Black Ties and Lullabyes (32 page)

It was. Bernie would have sworn she didn’t believe in those, but she’d had to change more than a few of her paradigms in the past couple of months. And every change had been for the better.

Her mother chattered for the next few minutes about dresses and flowers and music and al those other things that made a wedding a wedding. Bernie listened dutiful y, only to let a yawn slip past her lips.

“Oh, my,” Eleanor said. “Here I am talking when you should be sleeping. You look so tired. Come to bed.” She smoothed her hand over the soft linens. “Heaven knows this one is big enough for a family of four.”

“I’m going to stay with Jeremy tonight.” Her mother froze for a moment, the slightest bit of concern crossing her face. Then she lifted her shoulder in a tiny shrug. “Wel , considering the circumstances, I suppose it would be sil y to wait to share a bed until after the wedding, wouldn’t it?”

“Yeah, I guess it would.”

“And don’t worry about me, Bernadette. I have no intention of going downstairs to do any cooking anytime soon.”

“I don’t want you to worry about what happened tonight, Mom. Jeremy’s going to take care of everything.”

Her mother nodded. “I know.”

Bernie couldn’t have imagined how wonderful it would feel to say those words, and to know that the man behind them would do anything to love and protect them.

“You go on now,” Eleanor said, with a flick of her fingers. “I need to have a word with God.” She paused. “Actual y, two words.”

“And what might those be?”

Eleanor’s eyes shone with tears. “Thank you.” Bernie smiled. “Good night, Mom.”

“Good night, Bernadette.”

Bernie left the guest suite and made the long walk to Jeremy’s room. When she reached the door, she took a deep breath and knocked.

After a moment, Jeremy opened it. He stil had his tux pants on, but he’d taken off his shirt. He looked so sexy it was al she could do not to leap right into the room and rip the rest of his clothes off. He looked her up and down, a sly smile playing across his lips.

“I was right,” he said. “That gown is just your color.”

“It is, isn’t it?”

“My proposal,” he said. “Can I take this as a yes?”

“Yes,” she said. “You can take this as a yes.” He took her by the wrist, pul ed her into his room, and shut the door behind them. Before the night was over, with his whispered words, his gentle hands, and his adoring eyes, he told her he loved her a hundred times more. And when she woke the next morning, cradled in his arms, she knew she was home to stay.

If you so much as touch me again, I swear to God I’l
eviscerate
you!”

Jeremy ignored Bernie and took her hand anyway, wincing when she dug her fingernails into him instead of the bedsheet. But it was al in a day’s work for a labor coach. What Jeremy couldn’t figure out was why they cal ed him a “coach” when absolutely nobody listened to anything he had to say.

“You always did have a way with words,” he said, smiling down at Bernie.

“I’m not kidding, Jeremy. This is your fault. You started this whole thing. If sex so much as crosses your mind again—oh,
God
!”

“Remember your visualizations,” he said. “Picture yourself in a beautiful country garden, picking a bouquet of roses…”

“Oh, shut
up
! That birth class instructor was a New Age goofbal . How many flowers would she be picking if
her
uterus was tied in a freakin’ knot?” He helped her breathe through another contraction, and then the pain subsided. Barely. At this point, one was kind of blending right into the next one.

“Oh, God, Jeremy,” she said, gasping a little, looking worried. “I don’t think I can do this. It hurts so much. Are you sure everything’s al right?”

“Hang on, sweetheart,” he said, brushing her hair away from her temple, then kissing her there.

“Everything’s going exactly as it’s supposed to. Our babies wil be here soon.”

“I know. We’re having babies. Two of them.”

“That’s right.”

“That’s a hundred percent more babies than most people have.”

“Yes, it is.”

“One for each of us. Like Twinkies.”

He smiled. “But we can share.”

Then her brows drew together. “But they can’t come out yet. I’m not ready to be a mother.”

“Sure you are. You’re going to be the best mother ever.”

“No,” she said, breathing hard. “When they come out, I’m stuffing them back in.”

He smiled. “Sure you want to do that?”

“Yes. But don’t worry. It won’t be forever. Just until I know I can do this. I’l let them out in a couple of years.

Or maybe a decade or two.”

He squeezed her hand. “But I’l be there to help you, sweetheart. We can do it together.”

She took a deep breath and let it out, actual y smiling a little. “Oh, yeah. Together. That’l work.” Jeremy couldn’t have imagined being this much in love with anyone.

