Anna Marie Sorenson's Secret Affair (27 page)

While Pepper was turning red as she struggled to withhold the spew of abuse she so badly wanted to hurl at Beatrice, behind her Cameron was doing his best to keep a straight face.

Pepper decided that the best way to handle one of the rudest persons she ever had known was to ignore her. She looked at the packages. “Well, looks like it’s quite a boon, here. Anna, honey, you really did go overboard for a friend’s shower, didn’t you.” Then she gasped and swung around to her sister. “Oh, my god, Anna, are you…are you…this couldn’t be all for you, could it?”

A look of panic came over Anna Marie’s face. Suddenly, she knew that the last thing she wanted was to have Pepper know that she was pregnant with Dallas’s baby. At least, in this early stage of her pregnancy.

Pepper seized her sister’s hand in a bruising grip. “Anna, are you pregnant? Tell me this instant! Are you pregnant?”

“Uh…I…” was all she could manage.

“No, it isn’t Anna Marie who is pregnant. All this is for me,” Beatrice said.

Both Anna Marie and her sister stared at her with dumbfounded expressions.

“But, you’re too old,” Pepper said with some distaste.

“Pepper,” Anna Marie said sharply.

“Well, she is. Look at her, she’s fifty, way past her prime, and in her menopause.”

“I’m am forty-three, Mrs. Trenton,” Beatrice said icily. “And as much as my appearance may tell otherwise, I still have some eggs in my ovaries.”

“But, you’re not married.”

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Cameron winced. Beatrice narrowed her eyes. And Anna Marie was positive that she was about to take a swing at Pepper.

“But, you’re old,” Pepper said again.

Beatrice did step closer to her. Cameron quickly stepped between them.

He took his wife’s arms. “Listen, honey, why don’t we go on to the restaurant and meet my parents. We’re running a little late anyway.” He determinedly began to usher her towards the door. “Congratulations, Ms. Summer. Anna, sorry to interrupt. We’ll be seeing you.”

“Boy, your sister…” Beatrice said when they left. “If your sister didn’t have her husband, I think she’d be dead by now. He should be awarded the Nobel Prize for being married to modern day Medusa.” She waded through the pile of bags and picked up the instructions to the swing.

“Thank you, Bea.”

“For

what?”

“For

doing

that.”

“That’s alright. I figured it’ll be my only chance to be pregnant, so I might as well make the most of the opportunity.”

“I just couldn’t tell her that I was pregnant, especially Dallas’s baby.”

Bea went up to her and put her arms around Anna Marie. “Honey, you don’t need to

explain yourself. I have eyes of my own, and a brain.”

Then to both their shocks, Anna Marie threw her arms around Beatrice’s neck and burst into tears and began to sob. The older woman tightened her hold on her and rocked her, letting her cry it out.

“God, I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Anna Marie said as she pulled back. “Where did that come from? A gesture of sympathy and I’m a mess.”

Beatrice patted her shoulders. “It was a lot of things, honey. It’s all catching up with you.

The shock of the pregnancy, the excitement, the whirlwind adventure of preparing for your pending motherhood, Cyclone Pepper…”

Anna Marie laughed, beginning to feel better.

“And hormones. And if I remember correctly, you’re going to have many more of these

emotional episodes during the next several months. So, you better get used it. And start buying cases of tissues.”

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Pepper and Cameron came into the library the next day. She looked around, not knowing where to go or who she should see, as if she had never been in a library before and she didn’t quite know how to orient herself in one.

“Pepper,” Anna Marie said with surprise. She was at the help desk to help out her staff during the late afternoon hours when they were often busy. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to talk to you, Anna.”

Anna Marie looked at her sister then at Cameron, who gave her a look of apology.

“Well, I’m kind of busy at the moment. Can I call you later?”

Ignoring her sister’s request, Pepper asked, “Can we talk somewhere private? I feel this is a real emergency.”

“I really can’t, right now…”

“Please, Anna,” Pepper said with barely restrained patience. “I really would like to talk to you, now.”

Anna Marie cast her eyes at the three lines of people that had formed in front of the help desk, each line at least ten people. “Look, Pepper, I really can’t, right now…”

“Please, Anna,” her sister said, her voice loud so that everyone could hear.

