“What?” I asked when I turned and saw her staring at me.

She lay on her side the next morning, the white silk nightgown falling into a bunch close to her midsection. Her red hair partially obscured her right eye, and I leaned over and curled it behind her ear.

“Nothing,” she said with a smile and attempted to roll over on her back.

“No, that’s definitely something,” I replied and moved closer to her. I rose onto my palms and hovered above her, eager to taste her lips still swollen following a night of repeated sex. I brushed my lips against hers, and my eyes closed as I tasted the early morning sun on her as it peeped through the window blinds.

Her arms closed tightly around my neck, and her breathing escalated into gasps. I pressed into her, feeling her body mold into mine like she belonged there. I slipped my hand under the sheet and cupped her ass, squeezing her. Her legs automatically moved and locked around my ass, and her body arched as it prepared for another round of heated pleasure.

I was lost in the moment, alternating between how her body had hugged mine last night, how her breasts had fit perfectly into my mouth, and the way she had given herself to me—that, and the present feeling I experienced. Time had no meaning when I was with her. She embodied the present, past, and future all balled into a single moment, and I was her prisoner, trapped in her omniverse.

I was so caught up in my thoughts and the way she felt under me that I didn’t realize she had stopped kissing until I felt the cool air hitting my lips instead of her warmth. I opened my eyes and found her staring at me, though she was smiling.

“Don’t you have to go to work?” she asked as she traced her finger along my jaw.

“Have to?” I asked and lowered my head to nuzzle her neck. “I don’t have to do anything.”

“Come on,” she coaxed with a giggle and a small sigh. “You know money doesn’t make itself.”

“Uh-huh,” I replied, unwilling to listen to reason at the moment.

“Come on,” she said again, pressing against my shoulder, a weak attempt to get me to move. She sighed and fell back against the bed when she saw it was no use.

I relented. “Okay, okay, I’m going. But you will miss me when I’m gone,” I said and winked at her as I got up. My feet had barely touched the ground when I heard an all too familiar yet unwelcome sound. My mother.

“Raymond! Raymond! For God’s sake, where are you?” she screeched as doors banged and floorboards creaked in her wake. “Raymond!”

I looked at Anna, who had bolted upright in bed. She looked frightened, and pulled the sheet around her to make a protective cover.

“Stay here,” I told her and hurried to the door before she stormed in. I opened the door and stared down the hallway. She was two doors down and fast approaching.

“Well, it’s about time,” she snarled.

“What do you want? Do you know what time it is?” I asked impatiently and pulled the door slowly closed behind me.

“Yes, I know. My flight came in early. I was hoping I’d catch you before you left for work.”

“What do you want?” I asked, although I wasn’t interested.

“Can’t I just come by?” she asked.

“You don’t just come by. And no one who just ‘comes by,’ walks around banging doors and disturbing the entire house.” I looked past her and saw Marian, Anna’s mother, coming up the stairs, no doubt worried about the noise.

“Is everything all right?” she asked nervously and rubbed her hands down her dress as she spoke.

Mom glanced over her shoulder and saw the woman. “Go back to the kitchen and make some breakfast or something. As a matter of fact, take this coat.”

Marian looked right through her to me, waiting for me to tell her what to do. She clenched her jaw, and I could detect rising animosity.

“She isn’t the help. She is Anna’s mother,” I stated. By this time, Anna had come out of the room, wearing a robe. She hugged herself as she watched the scene my mother was creating.

“Her mother?” Mom asked, and looked from Marian to Anna. “But she looks…” She looked from one to the other again. “Are you serious? She is her mother? This woman?”

“And what’s wrong with my mother?” Anna intervened.

Mom advanced on Anna. “I knew there was something off about you,” she sneered. “Look at you, in plush robes and mink slippers, acting like you know about these things, when you are nothing.”

Her voice was bitter, and Anna winced as the words left my mother’s mouth. I was enraged at her bashing Anna.

“That’s it. You need to go!” I commanded and grabbed her shoulder.

“Let go of me,” she cried and shook me off. “This is what you decided to do? Move in the trash? Your father would be ashamed.”

I clenched my jaws and balled my hands into fists. “That’s enough. Ever since Dad left, you have been a miserable hag, like a dark cloud hovering over me and making my life miserable. Anna may not have money, but she is damned sure a classier woman than you will ever be. No wonder Dad left you. If I could, I’d do the same. Now get out of my house!”

She cowered like she was shielding a blow. “Don’t you mean our house?”

“No! I mean my house. The house that has my name on the deed. The house where Anna and I will start our family. My house, Mom!”

“Humph!” she huffed and folded her arms across her chest. “What family?” She turned her nose up at Anna. “If she can have children, don’t consider me the grandmother.”

That hurt even me, though I didn’t expect much better from her. I saw the tears as they came to Anna’s eyes, but they didn’t move my mother.

“Anna, go back inside the room,” I said softly, the only effort I could make at that point to shield her from any more of my mother’s unkind words.

“No!” she answered firmly. She stared at my mother, the tears streaming down her face. “Does it make you feel good to put people down? Do you think money gives you the right to treat people badly? As a matter of fact”—she sniffed, and wiped her hand under her nose— “Raymond has money, and you could barely find it in you to treat him like a son. What reason would I have to believe you would accept me?” She walked closer to my mother, so close their noses almost rubbed. “We will have children, and I have no problem shielding them from your cruelty. You deserve to grow old and lonely.”

I could not have said it any better. I felt proud of Anna for defending herself so valiantly. She turned to walk past my mother when she grabbed her by the arm.

“Let me go!” Anna cried, and yanked her arm back. Her hand twisted, and she staggered and bounced into the wall. Her head bumped against the hard surface as she lost her balance. Her arms flailed as she clawed at thin air before she crashed to the floor. I watched her fall like it was a slow-motion video, watched as her body bounced on the floor like a rubber doll.

“Anna!” I shouted and rushed to her. Marian did the same, but my mother stayed still.

Anna’s eyes popped open and so did her mouth, but no sound came out. She remained in the same position she had fallen, like she had been frozen to the spot.

“What is it?” I asked frantically.

Her hand moved to her stomach and her eyes searched for her mother. I looked for Marian too, because I had no idea what to think or do. I slipped my hand under the small of her back and tried to lift her. Her cries ripped through the air and I set her back down. Moving her seemed to cause her more pain, and I panicked.

“Mom, it hurts,” she sobbed and gripped her mother’s hands until her knuckles turned white.

Marian looked at me as I knelt on the floor, feeling useless. “We need to get her to the hospital.”

“Oh, she’s merely faking,” my mother hissed and waved her off as she prepared to leave.

“We need to go now or she might lose the baby,” Marian said.

My mother stopped but didn’t turn. I knew it would hurt, but I slipped my hands under her legs as Marian laid her hand on her shoulder and hoisted her into my arms, trying to minimize the pain she felt.

“She’s—” my mother began, but no one was interested in what she thought or felt. Anna was hurt and in pain, and she was to blame. I didn’t want to see her.

“Let’s go,” I told Marian as we rushed her to the car, the only thing on my mind the woman I loved and the baby she carried for us.

“I didn’t know!” my mother called after us.

I didn’t care. I only hoped she would be gone by the time I got back.