A month ago, on a cool, crisp Saturday afternoon, they’d gotten married in the sanctuary of Sunnyside Baptist Church. Teresa was Bernie’s maid of honor, and Jeremy asked Phil to be his best man. Eleanor didn’t stop crying al day. Jeremy hired the best photographer in the metroplex and made sure she had al the photos she needed to show her family, her friends, the ladies at the church, the postman, the clerk at the drugstore, and the poor woman who was just out walking her dog and minding her own business.

After her first night’s visit in the guest suite, Eleanor never left. At first she wasn’t sure about taking Jeremy up on his invitation, tel ing him the suite was entirely too luxurious for somebody as ordinary as she was.

But it wasn’t long before she felt right at home on the pil owtop mattress, raved about how helpful the Jacuzzi was for her arthritis, and had tea every morning on the balcony. In her spare time, she chatted endlessly with Mrs. Spencer, planning exactly how they intended to spoil the twins when they made their grand entrance into the world. And when the time came that Eleanor needed more help, Jeremy insisted that she would never have to leave the comfort of her new home to get it.

Bernie continued to oversee the renovations at Creekwood, and they were wel on their way to being wrapped up when she went into labor three weeks before her due date. The tenants were thril ed to have such a nice place to live. They thought the owner of their complex was just about the greatest guy on earth, and Jeremy couldn’t have imagined how wonderful it would feel to be that guy.

Life was good. And it was getting ready to be even better.

Another contraction came. Then another. Bernie swore she couldn’t do it, but Jeremy held her hand and got her to breathe with him. Half an hour later, their babies came into the world—a boy and a girl—

and just like that, Jeremy had the family he never could have imagined.

And he couldn’t have loved them more.

An hour later, Bernie lay resting in her hospital bed, exhausted and ecstatic al at the same time. Jeremy sat beside her, holding her hand with a look on his face that said there was nowhere he’d rather be.

Eleanor stood by the isolettes, admiring her new grandchildren.

“They’re so beautiful,” she said, rubbing her thumb gently over one of the babies’ hands. “I can’t believe I’m actual y a grandmother.”

And Bernie couldn’t believe the chain of events that had led to this moment. The night in Jeremy’s safe room. A pregnancy that never should have happened.

Jeremy’s insistence that he was staying in her life no matter what. Two highly dissimilar people fal ing in love, only to find out they weren’t so different after al .

Her mother was right. It was a blessing.

“What about names?” Eleanor asked. “Have you made the final decision?”

“Our son is Jeremy, Junior,” Jeremy said.

Bernie rol ed her eyes. “That discussion was closed weeks ago. He loves the idea of having a mini-me.” She sighed. “Two of them in the same house. Can you imagine?”

Eleanor trailed her fingertip over the other baby’s face. “You have a little girl here, too,” she said. “What have you decided to name her?”

Bernie looked at Jeremy. “Unfortunately, that’s stil up for discussion.”

“No, it isn’t,” he said.

She closed her eyes. “Jeremy—”

“I’m naming this baby.”

Bernie looked at her mother. “He’s been coming up with some weird names, but don’t worry. He thinks he has the final word, but I stil have veto power. If it’s something awful—”

“Her name is Eleanor.”

Bernie froze. Slowly she turned back around to look at Jeremy. Then suddenly he looked al blurry, because tears were fil ing her eyes.

“You’re naming her after me?” Eleanor said.

“If that’s al right with you,” Jeremy said. “Maybe we’l cal her El ie for short.”

“That’s what they cal ed me when I was a little girl,” Eleanor said, and then she was crying al over again.

Bernie pul ed Jeremy to her, putting her arms around him, hugging him tightly. “I love you,” she whispered in his ear. “I love you so much.” And he hugged her back, stroking her hair and whispering that he loved her, too. When she final y let him go, he scooped up little El ie. He stared down at his daughter, then lowered his lips and kissed her gently on the forehead, and Bernie thought she’d die from loving him so much. Eleanor sat down in a nearby chair. Jeremy brought the baby to her, and she held her as if she were the most precious thing on earth. Then he picked up Jeremy, Jr., smiling down at him like the proud father he was, one who Bernie knew would be there for his children every day of their lives.

Then he brought the baby to Bernie. As she cradled him in her arms, he blinked a few times. His eyes got heavy. Then he stuck his fist in his mouth and fel asleep.

