MATT WAS ON the deck, hungover, drinking beer and not enjoying the view of San Francisco Bay.
It had been two weeks since he’d left London and his need to know if Romy was pregnant was eating him alive.
His heart felt like it had been scrubbed up and down a stone wall until its entire outer layer had been scraped off and it hurt like hell. His head hurt, too, from thinking about her so relentlessly. The only part of him that didn’t hurt was his dick, which seemed to have dropped dead. He guessed that was something to be thankful for; his current broken state shouldn’t be inflicted upon any woman. But he wished it would give an intermittent pulse so he knew resuscitation wasn’t completely out of the question at some future date. Light at the end of the tunnel. Evidence he wasn’t going to feel this awful forever.
Okay, he needed more beer.
He wandered into the house he’d decided he hated on the basis that it was too Teague-like, and made for the kitchen—which he hated on principle because Romy had never seen it.
He’d just grabbed a bottle from the fridge when the doorbell rang, and he experienced the first surge of energy he’d had for two weeks. For a moment, he didn’t recognize it—and then he was racing for the door, yanking it open, his heart surging...then tumbling.
Not Romy.
The disappointment was bitter.
“What the fuck do you want?” he asked his father.
“Is that the best greeting you can manage?”
“For you, yes.”
His father laughed. “Aren’t you going to let me in?”
Matt didn’t move so much as an inch.
“You’ll be interested in what I have to tell you,” his father wheedled.
Matt turned sharply on his heel—not inviting him in but not barring the entrance—and headed back to the deck.
“I’ll take a beer if you’re offering,” Chet/Kevin said to his back, which was when Matt realized he’d been so eager to answer the door he’d taken his beer with him.
“I’m not offering,” he said, without turning around.
Matt took his regular seat, stretching out his legs, leaning back in his chair. Being near his father always made Matt want to occupy more space than usual. “What do you want, Kevin?” he asked.
His father grimaced—he hated being called Kevin but knew better than to ask Matt to call him anything else. “To impart some news.”
“So impart it.”
“Your mother and I are getting divorced.”
Matt waited for surprise to hit, for sorrow, regret, something. But he felt nothing.
“She’s met someone,” his father continued. And then, when Matt still said nothing, “Well?”
“Well, what?”
“Don’t you have anything to say?”
“How do you feel about it? About her loving someone else?” Matt finally asked.
His father shrugged. “I doubt it’s love that’s motivating her. More likely to be because he’s ten years younger and hung like a horse. I know—I hired him for a film.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s time for greener pastures for both of us.”
Matt sat up straighter. “You two have been frolicking in greener pastures your whole fucking lives.”
“Thirty years is a long time to stay with the one partner.”
Matt thought of Romy’s parents, about to renew their vows. “No, it’s not,” he said. “That’s why you get married. To stay with someone.”
“Yeah, well, I daresay it won’t last. I mean, a ten-year age gap? He can do better.”
“You’re a prick.”
“I don’t know why you always have to be so hostile.”
“Sure you do.”
“If you’re still bitter about Gail—”
“Don’t say her name!”
“—that happened a long time ago. It’s not as though you were ever going to marry her.”
“A pathetic prick.”
“Sex is just sex. That shouldn’t have come between us.”
“Seems like Mom found out sex isn’t just sex.”
“Matthew, I’ll have a replacement for your mother within a week. In my bed, and for the channel. And a fuck really is just a fuck at the end of the day.”
A fuck’s a fuck.
Matt recalled all the things he’d said to Romy about fucking and he seriously thought he might throw up. He stared at his father as though he’d never seen him before, the truth coming at him like some sign from the fucking universe.
Was it really as simple as it suddenly seemed? A matter of asking himself what he wanted his life to be? Because if so, he’d known the answer all along: he wanted his life to belong to Romy.
He wanted today what he’d wanted from the night he’d met her: everything, forever. Her thoughts, her laugh, her touch. He wanted the way she looked and the way she spoke, the way she smelled. He wanted her baby to be his. He wanted sex with her, and friendship, and everything between those things. He wanted every word either of them could think of for two people who belonged together, and if they discovered new words, then he wanted them, too.
And of course he knew the only word for all those things he wanted. The best word. The only word. The word was love.
“I’m nothing like you,” he said wonderingly to his father. “I’m really, truly nothing like you, and I have no idea why I always thought I was.”
