Shiver (25 page)

Chapter 35

LISSA

“S
ugar britches!” Lawrence yelled, picking me up off my bare feet as he stomped into the house. He didn’t set me down until he was all the way in the kitchen where Ethan stood, looking casually sexy in an untucked polo shirt and cargo shorts, his arms crossed in front of his chest.

“Put my wife down, you ass.”

Lawrence let me down with a thunk and reached out an arm to man-hug Ethan. Ethan clapped him on the back before pushing him away with a laugh.

“Where’s the birthday boy?” Lawrence swiveled his head to look around.

“He’s with his girlfriend,” I said.

“He has a girlfriend already?” Lawrence shook his head. “Boy should know better than to mess around with women.”

I snorted and pointed to the back of the house. “They were right out there a minute ago.”

The front door opened and I heard Steph walk in, chatting over her shoulder to Jennifer, who was carrying Thomas right behind her. I ran out of the kitchen to Steph and picked her up off the ground in a hug. We squealed and jumped around, so very excited to be reunited.

“Ugh, I’ve missed you so much,” I said over her shoulder.

She nodded. “It’s been dumb.”

We pulled away from each other and shared a watery smile. I tried to hide my concern for her while Ethan walked over to give her a kiss on the cheek.

“Hey, hot stuff.” She grinned at him. “How’s it hangin’?”

I stepped between them. “Leave my husband’s junk alone.” I laughed.

We all went into the kitchen together to see Lawrence leaning over a tray of chips and dip, helping himself.

“Hey, Lawry,” Steph piped up. “Thanks for leaving me out there.”

“You were too slow. I had to see my sugar britches. And don’t call me that.” He chomped on another chip.

Steph rolled her eyes. “He’s ridiculous.”

Ethan and I exchanged an amused glance. At least those two were talking. It’d taken a tremendous amount of texting on my part to get them there.

I introduced Jennifer to Lawrence and they started chatting, Jennifer clearly dazzled by his Southern-boy charm and panty-dropping smile. Thomas even cracked a smile at Lawrence, which was impressive. Steph and I caught up, laughing and generally being goofy while Ethan played bartender.

We all sat on the living room floor while Charlie lounged on the sofa behind us and Steph sneaked her chips. Lawrence had Jennifer rolling, laughing with stories of how we all met, and I almost died from the hilarity as he reminisced. Ethan got up and kissed the top of my head, his fingers trailing along my neck before he walked into the kitchen. I stood to follow him in, winking at Steph when she rolled her eyes at us.

He was bent over at the oven to pull all the scrumptious Mexican food out that’d been warming, so I ogled him.

“Are you staring at my ass?”

“Uh-huh,” I answered. “This reminds me of the first time you took advantage of me.” I grinned saucily.

He set down a foil-covered dish and turned to me, holding out his arms with hands covered in oven mitts. I hopped forward and jumped into his arms, wrapping my legs around his waist and planting a loud kiss on his lips. The oven mitts supported me under my white shorts.

“You’re so hot, I have to wear these just to handle you.” He kissed the tip of my nose and pulled back to look me in the eyes. “How you doing, baby?”

I smiled happily at him. “I’m good. This is fun.”

“Do you wish your family was here?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Of course. But I didn’t want to risk airplane germs, or Nathan and Abe germs, or Patrick’s doctor germs. Too many germs. Plus, it’s nice to keep it quiet. This is a big step for us.”

“No kidding.”

Chuckling, I dropped my legs down and slid out of his arms to help get the food ready. In easy silence, we unwrapped foil and put everything in bowls and on serving trays before carting it out to the coffee table. Everything smelled amazing, and we all stayed on the floor with Thomas and dug in. I loved that my friends had no problem with that.

Thomas crawled over to me and pulled up to standing, using my shoulder to balance. Ethan reached out his arm and Thomas grasped his hand, teetering on his feet to walk assisted over to his daddy. I smiled at them as I bit into my taco.

“Will he eat any of this?” Lawrence asked from beside me, watching Thomas move around.