“Wel , he’s certainly not like his father,” Bernie said.

“He’s not demanding anything.”

“Give him time. He’l be a chip off the old block soon enough.”

Jeremy sat down beside them, leaning in and resting his hand on the baby’s blanket. “My family,” he said softly, then turned to kiss Bernie on the cheek.

She couldn’t believe there had ever been a time when her only goal had been to keep him out of her life, because she couldn’t imagine living life without him now. In the end, he was al she’d ever wanted—a good, kind, dependable man who would love her forever.

One newly minted matchmaker

meets his match.

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of

Jane Graves’s

next irresistible novel

Heartstrings and Diamond

Rings

Available in August 2011.

Relationships,
Alison Carter thought,
are all about
modest expectations.
As she watched Randy inhale the last of his honey-glazed pork chops and drain his wine glass, then swivel his head to watch their waitress’s ass as she passed by, Alison added,
And
that soulmate thing is a crock.

The more she repeated those mantras to herself, the better she felt. After al , there was nothing real y wrong with Randy. They’d met at a party where he’d gotten too drunk to drive and she’d taken him home, and then they’d started to date. A sales rep with a big paper company, he had a townhome in Plano, not large, but bordering a somewhat prestigious area only a block from a golf course. He wore suits you couldn’t tel from designer originals, and shoes that looked like real leather. He did drive an actual Mercedes, a few years old with a great big payment, but a Mercedes nonetheless.

“You look great tonight,” Randy said, now that the waitress with the perfect ass had disappeared into the kitchen.

“Thank you,” Alison said. “So do you.” She wasn’t lying. He wore a pair of slacks, a sharply starched dress shirt, and a sport coat, looking as nice as she’d ever seen him, which real y wasn’t bad at al . In the candlelit ambience of the restaurant, he actual y looked handsome.

As for her looking great, she wasn’t so sure.

Yesterday she’d spent ten minutes in front of an evil three-way mirror at Saks as Heather convinced her that the dress she wore real y didn’t make her butt look big. Since junior high, Heather had always been one of those rare friends who never told her she looked good in something when she real y didn’t.

Sometimes the truth was hard to swal ow, but in the end it meant there was at least one person on earth she could trust. And if Randy truly loved her for her, did the size of her butt real y matter, anyway?

They’d been seeing each other for nearly eight months now, and it had been a decent eight months.

No, she didn’t have hot flashes of pure sexual hunger whenever he kissed her. She didn’t sit around at work al day doodling his name on a sticky note pad. She didn’t always leap up to answer the phone when she knew it was probably him. But after she’d turned thirty a few months ago, she’d decided there were tradeoffs she was wil ing to accept. She could wait for burning sexual attraction to strike her out of nowhere, or she could knock off the lottery mentality and go for the sure thing if it meant she might actual y get to have the home, husband, and family she’d always wanted.

It might not be great, but if they worked at it, it could certainly be good.

One day last week on her lunch hour, she’d seen Randy in a jewelry store at the mal . Then there was the conversation she’d overheard him having with somebody named Reverend McCormick. And then she’d spotted a Hawaii travel brochure on his desk at home. She brushed al those things aside, tel ing herself they didn’t mean ring-wedding-honeymoon, only to have Randy tel her he had something very important to talk to her about and make dinner reservations at Five-Sixty, the hottest new restaurant in the Dal as metroplex. Oddly, the only emotion she seemed to be able to summon was relief. But that was okay. Relief beat the hel out of desperation.

The waiter poured them more wine, then took their plates. Alison cuddled up next to Randy and stared out the window. Five-Sixty sat at the top of Reunion Tower, fifty stories in the sky, offering sweeping views of the Dal as metroplex. Dusk was becoming night, and with every second that passed, the city lights grew brighter and more mesmerizing. In that moment, Alison truly believed there wasn’t a more romantic place on earth. Then Randy turned and kissed her, and she was surprised to feel a little of that first-date flutter she thought was long gone.

“Alison,” he said final y, fixing his gaze on hers, “I think we’ve grown very close over the past few months.”

Her heart bumped against her chest. This was it.

After al these years, after al the wrong men, after al the blind dates, after al her waiting and wishing and hoping, she was final y making the leap toward matrimony.

Thank God.

“Yes,” she said. “We have.”

He brushed a strand of hair away from her cheek and stared soulful y into her eyes. “And I wouldn’t even be asking you this if I didn’t think our relationship was very, very strong.”

