was first on the scene works. Oh, God, Ciel, what is the world coming to when a harmless little old lady can’t even take a walk—in the middle of the day!—in Central Park?”
I knew she didn’t expect an answer. “How’s Dad taking it?” Aunt Helen had been like a second mother to him when he was a kid.
Mom switched gears from impending hysteria to deep sadness with a heavy sigh. “You know your father. He’s being strong for me.” There was a small pause—a sniffle and a deep breath. “Enough tragedy. What’s this ‘great news’ you were talking about?”
I might have known a simple thing like the murder of a relative wouldn’t keep Mom from pursuing a trail.
“Uh … nothing.” Crap, Ciel, think of something! “Look, now isn’t the time—”
“Ciel Colleen, now is exactly the right time to tell me some ‘great news.’ Spit it out this instant!”
“Laura’s pregnant.” The words were sucked out of my mouth by the force of my mother’s will before I could bite my tongue.
I know. It was awful enough I’d been willing to admit I’d known something before she did, but then not to wait for Thomas and Laura to tell her? Bad me.
