“He’s sorry.”
Jaycee had avoided AD for three days after her run-in with Beck. On the fourth night, she slipped in, hoping to have a quiet night, and she had until closing time.
She was standing at the stage counting her tips when she heard her boss’ voice coming up behind her. “What?”
Pete reached her side. “Beck,” he murmured. They were alone at this end of the room, but there were still staff clearing up tables elsewhere. “For the other night, he told me to tell you he was sorry.”
“Oh,” she said. “He has nothing to be sorry for, I was out of line.”
“It’s been tough for him,” Pete said. “He’s trying his best, and he’s doing amazing. Way better than any of us other guys would do. But you know what he’s like, he’s a perfectionist, and he wants to do this right. He’s not getting a lot of sleep.”
“He thrives on getting no sleep,” she said, fingering the stack of quarters she’d piled on the stage.
“When he’s working, sure, but this… fatherhood… it’s not like that.”
It tore her apart to think of him struggling. He’d once been her closest friend, her best friend, they’d shared everything, and now at the toughest time of his life she’d abandoned not only their children, but their father too.
“As long as he’s getting time with the canvas he’ll—”
“Canvas?” Pete said and snorted out a laugh. “The studio’s locked. No one’s been in it for weeks. Best we can tell he hasn’t been in there since before the boys were born.”
Shock made her mouth open as she looked to him. “No,” she breathed. “But, The Quag and—”
“He doesn’t have time, Jayc. He’s out there all by himself. The rest of us are trying to pitch in, we take turns to check in every day. Some days he’s totally zoned out and we don’t get two words out of him, other days he’s father of the goddamn year. We… we don’t know how to help him, Jaycee.”
That was terrible news. Awful. She’d been dealing with her own demons and had only had positive thoughts about Beck because she assumed he was living his dream. Could it be that his dream wasn’t as rosy as he’d thought it would be?
“You have to let him breathe,” she said, the words coming out of her in a whisper. “You have to sit him down, tell him to close his eyes, and remind him to breathe.”
“You think?”
Closing her own eyes, she pictured every time her maestro had been riled or stressed out in the past. “Provoke him,” she said. “Make him mad, tell him something outrageous and piss him off, get him so mad that you think he wants to put his fist through the wall and then…”
“What?”
She smiled. “Then you slide your hand onto the side of his neck and make him look at you, right into your eyes, and you… you take the burden from him. Don’t say anything, just… just let him pour it all into you through his incredible, intense gaze.” Gradually, her hand rose and although there was nothing there, she was sure she could feel him. “And then right when you think you have it, right when you feel the depth of that connection, you close your eyes and you breathe out, hard… and then… smile… For a minute, think about happiness and pleasure and joy, think about hope and destiny and when you open your eyes… you’ll see nothing but gratitude and love staring back at you.”
It was sad that she had to leave the illusion of that moment, but as her hand descended, her disappointment was joined by a warmth that she hadn’t felt since she’d last been with Beck.
“Yeah, I don’t think that will work for us,” Pete said. Maybe not. She didn’t think any of the guys would want to get that close to Beck, but that was one of the tamer suggestions that had come to mind. “You could… visit him.”
Ha, she smiled and began to move her tips into her purse. “That’s against the rules.”
“There are no rules now,” Pete said. “The contract is done. As long as he keeps paying the bills, everything is good. There’s no clause that says you have to live with him, none that says you have to abstain either.”
“Great. Sex,” she muttered. “Let’s talk about that.”
“Maybe that’s what’s eating both of you,” Pete said. “You lived together for months but could never do what you wanted to do with each other.” That’s right. Their relationship was a secret. So everyone assumed sexual frustration was making them both moody. “Or did you?”
“Not everything is about sex,” she said.
He sniggered a short, unimpressed laugh. “That’s kinda exactly what Beck said.”
“What business is it of yours, huh?” she asked, driving a fist to her hip as she faced him. “Why do you care who he sleeps with or who I sleep with? Beck is capable. He wants to be a father and I’ll tell you, Pete, I don’t have one damn doubt that he’s going to be the best goddamn father who ever breathed.”
She didn’t like the way he was examining her. “He brought you inside, Jayc. We don’t let people into our circle who bail when things get tough. You don’t want to see the twins? You don’t want to be a mother? Fine, whatever. That’s your business. But when our boy needs us, we step up. And Beck is our boy. You think he’d see you struggle for one second without stepping up? You didn’t sit with him every second you were in that operating room. You didn’t hear what he said about you when they told him you might not make it.”