Alison nodded. “Of course.”

“Like a rock.”

“Yes,” she agreed.

“You’re so beautiful. Have I told you that lately?” She gave him a smile that said,
Yes, but don’t
hesitate to tell me again.

“And you’re open-minded.” He pondered that a moment. “Very open-minded, I’d say.”

Actual y, she’d never thought of herself as particularly open-minded. But it was okay if he thought so, because that was a good thing… right?

He shifted a little, suddenly looking uncomfortable, and Alison smiled to herself. It was so cutely traditional for him to have a hard time with this. In fact, she was sure she saw him blush.

“I think Bonnie is open-minded, too,” Randy said.

Alison blinked. “Bonnie?”

“Yeah. And you seem to get along wel with her.” Alison worked with Bonnie, but Randy didn’t real y know her al that wel . Like al men, he was far more acquainted with Bonnie’s breasts than her face. God bless Bonnie—she could sprout two heads and the men of the world would never know it. But why was Randy bringing her up now?

“Uh… yeah,” Alison said. “I guess we get along okay.”

“I assume you think she’s, you know… attractive.” Yes. Bonnie was attractive. In a wide-eyed, short-skirted, body-flaunting way. “I… suppose so.”
What is
he talking about?

“Anyway, I was wondering…” He inched closer and stared directly into her eyes, and her heart practical y stopped. She stared up at him adoringly.

“Yes?”

“You. Me. Bonnie. What do you think?” Alison just stared at him. “What do I think about what?”

He laughed a little. “You know. The three of us.

Together.” He leaned in and kissed along her neck.

“Seeing you with another woman would be such a turn-on.”

For the next several seconds, it was as if Alison’s entire circulatory system contracted, stopping the blood flow to her brain. Surely he must have said,
Will
you marry me?
but somehow it had come out sounding like,
Wanna have perverted sex?

“What did you say?”

“A threesome. You, me, and Bonnie.”

Don’t just repeat it, damn it! Change it!

“When we were at that party at John’s house last month,” Randy said, “Bonnie seemed to be as open-minded as you are.” Then his voice slipped from soothingly sexual to blatantly carnal. “I think she’d go for it, don’t you?”

Alison yanked herself away from him. “Are you completely out of your mind?”

He stared at her dumbly. “What’s the matter?”

“What’s the matter?
What’s the matter?
” Alison sputtered aimlessly for a moment, words escaping her. Then she leaned in and spoke in an angry whisper. “That’s what you wanted to talk to me about?”

He shrugged. “Wel … yeah.”

“You brought me here to ask me that?” He looked befuddled. “Wel , it is kind of a big step, so I—”

so I—”

“What were you doing in that jewelry store three days ago at lunch?”

“Jewelry store? How’d you know I was at a jewelry store?”

“Just answer me. What were you doing?”

“Getting a battery for my watch. Why?” Alison felt a wave of nausea. “You had a Hawaii vacation brochure on your desk at home.”

“I did?”

“Yes. You did. Where did it come from?” He shrugged. “I don’t know. It was probably junk mail.”

The nausea continued to rol in, like surf crashing over a rocky beach. “Okay, then. You haven’t been to church since you were twelve. So who the hel is Reverend McCormick?”

“Who?”

“Randy,” she snapped, “I overheard you talking to somebody named Reverend McCormick last week.” Randy blinked. “Oh. I donated some of my old clothes to a church charity. Tax deduction. How did you—”

“Never mind.”

Alison dropped her head to her hands, feeling more dumb and deluded than she ever had in her life. How had this happened? What could she have seen in those bland brown eyes of Randy’s that made the concept “together forever” seem like an actual possibility, particularly since he was stil staring at her with a look that said,
Now don’t be too hasty—have
you ever actually considered the advantages of
lesbian sex?

“Randy, listen to me careful y. Are you listening?” He nodded, a hopeful look on his face. Hopeful.

What did he think she was going to do? Suggest a plan to catch Bonnie off-guard in the shower?

“My answer is no,” she told him, her voice quivering with anger. “Now, that’s not just any old no. It’s no, not in a mil ion years, not if we’re the only three people left on Earth and I’m the odd woman out and it’s the only chance I have to participate in sex again for the rest of eternity. It’s that kind of no. Are you getting my drift?” His face fel into a disappointed frown, as if he were a spoiled six-year-old who couldn’t understand why a spotted pony with a silver-trimmed saddle or a month-long tour of Disney World was out of the question.

