Behold the Stars (30 page)

She saw him and grinned, then looked sheepish and awkward. She was still a week or more away from being physically ready for sex, and who knew how long before her head was ready. He didn’t care. She was beautiful, fierce, strong, brilliant. And she was his. He took her face in his hands and kissed her softly. “I love you, Lillian Accardo. You are mine. And you look fucking amazing. I don’t know where or when you got that outfit, but I’m glad you did.” He stepped away from her, to the table at the side of the room. “And hey. Those shoes go with this.” He handed her a single, long-stemmed, red rose, which he’d had delivered to the room while she primped. Corny, maybe. But the smile on her face told him it was right.

She took his hand. “Come on, love. Let’s go get official.”

~oOo~

That night, their wedding night, for the first time since Ellis had taken Lilli, they slept naked together. Isaac savored the feel of her warm, soft body at ease in the curl of his own. They slept with his hand on her belly and her hand over his, their ringed fingers linked.

It was enough. It was everything.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Party planning was not something with which Lilli had any real experience. She’d been raised in a family which mostly kept to itself, without extended relations on the same continent, and after college she’d gone into the Army. Any party planning she’d been part of in the past had involved kegs and pizza.

But Signal Bend deserved a real Christmas. The town had been under siege for weeks—months, really. Years, if the economic disaster in the midst of which they’d been struggling was taken into account. And now Main Street was all but shut down. Everyone but Lilli had been stunned at the damage all those bullets had done. It wasn’t just windows that needed to be replaced. The buildings with wood exteriors, the plaster and drywall interiors, the stock—all of it was a mess. And Don Keyes’ dozer had pushed three vehicles straight through the entire front of Fosse’s Finds.

There was a lot to be done. The town morale was rising, and people were happy to do the repairs, but something told Lilli that they needed some kind of event to mark to end of trouble and the beginning of hope.

She knew she needed it. She needed to keep her mind busy. She’d quit her job, and she needed something to fill her head. When she was idle, she felt like she was losing control of it. She’d said nothing to Isaac. He knew she wasn’t quite right, but he thought it was temporary. He didn’t know she was worried that what had happened in St. Louis had broken her, after all, that maybe it had unlocked the crazy her mother had left behind in her.

And she was pregnant. God. What if she really was broken? What if she was destined to be the kind of mother her own mother had been?

Staying busy kept those thoughts away. Planning this huge party gave her focus, made her feel like Isaac was right, and the crazy was just a normal, temporary part of recovery from trauma. When the party was over, she was going to have to figure out what the fuck she was going to do with her life, though. Because being Isaac’s old lady was not a sustainable profession. That felt like a one-way ticket to crazytown.

She’d had to jump through hoops to quit her job, but she’d managed it. Honestly, they were glad to be rid of her; the Signal Bend story had drawn far too much attention for comfort. They’d changed her faked history, fleshed out parts, redirected others, making it, ironically, able to withstand a bit more scrutiny, since there would no longer be anyone standing at the gate, as it were. And she’d signed all the requisite forms promising to keep her mouth shut. And then “delivery men” had come to the house to take her hardware and debrief her. Her physical condition, with scars and bruises still evident, had been a source of much discussion, and that in itself, the detail they required, had been traumatic, but they’d gone away satisfied that their secrets were safe.

She was truly a civilian, for the first time since high school. She was still Lilli Carson, since that was how people knew her here, where she’d put down her stake, but she was just a regular person now.

No—she wasn’t Lilli Carson. She was Lilli Lunden now. She was glad for it. She was happy to be Isaac’s wife and to be carrying their child, but she was terrified, and nothing felt entirely real. A lot of her attention was spent trying to keep all that turmoil under wraps, trying to show Isaac that things were okay. That
she
was okay. She was hoping that would eventually be true.