“So? What?” she asked. “You think I don’t care about him? You don’t think it rips me apart that I can’t go to him and help him? Shit, Pete, if I’d known he wasn’t working…”
“What?” Pete asked, getting closer. “If you’d have known, then what?” But she didn’t have an answer. Jaycee knew if Beck wasn’t in the studio, things were worse than anyone understood. “He wanted to be with you, he wanted to sit with you every minute when you were in the ICU. It was us who told him to give you space. So if you’re punishing him for—”
“Punishing him? I’m not punishing him, I’m… Pete, the contract said—”
“Oh, the contract! To hell with the contract!” He shouldn’t be shouting at her because they’d draw the attention of the others, but she didn’t care about that any more than he did right now. “He needs you, Jaycee! Can’t you be his goddamn friend? Can’t you get your head out of what was and think about what comes next? I know you two never talked about the future, he told me that, and he told us to give you space! But I can’t see him like this and do nothing! Something’s eating him! Something’s wrong! He won’t open up to any of us! He just shuts down! He trusts you! He needs you! You’re his goddamn muse!”
She didn’t want Pete to hate her, didn’t want any of the guys to. She’d been so worried that Beck might think she was trying to muscle in with the boys that she hadn’t thought about them, their friendship, their future.
The boys were too young to know who she was or to be affected by her presence. Whereas Beck had saved her, he’d brought her back from the precipice at just the right moment. Without him, Mavis would be in the care of the state by now for sure.
Beck would never see her in need and hide from her. With all her thoughts of freedom, Jaycee hadn’t yet pinned down what she wanted to do with it. Maybe instead of fighting to get away from what was, she should think about repaying the kindness.
Shoving the rest of her money in her purse, she stormed away from Pete. “Jaycee,” he called after her, but she wasn’t slowing down, she went into the store cupboard, grabbed what she needed, and left AD on a mission.
Coming back here hadn’t been on Jaycee’s agenda. She probably still had her key in her purse, but she didn’t use it. Instead, she knocked and waited. There was light behind the glazed panel in the door though it was frosted so she couldn’t see specifics behind it until a tall blurred shape blocked the light telling her that someone was coming.
Staying against the door frame, she tried not to think about the dryness of her lips, or about the tingling in her belly or the anxiety firing her heart. Jaycee had to be confident to help him pull his head out of his ass.
When the door opened, Beck had his eyes closed in a long, tired blink, like he was trying to clear sleep from his head. It took him a minute to focus. The minute he did, he got worried.
“Jaycee, what’s—” Taking his hand, she cut him off by walking inside without an invitation. He pushed the door closed, but didn’t let go of her hand as she pulled him through the kitchen and toward the stairs. “No, Jayc—”
“Shh,” she said, turning to walk backwards up the stairs.
Seeking his other hand, she kept both in hers and pulled him up though he was slow and reluctant, she took it one careful step at a time. When she got to the top, she had to let one of his hands go to input the code and used all her strength to pull open the door.
Because usually she had two hands for this instead of just one, it was a struggle. But she was afraid that if she let him go he might run away again.
Flicking on all the lights, she paused to absorb the scent and sensation of the room. Pete was right; it was exactly as they’d left it. Right down to her underwear, still strewn on the floor near the shirt she’d cast off on the night she’d ended up giving birth.
As shocking as it was to find the place a time capsule to their relationship, it intensified the moment, which was good because it should help her wake him up.
The worn armchair at the end of the bed was still in place and when she reached that spot, she pulled her purse over her head and yanked out the sketch pad and pencils she’d grabbed from AD.
Putting them on the chair, she went to stand in front of him and while his expression was deadpan and tired, she didn’t waver. “Undress me.”
“Jaycee—”
“No excuses, Maestro. It’s ridiculous. You haven’t been in here?” she asked and picked up his hands to use them to push her jacket from her shoulders.
“The boys are downstairs, I have to feed them in an hour and—”
“Then we have an hour,” she said, glancing at the monitor on his belt. “I’m not asking you to neglect them, but I’m not leaving here until you undress me.”
Something softened in his expression, but it wasn’t tenderness, it was… amusement. Well, that was something better than exhaustion. “So, if I never take your clothes off you’re going to live in our studio forever?”
“With The Abyss and The Quag,” she said and smiled. “Beck, are you trying to turn me on?” His smile came with the exhale of a laugh and she couldn’t contain her grin. “That’s better… Now would you please take my clothes off? I don’t usually have to beg you like this.”
“Girl, I’m too tired to make love to you properly,” he said and dipped to lay his face in her hair. “You smell amazing. Damn, I’ve missed your smell.”
“I didn’t come here for sex,” she said, pushing on his chest to straighten him up. “I’m suggesting a platonic maestro-muse relationship… You’ve seen me naked before… Granted, my body doesn’t look the same as it used to, but…”
Hmm, for the first time she stopped to think about whether it was smart to take her clothes off for him. He’d known her when she had her former figure, before the twins had been showing. And he knew her pregnant. But she was still getting used to her post-baby body, maybe she shouldn’t be thinking about shattering any positive memories he might have of her form.