“Geez, Pepper, giver her a break,” Cameron finally said.

One of the young assistants touched Anna Marie’s arm and gave her a reassuring nod.

Anna Marie indicated to her staff that she would be but a few minutes and stepped out in front of the counter. She led her sister a few steps away. “Alright, if it’s that important, but I can only talk for a few minutes. I can’t leave the desk short staffed for long. Now, Pepper, what is it that you need to talk to me that it couldn’t wait for a few more hours?”

“I had to come here and stop you from ruining your life, Anna.”

“What?”

“You’re ruining your life. And it doesn’t help that you’re only closest friend, who is a middle-aged spinster, is having a baby on her own.”

“Oh, Christ, Pepper. Is this what was so important that you had to take me away from my work?”

“I’m worried about you, Anna. You need to find a man, before you become your friend.” Anna Marie rubbed her forehead with her hand. “Look, Pepper, I really appreciate your concern on this, but can we, at least, talk about it later?” She gave a wince when she felt a twinge Secret Affair 172

in her belly. It was the third one she had felt since she woke up. She tried to remember what she had eaten last night that might have given her indigestion. The pregnancy books had said that a woman’s digestion could go through changes.

Pepper grabbed her arm and pulled her closer and said in an urgent whisper, “This is an emergency, Anna. And I intend to help you through this. Now, I want you to come over to the house for dinner tonight. I invited Richard, this guy who has an office above my restaurant. I think he sells stocks or bonds, or something. He came from Atlanta, Georgia. He’s about your age, and he’s single, and no kids.”

“No, Pepper, you’re not setting me up again. The last time you did that, you didn’t even realize he was gay.”

Pepper frowned. “Who’s gay?”

“Josh. The interior designer that you set me up with a few months ago at your restaurant.”

“Josh? He’s gay? I never knew that.”

“It was all but written on his forehead.” Anna Marie winced again as she felt another twinge. “Cameron even knew that.”

Pepper gave her husband a sharp look. “Did you know Josh was gay?”

Cameron rolled his eyes. “Everyone knew.”

“How come I didn’t? How come you didn’t tell me?”

Cameron’s face was bland, and Anna Marie was sure that he had tried to point out the fact but his wife had refused to listen to him, so intent, as usual, on her purpose for the interior designer.

“Well, then, is Richard gay?” Pepper asked her husband.

“No, honey, Richard’s not gay.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, honey, I’m sure.”

“Good.” Pepper turned back to her sister. “You’re coming over tonight. Six-thirty. Don’t be late.”

Before Anna Marie could respond, Pepper was walking away. Cameron gave her an

apologetic look, shrugged his shoulders and followed his wife. Anna Marie heaved a sigh, then grimaced as another cramp, a much stronger one, flared in her abdomen, and she almost doubled Secret Affair 173

over. She stilled until she could get her breath back. And when she did, she went to her office, thinking, perhaps, she needed to rest for a moment.

An hour later, Beatrice opened the door of her office. “There’s a guy out here who wants to know if we can order a loan from a library in Alaska on trout fishing.” She became alarmed when she saw Anna Marie doubled over in her chair and her face white as a sheet. “Oh, my god, what’s wrong?”

“I…think…I think you need to take me to the hospital,” Anna Marie managed to gasp in between the pain.

Beatrice reached for the phone. “I’m calling emergency.”

“No!” Anna Marie clumsily grabbed the phone from her. “No! No ambulance, no fire

truck, or paramedics. Just take me to the hospital.” She doubled over again, crying out as another cramp bit into her.

“You need an ambulance, honey.”

“Please, Bea, just take me. It’s only a mile away. I don’t want anyone to see me. I don’t want them to know about the baby. Oh, my god, the baby!” Tears came to her eyes as she began to realize what the pain might mean. “Please, quickly, get me to your car.”

“Alright. Alright.” Bea grabbed Anna Marie’s purse. “Can you walk?”

She nodded, one hand on her stomach, the other gripping Beatrice’s arm. Her teeth were gritted and she said with an uncharacteristically iron determination, “Yes, I will walk.” Beatrice led her out of the building through the back entrance, grabbing her own purse from her office on the way.

