CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

Travis looked dazed and confused.

He slumped against the wall, watching a woman in red walk away. Brent headed over to him, knotting his tie after having just washed his hands in the men’s room. He had to make a flight back to Vegas with Shannon in a few minutes, but wanted to catch up with his old friend.

“You hiding out here in the hallway?”

Travis blinked, then shrugged. “No. Just trying to understand a woman.”

Brent clapped his buddy on the back. “Good luck with that. It’s like learning a whole new language, and no one gives you a dictionary for translation.”

“Exactly,” he said, gesturing in the direction where the woman had disappeared. “One second she’s all over you, and the next second she practically wants to slap you.”

“Been there, man. I have absolutely been there. If it’s any consolation, sometimes those slaps can turn into something a whole lot better.”

“I was hoping it was going to turn into something better tonight,” Travis said, shoving a hand through his hair, then turned to face Brent and pointed at him. “Hell¸ I was about ready to use your office.”

He laughed. “Afraid you would have found it occupied.”

Travis knocked fists with Brent. “Excellent news. At least one of us is figuring out women.”

“Took a long time. You’ll get there. You should talk to her though. Whoever she is.”

Travis scrubbed a hand across his chin and sighed. “She might be a little pissed off at me right now. I wasn’t completely honest about something.”

“Then let her know you were less than honest, say you’re sorry, and tell her what you want. Her, I presume. Women like honesty,” he said, speaking the simplest of truths. Weird, that after all that had transpired he was now in a position to give relationship advice. “By the way, thanks so much for coming by today. I really appreciate you doing a prelim for me.”

“Anytime. And incidentally, Shay is pretty crazy about you. Let me just say that. I chatted with her earlier, and I’m pretty sure she has it bad for you. She’s a keeper.”

A grin spread across Brent’s face. He was sure of that, too. Being certain of how they both felt was such a gift. One he’d cherish.

Fifteen minutes later, Shannon was on top of him, riding him hard in the limo on the way to the airport, and he thanked his lucky stars the flight home was short because he couldn’t wait much longer to have her again. He had a wild hunch they wouldn’t be sleeping much tonight. That they’d be wrapped up in each other all night long, making up for lost time. She told him she wanted him to come back to her place, and even though he had a ten a.m. meeting with James and his real estate guys, he figured that was what coffee was for.

That was all he’d need tomorrow. For tonight, he’d have her.

* * *

The stars twinkled against the inky black night as the driver pulled off the highway, and headed to her condo. Time marched closer to the moment. To the telling. Her stomach executed a fresh series of nosedives as the town car neared her home. She reminded herself that everything would be fine. Well, maybe not fine at first. But it would be fine soon enough.

She’d tell him, and it would be hard for them both, but they’d comfort each other.

This was not the sort of news that could break them up. The loss was simply another part of the past, one she’d share now that they were finally back in the town they called home. Even though so much had gone wrong for her in Las Vegas, so much had gone right there, too. Las Vegas was the place where her grandma and her brothers lived, and it was the town where she and Brent had fallen in love again, against the neon lights, and the blinking billboards, and the spectacle of the Strip. From the fountains at the Bellagio, to the Shops at Caesars, to the darkened theater at the Luxe—this was their place, and the city of sin had given them a second chance at love.

And at truth.

That was why she wanted to tell him the story there. At home. Not in a hotel room. Not in an office. Not in a cab, or a car, or a plane. But in her house, where she could tell the story the way she needed to.

As the car wedged itself next to the curb, Brent paid and tipped the driver, then grabbed their bags.

“A sleepover at last,” he teased as they walked up the three flights, the sound of their footsteps echoing in the creaky silence of the building after midnight. She unlocked the door, both grateful and nervous that the moment had arrived. She spotted a lone spare key amidst the mail she’d tossed on her table in a rush when she’d left yesterday.

“Crap.”

Brent turned around, and shot her a curious stare.

She smacked her forehead with her hand. “My friend’s cat. She’s out of town, and I said since I was only gone for twenty-four hours that I could feed him.”

“He’s probably hungry.”

She snatched the key from the table. “Be right back. Sorry if the place is a mess. I left in a hurry.”

Racing upstairs, her heels clicking against the wood, she unlocked Ally’s condo to find the silver and black tabby meowing indignantly at her.

“Hey Nick,” she said to the feline.

Now, where was his cat food?

* * *

So this was her place. This was her home. He’d caught a glimpse of it on Saturday, but hadn’t taken it in. Her home had an open, airy feel, even at night. The couch and chairs were light shades of yellow and beige, with gold pillows tossed on the cushions, and billowy curtains by the windows.