He was being incredibly patient with her—overprotective, yes, but she didn’t mind that so much at the moment. He hadn’t pushed her at all about the physical stuff. Tasha had told her to wait at least a month, better six weeks, before they tried anything, but it had been just more than a month now, and Lilli was nowhere near ready. It had taken her weeks to get comfortable being touched in any kind of intimate way—a passionate kiss, or, hell, even Isaac’s hand on her back, any touch that had once been sensual between them, had made her stiffen and remember. She’d had to work hard to get to a point where she could just feel
Isaac
. It wasn’t that she didn’t want him. She wanted him desperately. But she hadn’t yet figured out a way to close off the memories from that day in Ellis’s cell, and any intimate touch set them careening through her head.

Goddammit; she was stronger than that. She’d shoved bad memories aside her whole fucking life. She’d always believed—
known
—that life could always go to shit in a heartbeat, no matter how hard anyone tried to be snug and safe, and that the only thing to do was not to get caught up in the shit. Do one’s best. Be true to one’s truth. Love as fully as one can. Understand that anything else is chaos and try to navigate around it. That meant setting aside the bad shit and not letting it take over. But this time, she couldn’t find the strength or focus to clear it away.

Maybe part of it was that she still felt wrong, inside. It wasn’t pain, exactly. The pain had been bad, but she knew she was healing well. But she felt different. It was as though Ponytail and his sidekicks had left something behind, or had somehow made her different inside. She hadn’t been able to make it any clearer to herself, and she certainly had not said anything to anyone else. She was sure it was all in her head, but that actually made it worse. It meant she really was crazy.

Like her nagging conviction that she was no longer pregnant. She knew she was. She’d had several more tests, including an ultrasound. She was sick in the mornings. Her breasts hurt. She had all the symptoms. And still she felt wrong—another thing she hadn’t told Isaac. He was already fully involved in making ready for a baby, opening up the room upstairs that had been his sister’s, clearing it out, preparing to remodel it, and ordering wood to build nursery furniture. He’d put all of his anger and grief over what Ellis had done to them and the town into his hope for their family. She tried to take energy from him and quiet her irrational fears. But when she put her hand on her utterly flat, firm belly, she felt empty.

Focusing on the party gave her something else to think about, and then she felt mostly normal. She’d felt good while they were away, picking up the ‘Cuda and getting married. She’d had fun and had been able to relax a little, like she’d left her worries and fears at the Signal Bend border. She and Isaac had been focused on each other, and the days had passed swiftly. It was in Reno that she’d finally been able to seek out his touch, to be comfortable skin to skin with him, and even sleep with him behind her, without having to psych herself up like a fucking drill sergeant. But the trip had been a short one, and they’d come back to their life, where the worries and fears awaited her.

Now, she was standing in the middle of the Hall, managing Dom and the new Prospect, Omen (his given name was Damien, and Lilli had been in the clubhouse when Bart and Havoc, thinking themselves quite brilliant, had laid the name on him), while they put up the massive real Christmas tree. It was Christmas Eve, the party was later that evening, and the decorations, including the tree, were supposed to have gone up while she and Isaac were away, but they’d gotten home the day before to learn that Len had not been able not bring himself to deal with the decorations, not even enough to convey to one of the club girls, or a town woman, what Lilli wanted. He’d managed food and everything else, but the thought of evergreen garlands, red velvet bows, and colored lights had apparently been more than his macho, inked heart could take.

She’d seen the trailer he called home. She understood. His barn, where he bred and raised his horses, was a thing of gleaming, efficient beauty, but his house was a trash bin with a roof. Decorating was far beyond his abilities. So she’d given him a punch in the ribs and taken back over. The Hall was going to look fucking festive if she had to string Len’s intestines around the room and hang mistletoe from his severed fingers.

Which she’d said to him. In so many words. He’d grinned, kissed her cheek, and made himself scarce, muttering something about hormones.

And she’d felt a pang of loss. Which was crazy.
She was pregnant
. Why couldn’t she believe it?

When the tree was up, she and a couple of club girls put up the decorations, while Dom and Omen moved on to stringing the lights and garland. C.J. and Havoc sat at the bar pelting them with peanuts, while Badger—still on restricted activity but recovering well from a bullet to the back—stacked clean barware under the bar. She’d tried to get the peanut-throwing to stop, but they’d ignored her. So she’d have somebody sweep once they got their middle school mania out of their system.