His father let out a bark of laughter. “Funny you should say that, because we weren’t so sure ourselves. But we had you tested and you’re mine all right.”
“No, I’m not,” Matt said. “I’m not yours and I’m not hers, either. I would never test my child’s DNA because all I want it to be is ours. You see, Kevin, I’ve come to the conclusion that a family isn’t about blood, it’s about love. I don’t want to be the bystander in a sexual menagerie, I want to be part of a real family. Because I’m not a sex addict even though you tried to make me one, and I know that sex isn’t just sex, that it’s a big deal, and it’s an even bigger deal when you’re in love.”
Love—the word burst inside him and he fucking loved it. Loved her, with her steadiness and her paperwork and that tiny streak of wild that meant she could try to bite him through the skin but do a piss-poor job of it just because she didn’t want to hurt him. He loved her so much he could have died on the spot with the realization of it and died happy.
But his father was laughing dismissively. “Love is a bourgeois emotion.”
Matt got to his feet. “Then call me bourgeois, because I feel it and I want it and I’m going to go and get it. So see yourself out, Kevin—I have to pack.”
* * *
Talk about déjà vu! Throwing clothes in his duffel, grabbing his passport, heading out the door and—
“Shit!” as he whacked straight into someone. He stepped back. “What the fuck, Teague.”
“Those were going to be my words to you. What the fuck have you done to her?”
“I don’t have time to talk. I have to fly to London,” he said, and made to barge past.
Teague grabbed his shoulder, stopping him. “Don’t you think you’ve done enough damage?”
“Whatever damage I’ve done, I’m going to undo it. Now let go.”
“You won’t undo it in London, because she’s not there.”
Matt fixed him with a gimlet eye. “Where is she? And don’t say at your apartment in Manhattan if you value your life.”
“I’m not in Manhattan, dodo.”
“You know what I mean. At your apartment, when she should be here.”
“As it turns out, she is here in San Francisco—albeit not with you.”
Matt dropped his duffel bag and stood rooted to the spot, staring at Teague but comprehending nothing.
“Now,” Teague said calmly. “Can we go inside and discuss what happens next?”
“You go inside and do whatever you like—but first, tell me exactly where she is.”
“She’s here for Lennie. I’m sorry but she doesn’t want to see you. That’s why she sent me.”
“I don’t underst—”
“I have a waiver for you to sign.”
“Waiver...? Is she... Is she...” He closed his eyes, opened them. “Oh God, she is, isn’t she?”
“If you mean pregnant, then yes. And before you try to kill me, no, it’s not mine.”
“I know that. It’s mine.”
“Biologically, yes.”
“Not just biologically.”
“Not just—Okaaay, I see. I think. But my understanding is that you were never going to be registered on the birth certificate so the only way you can gain parental rights is to—”
“Apply to the court for a PR order if she won’t work out an agreement with me.”
“Been doing some research, I see.”
Matt shrugged a shoulder.
“She doesn’t want to work out an agreement. And she seems to think you’ll be fine with that.” Pause. “She wants to move on, Matt.”
“Where is she?”
“It won’t do you any good to see her.”
Matt’s hand shot out and grabbed Teague by the throat. “Where. Is. She?”
Teague tried to nod his head.
“Does that mean you’re going to tell me?” Matt asked.
Another attempted nod...and Matt released him.
“Jesus, Matt,” Teague said, rubbing his neck.
“Sorry.”
“No, you’re not.”
“No, I’m not. So where is she?”
“Ah, geez! This sucks, you know? I’m not supposed to tell you.”
“I’ll kill you if you don’t.”
Teague sighed...laughed...sighed again. “If I tell you, it’s only because I think you love her.”
Matt’s jaw tightened. “I do. Now. Where is she, goddamn you?”
“She’s having lunch with three business associates at a restaurant called Persini’s. One of them is probably going to be a client, so don’t barge in there being a dick and embarrassing her.”
“Shut up, Teague.” He turned to unlock the door. “Go in and make yourself a drink.” He laughed. “You’ll like the place—that much I can promise you. But I don’t like it and neither does Romy, so if you’re looking for a house in San Francisco, make me an offer. Pick a bedroom if you want to stay.” Another laugh. “The walls are thick so it won’t worry us.”
“What does that—? No, don’t tell me. But seriously, can’t you at least shave before you go and see her?”
Matt thought about it. And then said, “No. It’ll take too long.”