***

 

We ended up going to her place. Jamy, she explained, would be at Sam’s for the night. They’d started dating the same night Sabine and I had met, and apparently it was going well.

I met her at her door, since I’d followed her here in my own car. She kicked off those sexy-as-sin heels as soon as she stepped into her apartment, then turned to me.

“No shoes in the house,” she explained, pointing to a cubby just inside the door. “Jamy’s rules.”

I nodded as I stepped out of my shoes. “That’s okay. We don’t wear shoes at home, either.” Well, we didn’t used to. Having so many people in and out of the house now meant that rules like that were much more relaxed than they used to be.

She watched me curiously as she hung her purse on a peg attached to the wall. “We?”

I paused for a beat. My living situation wasn’t really a long story, just a difficult one to tell. I wasn’t sure I wanted to get that heavy tonight. So I decided on a shortened version, hoping she wouldn’t ask too many questions.

“I live with my grandmother,” I told her.

She grinned. “The one who raised you?”

“The very same,” I confirmed, smiling softly. She remembered.

Though the Bubbe I saw everyday was not really the same sharp-as-a-tack, no-nonsense woman who’d raised me with her own distinct blend of strict discipline and over-the-top affection. Not anymore.

She led me into the living room, gesturing for me to take a seat. “You want something to drink?” she asked.

“Just water, please,” I replied as I settled on one end of the sofa. I watched her hips sway as she walked to the small kitchen on the other side of the room. She returned a moment later with two bottles, handing me one.

I took a sip of the blessedly cold liquid as she settled on the opposite end of the sofa, tucking her feet under her hips.

“So why did your grandmother raise you?” she asked, leaning an elbow on the back of the couch and resting her head in her hand. Her hazel eyes studied me, still alight with curiosity.

I sighed. So much for not getting into the heavy stuff. “My parents died when I was three,” I started.

Her eyes were sad, but something told me it wasn’t all for me. “What happened?”

I let out a tired sigh. For obvious reasons, I hated telling this story. “Car accident.”

I cleared my throat, hoping that could be the end of it. But when I glanced at her, her eyes were still sad, but her expression was calm and serene, telling me she’d listen to me and not judge or patronize. My turmoil would be safe with her. And just like that, I wanted to tell her.

“They were picking my sister up from a friend’s house. Slumber party.” I took my glasses off, wiping them with my handkerchief, like I always did when I was thinking through something. “Rachel called home and said she didn’t feel well. Bubbe always said she was probably just homesick. She was only six at the time. Really too young for a sleepover.”

I could feel her eyes on me, but she stayed silent, waiting for me to finish the story, I guess. So I did.

“They left me at home, with Bubbe. They were getting ready to go out anyway. It was supposed to be their date night.” I put my glasses back on. She was watching me carefully when I looked back up.

“Bubbe is your grandmother?” she asked, and I nodded. “Is that a nickname?”

I shook my head. “It’s Yiddish for ‘grandmother.’”

“Ah.” She opened her mouth to ask another question, then closed it.

“You can ask me whatever you want,” I assured her. Might as well get the whole terrible thing out, now that I’d started.

She took a deep breath. “What about your sister?”

I looked away. “Rachel was in the car with them when it happened. A drunk driver hit them on the freeway, pushing them across the median and into oncoming traffic. She died on impact.”

She made a soft noise, and when I looked back at her, she was blinking like she was fighting back tears. “At least she didn’t suffer,” she whispered, her voice thick.

I nodded. Not like Mom and Dad, I thought. But she didn’t need any more of the grisly details. Not tonight.

She cleared her throat. “You must miss them,” she said in a stronger voice.

I shrugged, looking down at my feet. “I don’t remember much of them. I was so young when they died that I never really got to know them. It’s more like I miss the idea of them, the idea of having a family, you know?” I couldn’t disguise the longing in my voice.

She was silent for a long moment. “You want that,” she guessed. I looked up again, and she was watching me warily. “You want a family.”

I nodded. “One day,” I said noncommittally.

I tried my best to paste a casual, disinterested expression on my face. I didn’t want to scare her away again. Because the truth was that I wanted a family so, so badly. I wanted it more than just about anything else in this world. And she was at the top of my list of people to do with.

She was the entire list, in fact.

She looked away for a long moment, biting her lip. “I’m not pregnant,” she whispered. “It worked. The morning-after pill. I’m not pregnant.”

I went very still as I digested this. “Okay,” I said, because I couldn’t think of what else to say.

Not pregnant. She wasn’t pregnant. She was not going to have a baby. My baby.