“Maybe you just need a chance to think about it,” he said.

Think about it? Was he
serious
?

“Randy,” she said with a growl in her voice, “you’re going to get up from this table right now. You’re going to leave. And if you so much as glance back over your shoulder, I’m shoving you through the window. It’s fifty stories to the ground, and I don’t give a damn. Do you hear me?”

Randy drew back with a startled expression. “But why? Just because I had one little idea to spice up our sex life that you didn’t like?”

Alison’s mouth dropped open. “One little idea?
One
little—”

“So forget I mentioned it,” he said with an offhand shrug. “No big deal. We can stil have regular sex.

Just you and me—”

She grabbed him by his lapels and dragged him forward. “Get. The hel .
Out.
”

“Come on, Alison,” he said, a nervous laugh in his voice. “You real y don’t want me to—” She leaned away and whacked him on the arm with her doubled-up fist. “I said
out
!” When she reared back to smack him again, he threw up his arms to ward off the blow. He scooted out of the booth so quickly he banged the edge of the table with his hip, knocking over his glass of Pinot Noir. The wine spread like a gigantic Rorschach blob on the white linen tablecloth. He stared down at it dumbly.

“Out!” Alison shouted.

He took two shaky steps backward, his shocked expression shifting to a vindictive glare. “Yeah, wel , you know what?”

“What?”

“That dress makes your butt look
huge
!” A pure, unadulterated, I-hate-you kind of anger wel ed up inside Alison that she’d never felt before.

As he spun around and stalked off, she closed her hands into fists and banged them on the table. The last wine glass standing shimmied a little, but she managed to grab it before it fel over. In three seconds she’d drained its contents and smacked the glass back down on the table, feeling the wine burn al the way down her throat. It hit her nauseated stomach like cold rainwater on hot lava, and she swore she could actual y feel the sizzle.

She closed her eyes to try to gain back a modicum of control, and when she opened them again, she realized the restaurant had fal en silent, the waiters had frozen in place, and everybody was looking at her as if she were a rabid dog foaming at the mouth. She sat up straight and put her hands in her lap, trying to look calm, sane, and sensible. Judging from the fact that everyone was stil staring, she wasn’t succeeding.

The waiter walked tentatively back to the table, staying slightly more than arm’s length away. “Uh…

madam? Wil there be anything else?”

Yes. A gun so she could chase Randy down and blow him away. A big, fat box of Kleenex so she could cry her eyes out. A trench coat so everybody in this restaurant wouldn’t be looking at her ass as she walked out the door, wondering if Randy had been right.

“No. Nothing.”

In the time it took for her to decide that the wine-red Rorschach blob on the tablecloth looked like a pissed-off woman castrating a depraved man, the waiter returned with the check.

The check. Wel , crap. Not only had this been one of the worst nights of her life, now she had to pay through the nose for the privilege of participating in it.

She winced, paid the check, and left the restaurant.

And sure enough, she felt the col ective gazes of every patron in the place focused squarely on her backside. The moment she got home, she was burning this dress.

She went into the elevator and leaned against the wal , feeling a little woozy as she shot down fifty stories. But it wasn’t until she stepped into the hotel lobby that it dawned on her that Randy had driven her there, and she had no way home.

No car, no fiancé, no hope, no nothing.

Alison trudged through the underground passage to Union Station, where she went to the surface again and sat down on a bench to wait for the northbound train. She grabbed her cel phone, cal ed Heather, and asked her to pick her up at the Fifteenth Street station in Plano. Since Alison wasn’t exactly radiating the excitement of a newly engaged woman, Heather started to worry, but Alison told her she’d fil her in when she got there.

Just last week, Heather and her husband, Tony, had returned from celebrating their first anniversary in Las Vegas. Alison tried not to be pea-green with envy about that, but it was a hard-won battle.

You got the last good one, Heather. Hang on to
him.

Anger had carried Alison this far, but now in the silence of the aftermath of her future going right down the tubes, she couldn’t stop the tears from coming.

God, she hated this. Sitting alone at a train station by an overflowing trash can beneath garish lights wearing a dress she now despised, crying her eyes out. Could it get any worse than that?

When the train came several minutes later, she sniffed a little, dried her eyes with her fingertips, boarded a car, and plopped down on a seat.