She stepped back to take a look at the tree as Candy, one of the perkier girls, stood on tiptoes at the top of the ladder to put the glittery, flaming horse, which somebody had made for the Horde at some point, on the top of the tree. Candy, at the top of the ladder in her teeny little skirt, had all the guys’ attention.

All but one.

“Me, Sport.” Lilli felt Isaac’s hands come around her waist and rest on her belly. He’d taken to announcing himself when he came up on her from behind, because she leapt out of her damn skin if she wasn’t expecting to be touched. She could relax into his body now, but not unawares. Maybe never again unawares. But knowing he was there, she was fine, and she leaned back against him as he nuzzled her neck. “You two doing okay?”

Her and the baby, he meant. God, he was so sweet and attentive, so much in love with the idea of this baby. So much in love with her. She wanted so much for it to be real, for it to be right. The thought that something was wrong scared her more than maybe anything ever had.

No. Stop. Jesus, what was wrong with her head? Why couldn’t she just relax and be happy? With a breath for strength, she smiled and tipped her head to his. “We’re good. About done here, I think. I want to lie down for a while before tonight. If you think I can leave the cavemen unattended for an hour or two without them destroying all this hard work.”

Isaac turned her in his arms. “They’ll behave. Want some company?” He kissed her, and she hooked her arms around his back.

“Sure.” It was good to be able to enjoy being close to him again, even if that was all they had. She hoped she’d be able to do more before he was no longer able to be patient with her.

He grinned and took her hand. On their way past the bar, Isaac dropped a heavy hand on Havoc’s shoulder. “Don’t fuck up the party shit, boys, or you’re getting ass-kickings for Christmas. We’ll be in my office. Emergencies only.”

~oOo~

Lilli didn’t dream when she napped, so she woke after almost two hours feeling rested, her head on Isaac’s chest. There was something strangely cozy about napping on the sofa bed in his office, hearing the vague sounds of the clubhouse around them.

“You awake?” Isaac’s deep voice rumbled in his chest.

She stretched. “Yeah. That was nice.”

He chuckled. “Yeah, it was.” Her left hand was on his belly, and he picked it up, playing with the rings he’d given her. In the few days they’d been married, he’d already taken up the habit of playing with her rings.

They’d gotten lucky with their rings. Neither of them had had heirloom rings to give each other—their parents’ marriages had been tragic in one way or another—and they’d not had a lot of time to think about rings before they’d arrived in Reno. But Nevada was a state that catered to the unprepared bride and groom, especially in the larger cities, so there were four jewelry stores within a block of their hotel—including one inside the hotel. They’d separated, and within two hours of arriving in Reno and realizing they needed rings, they had made perfect choices for each other.

Even though they’d never been officially “engaged,” it had been important to Isaac that she have two rings, and that they make a statement—a declaration, even. Lilli had been worried that he’d saddle her with some kind of blingy atrocity, but he’d picked a perfect set. He’d chosen for her a large but simple amethyst solitaire in a platinum setting, square cut and bounded by small, pavé diamonds. The bands of the solitaire and of the matching wedding band were also set by pavé diamonds. Amethyst was her birthstone, and she loved the nontraditional choice. She liked to see the rings on her finger, and so did he.

Lilli had gone to all four shops before she found the right ring for him: a wide, heavy band of hammered platinum. His hands were huge, so she’d had to ask them to set it aside so she could bring him in and make sure they had one sized well. Miraculously, they did. It looked perfect on his finger. His wedding ring had displaced a heavy silver ring with a runic “H,” like a signet. He’d moved that to his right ring finger and no longer wore the horse head ring he’d worn there. That horse head could put some hurt down in a fight, so Lilli had been surprised to see him choose the signet over it. He’d told her he was hoping to live a life in which being able to take a guy’s eye out with a punch wasn’t something he really had to plan for anymore.

That would be nice. A quiet life. Lilli thought she’d like to try that.