But as she pondered this with a frown, his fingers got to work like they’d sensed the possibility of her raising barriers. He took off her jacket and unzipped her dress, but he pulled out her hair clip and leaned in to inhale the scent of her again before he pushed the straps of her dress away.
She didn’t stop him when he unhooked her bra, but she did arch as he peeled it away. “Wow, those babies are huge,” he said.
She pouted at him. “And sore,” she said, taking his hands to cup them around her breasts.
“You’ve been in pain?” he asked, brushing his thumbs into her cleavage and back toward her nipples. The stimulating action made her relax more than she had in weeks. “Muse, I—”
“It’s ok, they’re getting better,” she said then realized what she’d done by putting his hands on her. “Oh, I just totally forced you to grope me, is that inappropriate?”
“Probably,” he said but didn’t move his hands away as his grin got mischievous. “Wasn’t MAC platonic?”
Swatting his chest, she laughed. “Don’t,” she said and stepped closer to him. “Can I use a sheet?”
“For what?” he asked, going to look at the pencils she’d brought.
“So I can cover up,” she said, splaying her hands on her lower abdomen. She hadn’t put on as much weight as she’d feared she might, but her shape was definitely different.
The sly look he tossed over his shoulder at her as his eyes slunk down her body didn’t help. “Will it make you feel better if I tell you I’m hard?”
“Beckett!” she screeched like she was offended. “Do we have to buy you a dictionary? I said platonic.”
He stood up, poking the point of a pencil into the pad of his thumb. “How about posing in The Quag or in front of The Abyss?”
Tilting her head, she narrowed her suspicious eyes. “You’re trying to seduce me. You think I won’t be able to contain myself if you tell me to make love to The Abyss again?”
Again. It would be laughable to anyone else if she said that, but he got it. Coming over, he kept scrutinizing her body. “Can you… I mean… can you have sex?”
“No!” she said and turned around to elbow him before she climbed onto the bed on all fours and grabbed a pillow. “Physically, yes. I had my six-week check and I’m good to go and the bleeding has stopped, thank god.”
“Take your panties off,” he said, positioning himself on the armchair and opening the brand-new pad.
On her back, she lifted her hips and wriggled out of them. “But it would probably feel weird, don’t you think?”
“What kind of weird?” he asked, propping his feet on the end of the bed to begin making a few lines on the paper though she hadn’t actually settled her upper body yet. “Pull your hair forward over your shoulder.”
“So that you don’t have to look at my breasts?” she asked, but was teasing as she did what he said and curled her arm around the pillow to rest her head on it.
“Because I love your hair,” he said and paused for a second until she stopped moving. “You still haven’t told me what would feel weird.”
“Sex,” she said, opening and closing her mouth to scratch her chin on the pillow, which of course just so happened to be his, so it felt almost like she was tasting his scent.
“People have sex after they have babies,” he said. “Where do you think baby number two usually comes from?”
“Yeah,” she said. “But I… I don’t know, I heard it’s different after.”
“Different how?” he asked, his eyes narrow and intent as he drew his knee a little higher.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I haven’t done it… I haven’t even had an orgasm since… well, since I was last in this bed I guess.”
That made him stop and lift his head. “What happened to playing Killing Me Softly twice a day?” he asked, and she didn’t get it. “You know, strumming my pain…”
She laughed. “Geez, Beck, where do you come up with this stuff? And no, I haven’t… I’ve been too afraid to even touch down there. I don’t even know if I could bring myself to climax now.”
He went back to his drawing. “So you think people stop having sex and twanging the ukulele after they have kids? That’s kinda sad, isn’t it?”
“I don’t think they stop, I just haven’t… been in the mood.”
Again, he stopped and this time he groaned. “Ok, Muse, you’re depressing me. You haven’t been in the mood for sex?”
“Doctor Nicks said it’s normal,” she said. “I haven’t really, you know… felt good… about anything.”
“Anything like what?” he asked. “You’re the most amazing person on the planet, so you better not be suggesting anything else.”
“You’re biased,” she said.
“Why am I biased?” he asked and when she looked at him, she was kind of pleased that he just kept on drawing.
“I feel guilty,” she said. “And vulnerable… I… I guess I feel exposed.”
Which was a stupid thing to say when she’d just shown up on his doorstep and told him to take her clothes off. “What do you have to feel guilty about?”
“We shouldn’t be talking about this,” she murmured, stroking the linen she was lying on.
“We can talk about anything,” he said. “You felt comfortable enough to knock on my door and demand I strip you naked and we haven’t seen each other for six weeks.” She smiled. “What?”
“I was just thinking that exact thing,” she said. “How stupid it must sound for me to tell you I feel exposed right after I bare all for you.”