Her house was hardly messy at all.

As he wandered through the kitchen, he spotted that frame again on the counter. The bright sunflowers. He peered more closely at it, and wondered again what the stone was by the flowers. Maybe a garden wall?

Wait.

She’d called him a sunflower, hadn’t she?

He snapped his fingers, remembering. On the phone the other night, she’d said he was her sunflower. Maybe this was her way of thinking about him when they weren’t together—with a picture of a sunflower. The corner of his lips twitched up. Fine, he wasn’t a flowery guy, but when the woman you love says you’re the sun in her life, you gladly take the compliment. He tapped the frame once, then set it back in place and strolled down the hallway. He stopped short at her bedroom door, opened wide. He couldn’t resist peeking. That was where she’d spent her nights. That bed, right there, with the orange and purple pattern on the cover.

That was where she wouldn’t be sleeping tonight. He could picture her perfectly, on all fours in the middle of the mattress, her back bowed, hands tied to the headboard. He’d take her like that. Fuck her hard on her hands and knees. Grip her hips and sink into her. Smack her ass as he made her cry out in a pleasure.

A barely audible groan escaped his throat as the reel played before his eyes of her naked, lithe body trembling. Ready for him. He strolled into her room and brushed a hand over the corner of her bed. A few more minutes, and he could have her like that. That was his plan. He turned around to leave, when a flash of yellow caught his eye once more. Something about it felt familiar. He walked to her nightstand. The drawer was open and a small book appeared to have fallen off the nightstand into the drawer.

Or been shoved in.

Some part of him knew better. But another part was intrigued. Curious. Then far too curious when he saw the cover.

It was a photo album, and the cover image matched the picture in her kitchen frame. Another close-up shot of a sunflower. Somewhere inside of him, a warning bell told him maybe not to cross this line. He shouldn’t even be in her bedroom without permission. You don’t just walk into a woman’s bedroom, uninvited. And you don’t take a photo book out of a drawer without permission. But when you spot a black-and-white image slip out of one of the pages, and that black and white image has a name and a date, you might not be able to control yourself.

The name Paige-Prince, Shannon was printed in small letters on the edge, along with a date ten years ago, and then the words that knocked him to his knees. Highgate Maternal Fetal.

His heart sped in his chest, spinning wildly out of control. Blood pounded in his ears, and his throat went dry.

He inhaled deeply, as if the air would steel him, but his breath still came erratically. Then he did it. With traitorous fingers that dug into her privacy willfully, he pulled out the black-and-white image. He blinked. Once, twice, then he let it register. An ultrasound picture of a baby inside the womb.

His eyes returned to the date again, and he computed quickly. This was four months after they graduated from college. Four months after they split. A strange, sick fear descended on him, and his nerves frayed like the ends of a rope as questions assaulted him. Where was the baby? Did she give up a baby for adoption? Have an abortion? Have a kid somewhere? Was her grandma raising her baby?

Their baby...?

That thought was too foreign, too bizarre. He sat on the edge of her bed, frozen, holding the image, the private medical record.

His fingers itched to open the book.

His sense of right and wrong told him to let it be.

But selfish desire won. He flipped to the beginning. The album was scant, containing only a handful of images. The first was a shot of her in a mirror, and his heart tripped back in time as he gazed at Shannon, his Shannon, from ten years ago. Her hair was short then and still blond, her face so fresh and young, her expression a half-hearted smile. She had taken the photo of herself sideways, capturing the small swell of her belly in a mirror.

Seeing the ultrasound was one thing. Seeing her pregnant was entirely another. It walloped him.

He turned to the next page. The words nineteen weeks were written in blue ballpoint on the page, and in the plastic sleeve was another shot of Shannon, barely bigger. Then one at twenty weeks. He turned another page. An image of a white baby blanket on a hospital bed. After that the photos ended, and the last several pages contained only images of sunflowers.

He didn’t know what to make of the sunflowers, or of the way the story in these pictures was unfinished. The story ended, and then it became something else, told in a language he didn’t understand.

Shoes clicked on the floor, and the hair on his neck stood on end. He snapped the book closed as she called out his name. He started to stuff the book into the drawer. But when he turned around, she was standing in the doorway, and he had her photo book in his hand, trying to jam it into the nightstand.

Her expression was one of shock. Then disappointment, and next came a trace of grief. Somehow, her eyes contained all three.

She swallowed, and her face seemed pinched. But her voice gave her away. A bare whisper, laced with pain, as she closed her eyes, opened them, and spoke.

“Like I said, my house is a little bit messy.”

He nodded. “Is there something you need to tell me?”