I shook my head. “No. But he’ll touch it. That’s a pretty big deal.”

“Wow,” he said quietly. “I mean, I know all this, but really seeing it is a different story. How are you guys holding up? Really?”

I smiled. “We’re really good. We’ve had some rough spots, but we’ve figured out how to cope with it all. We just… we make it work.”

“I heard you got caught doing it in the horse trailer.”

I let out a bark of laughter. “We did not!”

“That’s not what I heard.”

“I’m rather appalled that you guys had a discussion about this at all. But we didn’t get caught. Not really.”

“You have no reason to be embarrassed. I bet you really put on a show for those ladies. It’s more action than they’ve seen in years!” Lawrence winked at me.

I just smacked him, then leaned my head on his shoulder.

“I’ve missed you,” I said.

“Me too, sugar britches. Me too.”

ETHAN

While sitting and chatting with Jennifer and Steph, I watched Lissa and Lawrence out of the corner of my eye with total amusement. I remembered when I’d been so fucking jealous of him, thinking they were dating, that he was touching her. Now I knew she was mine. I had no insecurities where she was concerned. She was my wife and the mother of my child. Hopefully with more to come, if I had my way.

Lissa turned to me and wiggled close. My arm automatically wrapped around her hip, my hand finding the smooth skin under her tank top.

“Why don’t I clean up and we’ll get ready to sing ‘Happy Birthday’ to our one-year-old?” I said softly in her ear after kissing her cheek.

“I’ll help. That way it goes faster.”

She pecked my cheek and hopped gracefully to her feet, pulling up on my arm. We stacked all the dishes and took them in shifts back to the kitchen. There wasn’t much to clean up because there wasn’t much food left over. Once the dishwasher was loaded and everything was wrapped up, we looked at each other over the pile of cupcakes.

“One whole year,” Lissa said in wonder.

“I can’t believe we made it. It feels like so much longer than a year.” I shook my head.

She did her cute snort-laugh. “I’d like to be mad at you for that comment, but I can’t. It’s so true.”

I smirked at her. “Ready?” I asked, gesturing to the single candle waiting.

“As I’ll ever be.” She plopped the candle in a cupcake and lit it. Our eyes met over the flame and I winked at her to lighten the mood.

We walked together back into the living room and started singing, badly. Everyone joined in. Badly. Except for Jennifer. Her voice was soft and beautiful. Thomas’s wide eyes darted between all of us, and it was clear he could either enjoy the attention or have a meltdown at any moment. Collectively, our voices softened, and we were so grateful to our friends for recognizing instantly the fine line we were walking.

Steph had her phone out to take pictures when Lissa and I crouched next to our son and helped him blow out his candle. I held my breath though, because even though she said she wasn’t, I knew Lissa was hoping this kid would tear into that cupcake like a typical one-year-old. I also knew it wasn’t going to happen, so I was ready to be there for her.

When Thomas stared at the cake with disinterest, Lissa gently took his hand and dipped his index finger into the frosting. His brows came together as he stared at his finger. She cautiously guided his hand to his mouth and touched the frosting to his lips. His little tongue darted out to taste it and he simply kept a thoughtful expression on his face. I saw Lissa start to smile, but she also drew her lower lip between her teeth and clamped down.

So I quickly leaned over and took a big bite of Thomas’s cupcake, smearing frosting all over my face and making a ridiculous spectacle. Thomas started to giggle and wave his hands in the air. I grabbed him out of Lissa’s arms and let him study me. His little hands touched my cheeks, careful to stay away from the goo. But I let him watch. It was important.

Lissa looked on with what could only be described as adoration on her face. Her green eyes were glowing brightly with nearly shed tears, but she was happy and smiling as she stood on her toes, darting out her tongue to lick some frosting off my lips. I swooped an arm around her and dipped her back to kiss her deeply, tasting her sweetness and rubbing some sugar off on her. Steph was furiously tapping her phone, taking pictures of us laughing. In love. It was a perfect moment in an otherwise imperfect situation.