I closed my eyes, trying to process the emotion that washed through me. I don’t think I realized how badly I wanted a baby with her – how much I just wanted to be with her – until that moment. True, I hadn’t known her very long, and I still didn’t know her very well. But I knew enough. Sabine was intriguing, and funny, and smart, and so beautiful it made my teeth ache. She was warm, and loyal, and affectionate. She was also combative, secretive, and closed-off in ways that frustrated the hell out of me. She was a complicated, enigmatic woman, and I knew it would never be easy to be her partner.

But when I thought about being her partner, when I thought about spending my life with her, raising children with her, every cell in my body instinctively knew that it would be worth the fight. I’d go ten rounds with her every single day, if that was the price of getting to be by her side.

I wasn’t naïve enough to think a baby would suddenly change her mind about relationships, and I definitely was not trying to trap her. But it would give me an in, so to speak. It would give me a permanent excuse to be in her life. I knew we could be good together, that we could have a happy family and a happy life. And I wanted that with every fiber of my being. But the little experience I had with her told me I needed time, patience, and proximity to convince her to give it a try. I needed to wear her down.

But now I wouldn’t have an excuse to be in her life. I had nothing but our tentative connection to keep us together. And unluckily for me, it was one that was obviously much stronger on my side than on hers. For a moment, the task before me seemed impossible.

I took a deep, fortifying breath. You can do this, Levy, I told myself. She wants another night. You can turn that into more. You’ve done it once with her, you will do it again and again and again, until it works.

She made a strange noise, almost like a mewl, and my eyes popped open to find her across the room, standing in front of a door that I guessed must be her bedroom. Her back was turned to me, her hand on the knob. Was she headed to bed? Had I upset her with my reaction? She probably wanted to celebrate the good news, and here I’d been not-so-subtly grieving for the last few minutes.

“Oh.” I stood, looking around awkwardly. “Did you want me to go?”

She turned, giving me an amused look. “No. Just letting my cat out.”

Ah. That was where the mewling sound had come from. But more importantly, she didn’t want me to go? Excellent. And she had a cat? Even better. I was a cat person through and through.

“Fair warning, though,” she added. “She hates everyone but me.”

I raised a brow. “Oh?”

She nodded, turning back to the door. “She’s just misunderstood, though. She’s not bitchy, she’s a motherfucking queen. She simply has no time for peasants.”

I chuckled. “I get that. I have a cat, too.”

She faced me again, her hand still poised on the doorknob. “You do?”

“Her name’s Ruth,” I replied with a nod.

She giggled. “Odd name for a cat.”

“Well, we got her when she was three weeks old. I found her under a dumpster outside my family’s antique shop when I was sixteen.” I smiled, thinking of the tiny, half-starved creature I’d found that night. I’d been taking the garbage out to the dumpster after closing and heard her howling. I had to crawl almost all the way under the hot, smelly dumpster to reach her. But one look at her enormous green-gold eyes, and I knew she’d be worth the trouble.

That was a theme with me, apparently.

Sabine smiled. “A rescue,” she said softly. “Somehow I’m not surprised.”

I grinned at her. “Anyway, my grandmother bottle-fed her for weeks, until she was old enough to eat solid food. But the cat had bonded with her instantly, and she would follow her everywhere.” I ran a hand over the back of my neck. “Still does.”

Her brow wrinkled in confusion. “I still don’t get where the name ‘Ruth’ came from, though.”

I chuckled. “Well, my grandmother’s name is Naomi.”

“Ah.” Understanding dawned in her eyes, and she gave me a soft smile. “‘Whither thou goest, I will go.’”

“You know your Bible verses,” I observed.

She nodded, looking sad again. “My mother was a devout Catholic. She was born in Haiti.”

I hesitated, wanting to ask more about her mother. Specifically, the way she’d spoken of her faith in the past tense. Best case scenario, her mother was a healthy, very-much-alive, but lapsed, Catholic.

I didn’t want to think about the worst case scenario. And Sabine’s shuttered expression told me it wasn’t a subject open for discussion right now.

She quickly pasted a bright smile on her face, which I’d noticed was a pattern with her. She actively avoided heavy subjects, at least when it came to herself. Instead, she affected a light, carefree attitude, trying to hide the sadness that I had a sneaking feeling made a permanent home inside her.

“Anyway,” she plowed on, “sounds like your cat is a sweetie.”

I chuckled. “Well, I say that I have a cat, but really she’s Bubbe’s shadow.” In fact, sometimes Ruth was the only thing that could keep my grandmother calm during one of her episodes.