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Chapter 14

At the hospital, the doctor told Anna Marie that she had miscarried.

Once she was allowed to see her friend in a recovery room, Beatrice had expected to find her in a torrent of tears. When she entered the room, the small woman lying in the hospital bed was quiet, even stiff to the point of being lifeless, her face pale, her gray eyes dull. An eerie calm seemed to have settled over her.

“How are you feeling?” Beatrice asked.

Anna Marie shrugged as if she cared little of how she felt. “Fine, I guess.”

“I’m so sorry about the baby, honey.”

She looked up at her friend and some of the calmness cracked as tears swam in her large gray eyes. “I guess it was too good to be true. It just wasn’t meant to be that I should have any part of him. God, what am I going to do with all that stuff I bought?”

“Don’t worry about it, Anna. I’ll take them back. All of it.”

“Thank you,” she said, the polite listlessness coming back to her face.

There was a small pause. Then Beatrice asked, “Are you going to tell your family?”

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Anna Marie shook her head. “No. I don’t want anyone to know about this.”

Although there was some concern in Beatrice’s eyes, she nodded. “The doctor said you can be released tomorrow. I’ll come by for you then.”

Anna Marie nodded, her lifeless eyes staring out the window. Then she said as Beatrice opened the door, “Bea?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you. For doing all that you did for me. For being with me.”

Beatrice went back to the bed and kissed her on the forehead as a mother would to a

child, then left the room.

For a long time, Anna Marie did not stir from her position of staring out at the window, her thoughts far away from the hospital room, so much so that she did not hear the door open again.

“Hello, Anna,” a male voice greeted her.

She turned and was surprised to see Cameron standing a few feet from her. “Cameron, hi.

What are you doing here?”

“I came to see you.”

“How did you know I was here?”

“One of the nurses’ husband works at the office, and she recognized you.”

“Did she tell you that I lost my baby?”

“No, she just said that you had been admitted. On the way, I sort of figured it out on my own, with all the baby stuff that I saw in your living room a few days ago. I realized it wasn’t for your friend who was having a baby but you.”

Anna Marie lowered her eyes from his because she was feeling ashamed by the concern

in Cameron’s eyes when she had not planned to tell her family about her pregnancy. “Does Pepper know?”

“No, she doesn’t. When I got the phone call, I almost called your sister. But, then, I realized that you must not have wanted her to know that you were pregnant in the first place.

And, if you want it that way, she doesn’t have to know.”

“Thank you, Cam. You must think me awful that I keep something like that from my

family.”

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Cameron sat down on the bed and took her hand. “Remember, I’ve been married to your

sister for close to ten years. I know that there are certain things that you need to be able to keep to yourself, Anna, because your parents and your sister might take them away from you. Besides, you would have had to tell them sometime had the baby survived. As it is, it’s up to you when and if you want to tell your family. I just came here to make sure you were okay.”

Anna Marie stared up at him, and she was struck by the similarities with his brother, the strikingly handsome face, the shape of the eyes, towering height, the long lean body, the clean cut of the male features. It made her heart ache to look into Cameron’s eyes, when never before did she experience any strong emotions when looking at him.

“You’re too good for Pepper, Cam. I know I shouldn’t say that, but it’s true,” she added when she saw the surprise in his eyes.

Cameron patted the back of her hand. “Believe it or not, we fit, as strange as it may seem.

I guess that’s love. Can’t make heads or tail of it. Now, you, young lady, is there anything I can do for you? Get anything for you?”

“No, thanks, Cam. I’m fine. I’m being released tomorrow and Bea will take me home,

then.”

“Take care, Anna.” He kissed her on the forehead as much as Beatrice had done and left the room.

When Anna Marie went home from the hospital, she wanted to be able to forget that the pregnancy ever happened. As she stood in her condo after Beatrice dropped her off, she realized that her assistant librarian had taken away all remnants of the baby, having had cleared the clothes, toys, rattle, diapers, and books out of the condo. Beatrice had even taken away the swing that they had put together.

And as Anna Marie stood in her clean home, she felt a sharp loneliness that she had never felt before. She dropped her purse on the floor, went to the couch, and let herself give in to the torrent of tears that she would not let come at the hospital.