After everyone had enjoyed their own treat, I sat down next to Jennifer, who had been studying our entire afternoon with various expressions.

“Thanks for coming, Jennifer. And for… everything. You’ve been incredible,” I said, trying to convey my sincerity. My gratefulness.

She smiled at me. “I know it’s hard. But you guys are going to be okay. I’m going to stick with you for the long haul too. You won’t get rid of me until that kid is operating at one hundred percent.”

I raised a brow. “You’re locked in now anyway. You’re not getting rid of us until well after that.” I tilted my wineglass at our crew. “This is our weird and dysfunctional family. Congratulations for being a part of it.”

She held her glass out and clinked it against mine. “I’m honored.”

We’d spent a few quiet moments watching the other interactions around us before she finally asked, “May I ask a question?”

“Of course.” I turned my head to look at her.

“I might have an idea. How do you feel about… weird?”

I nodded slowly and took a sip of wine. “We actually do weird really well.”

Epilogue

Thomas ran across the courtyard of the barn, chasing his sister with a mane comb. Amelia squealed in irritation and ran straight into her daddy’s arms. Ethan scooped her up, the tattoo-decorated skin contrasting with the purity of his daughter’s.

“Thomas!” I called out. “Knock it off!”

“Yes, ma’am.” He bowed his head, but not before I saw that smirk flit across his features.

It’d been an interesting few years. After his first birthday, Jennifer had turned us on to a holistic doctor who integrates Eastern and Western medicine. We had ups and downs and numerous doubts, but at the end of the day, we decided to jump on the bandwagon and go for it. Even Thomas’s doctors at UVA gave the go-ahead. They didn’t know what else to do either.

We did acupuncture, dietary changes, homeopathic remedies, massage, gymnastics, swimming. You name it. Some things worked incredibly. Some things made it worse. Some things are still undetermined. But each experiment was a learning experience.

Then one day, the kid picked up a banana and started eating it. Seriously. If I hadn’t vividly remembered being in labor with him, I would have questioned if he was mine. He fucking loved bananas. Still does.

He’s healthy and ready to start school at six years old. And we made another one! That was a tough decision. We went back and forth with the idea before I finally said that the likelihood of the same thing happening again was slim, and if it did happen again, well, we were better equipped to deal with it, so we would be fine.

I was pretty sure I got pregnant with Amelia as soon as those words left my mouth. I was thrilled when we found out she was a girl. Ethan was terrified about her teenage years even when she was still in the womb. To be honest, I remembered myself at thirteen and was still scared.

But when that little girl arrived, she had her daddy wrapped around her teeny finger immediately. He was hopeless where she was concerned, and I loved to watch them together.

Ethan pulled their pony out of his stall and plopped Amelia on top, keeping a hand on her leg. She rode around, completely confident, twirling the pony’s mane around and around her finger. I sat leaning against another stall door, watching and enjoying the antics of my family.

I was still wearing my breeches but had removed my boots, and I crossed my flip-flop-clad feet in front of me. Charlie slowly ambled over and took her time to sit down next to me. I ran my fingers through her long, silky fur as we gazed over what we’d started together so many years ago. I leaned my head against her neck, and I took the time to just sit with her.

Ethan looked over to us and leaned toward Amelia to whisper in her ear. She nodded and he plucked her off the pony, handing her the lead rope. Thomas ran over with a brush and started smoothing Rocky’s coat.

I bit my lip and my husband strode over, looking every bit as sexy as he did when we’d met, now just a little more mature. He walked around behind me, sitting so I was between his long legs. I scooted back until I was pressed tightly to him, and he tilted his head to kiss my neck. When his teeth lightly scraped down to my shoulder, I couldn’t help the tremor that coursed through my body, and I felt Ethan smile against my skin.

“Cold?” he whispered.

I slowly shook my head. “No,” I whispered back softly.

He used his hands to turn my head and captured my lips in his, swiftly and passionately.

“That’s good, babe. I never want you cold. Only to shiver.”

The End