“I understand you, Jaycee. I know it makes you uncomfortable sometimes—”
“No,” she said, looking at him. “It doesn’t make me uncomfortable. The truth is… I’m only ever comfortable when I’m with you… I can’t explain the way it makes me feel when we’re in the same room. It’s ridiculous how much of a difference it makes to my mood and the way I feel about… everything.”
“I do understand it, Muse,” he said. “I’ve been in a daze for six weeks. I’ve been doing everything I need to and trying my best to feel like I fit, but I… it’s like I’m out of faze with the world. Like I’m half a step behind or not quite there in any moment… I don’t know…”
“Like you’re drugged or crashing after a high,” she said, relaxing into the pillow again.
“Yeah,” he said and paused for a second to appreciate her before he went back to drawing. “Tell me why you feel guilty.”
“I wonder if I did the right thing,” she said, smoothing her hand on the bed again. “I go from feeling so high that I helped you achieve your dream, to plummeting all the way to rock bottom. Sometimes I feel like I miss them, and that makes me feel selfish because I know I can’t be what they deserve… and then I get so scared that I’ve hurt them by walking away. I’m terrified that abandoning them might screw them up in exactly the way I wanted to avoid.” Beck didn’t respond and when she realized there was no sound of the pencil or movement, she looked up. “Maestro? Don’t be mad at me, I’m not trying to—”
“You’re talking about the twins,” he murmured. “You think about them?”
“Every minute,” she admitted. “They lived in me and then I just let them go and I… I know I signed the contract, I’m not talking about changing the rules. The rules are the reason I stayed away from you. The reason I knew you’d be better off without me in your life. I didn’t want you to think that I was getting ideas of… anything. I’m not. I know I would be a terrible mother. I don’t want to be a part of their lives. I trust you to love them completely. Oh, God, Beck, I’m sorry, I opened my big mouth and I—”
“Do you want to meet them?” he asked and there was hope in his voice that was almost optimistic.
He didn’t sound angry at all. “I don’t know. I… I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t thought about it. But won’t that make it harder?”
“Not on them,” he said. “It helps their development to be around people.”
If it would be better for the twins, maybe she should think about it. Except… “What if I hurt them?” she asked.
Beck smiled. “How would you do that?” he asked. “I’m the meathead, remember? If I can handle it, you can. You’ll learn how to hold them and how to play with them and—”
“Not physically,” she said. “Emotionally. I’ll have to walk away and… they’ll think they weren’t enough.”
“I told you way back at the start that I wouldn’t let them judge you. Isn’t it better to love them some than never love them at all?”
“I don’t think I can love them,” she said.
It made her heart ache just to say the words, especially to this man who adored them.
“Jaycee,” he said, putting the pad aside to slink onto his knees and move toward her. Leaning over the bed, he took both of her hands. “You’ve loved them for months. You’ve loved them since you saw their first scan, maybe since before then… You don’t even see how you’ve been a mother to them already. But you have.”
“That wasn’t the deal, Beck,” she said. “They’re your children, not mine.”
But he wasn’t ready to give up. “You don’t have to be their mother. You can still be a part of their lives as fun Auntie Jaycee,” he said. “They never have to know you gave birth to them.”
“You said you wouldn’t lie to your children,” she said, taking one hand out of his to thread her fingers into his hair. “I understand that… I respect it.”
“Muse, they’re too young to put any label on you,” he said, moving his head in time with her fingers that were combing through his hair. “There is no pressure on you, absolutely none, and you are not obligated to them. You’re not responsible for them, not in any way… But you’re my muse and I don’t want to lose this, not now, not yet… We still have so much work to do.”
There was only one conclusion. “So, if I’m a part of your life I have to be a part of theirs,” she said, and this was exactly why she’d stayed away because a part of her had always known that.
“They’ll be around,” he said. “I don’t want you to feel like you have to run out of the room or hide every time one of them needs something and I don’t want to hide them from you… We’re friends. We can be friends… Platonic, that’s what you said, right? Can’t you just think of them as your friend’s kids?” Maybe he could sense her considering it, but he smiled and pulled her hand against his lips. “If I had kids when you became my muse, would you have hidden from them or refused to look at them?”
“No,” she said. “I was trying to stick to the terms of our contract. I’m supposed to leave you alone to raise them.”
“Nowhere did it say you had to leave me alone. The contract said you had no responsibility for them and meeting them won’t change that… I want you in my life, Muse… You’re one of the Infamous Five… We stick together.”
Which was pretty much what Pete had said to her tonight. The decision was hurried by the croak that came from the monitor on his belt. Beck let her go and leaned back to look down at it and when he looked back at her he was asking… did she want to meet his son?
Although her heart was trying to escape her chest, Jaycee nodded once, and he smiled. Lunging forward, he kissed her forehead and then turned to stride from the studio.