She grinned. “Well, Harriet Jones, Prime Minister is nobody’s shadow,” she said as she opened the door.

“Harriet Jones, Prime Minister?” I gave her a mock-affronted look. “And you have the nerve to say that Ruth is an odd name for a cat?”

She giggled as a brown-and-gold blur streaked past her feet, coming to a stop about a foot from me. The cat hissed softly, but that didn’t scare me. I crouched down until I was eye-to-eye with the beautiful Bengal, her distinct leopard-like spots rippling as she arched her back. I glanced at Sabine, who was looking at her pet with an affection that made me envious.

But I couldn’t really blame her. Harriet Jones, Prime Minister had an unfortunate name, but she was a beautiful animal. But then, I’d expect nothing less. Of course the exotic goddess who haunted my dreams had a suitably regal cat.

“Don’t tell me you’ve never watched Doctor Who,” Sabine chided. “We couldn’t be friends anymore.”

I lifted my eyes to hers, smiling as I extended a hand for the cat to sniff. “I’ve watched a lot of the old stuff.”

Her eyes twinkled down at me. “Of course you have.”

“His style was pretty scruffy,” I replied, trying to hold my hand still as I felt whiskers hesitantly brushing my knuckles, “but I love Tom Baker’s episodes.”

She gasped theatrically. “Oh, no. Ten. Ten is the best. David Tennant can come get it any time.”

I laughed. “So the key to your heart is spiky hair and Chuck Taylors?”

“More like the key to my panties,” she retorted. She eyed me speculatively. “But I think I’d be sad if you started wearing tennis shoes.” She gave me a cheeky wink. “The Oxfords really work for you.”

I grinned, loving that she dug my style. Most people made fun of me for it.

“That’s good. Because I gotta say, Ten has nothing on Four. Well, style-wise, maybe. But not any other way.” I was teasing, of course. I hadn’t actually seen any of the new series. The originals, with their cheesy costumes, wooden acting, and truly terrible production values, were just better. No one could tell me otherwise.

She put a hand to her heart. “That’s it. We definitely can’t be friends anymore.”

My turn to give her a speculative look. “Are we, though?”

Her brow wrinkled in confusion at the sudden shift in conversation. “Are we what?”

“Friends,” I clarified.

Before she could answer me, I felt a warm little body press itself against my shin, and I heard – and felt – loud, contented purring. I looked down to see Harriet Jones, Prime Minister rubbing herself all over my leg. Her golden eyes were glowing slits as she turned her little face up to me, her oversize tag – a replica British government ID badge – knocking against my shin with every turn.

“Huh.” I looked up at Sabine in surprise. “I thought she hated everyone but you?”

Her mouth hung open in shock as she stared at her cat. “She does.”

“Well, she doesn’t seem to hate me.” I arched a brow as I gently scratched the cat behind her ears. “Maybe she can be my new friend.” I grinned as Sabine’s eyes flicked to mine. “You know, since you and I aren’t friends anymore.”

Slowly, a smile spread across her face. “You and I are friends,” she said.

I stood slowly, careful not to frighten Harriet Jones, Prime Minister with any sudden movements. “Oh?”

She nodded, her eyes glittering wickedly. “We’re friends who fuck.”

I inhaled sharply. She wanted to be friends with benefits? I pursed my lips, feeling torn. I mean, on the plus side, benefits. Lots and lots of sexy benefits, whenever I wanted. But on the flip side, I wanted more than that. So much more.

Ultimately, I nodded. I could do friends with benefits for now. I could bide my time, until she was ready for more.

“Works for me.” I took a step toward her, sending the cat scurrying away and under the couch.

“But we don’t tell anyone,” she said softly, smoothing her hands down my chest. “Our friends or anyone. I want this to be just us.”

Internally, I winced. I wanted to shout from the rooftops that she was my woman, and I was her man. In a friends-with-benefits kind of way, anyway.

But outwardly, I nodded, leaning in for a slow, thorough kiss. “Just us,” I confirmed. “Which means I’m the only friend you give your fucks to.”

Her pupils dilated, just like they did the last time I threw out the F word. She liked it when I cursed. She liked it a lot.

“Fine,” she agreed in a breathy voice. “But I’m the only friend you give your fucks to as well,” she said, her eyes narrowing threateningly.

I grinned, loving how readily she’d agreed to be exclusive. “Done.”

“Then let’s get down to it,” she whispered, leaning in to seal the deal with a kiss.

And then she grabbed me by the bow tie, pulling me into the bedroom and closing the door.