Bliss Series Boxed Set: The Whole Damn Harem (25 page)

After a few tears, and a lot of laughter, I borrow mom’s car and drive to the train station to pick up Kate. She caught the first train up here after she finished work. The entire twenty minute drive, I was trying to work out how I was going to tell her. This was something that I’d never even considered happening again. Not until I was married or in a committed relationship, neither of which I was looking for.

Daniel Winters snuck up on me and changed all that. From that first meeting, I knew something was different about him. It wasn’t just a physical attraction, there was something else there. He wasn’t just a smoking hot volcano of fine, although that was certainly appreciated. It was his spunk. The cocky sense of humor that made me smile whenever he’d text me. His thoughtfulness that makes my heart speed up whenever I saw him. Even the way he’d hold me close when we slept together, like he needed to touch me as much as he needed his next breath.

Everything he gave me was everything I never knew I wanted. And when I did finally catch up to what was going on between us, I ran away. Twice! I can’t expect him to take me back now without so much as a fight. And throwing the baby into the mix now...I know he’ll do the honorable thing, but I don’t want obligation. I don’t want him guilted into being with us. I want the whole damn thing. Love, trust, respect, commitment.

I want it all, and I want it with him.

It’s because of this that I can’t tell him about the baby until I know that the baby is going to stay put inside me. I’ve miscarried once, and as much as I didn’t want that child, it shredded me in two the moment I knew that I’d lost my baby. I would not want to willingly inflict that pain on anyone unnecessarily. So as unfair as it may be, I’ll wait until I’m safely into the second trimester and tell him then.

Whatever happens between the two of us after that will be up to fate. Because God knows I’m all out of ideas when it comes to how I can prove to Daniel that he’s what I want and that he’s who I want it with.

I see Kate’s mane of red hair come off the train, then spot her huge smile as she sees me waiting for her on the platform. She stops right in front of me, putting down her tiny travel case and putting her arms on my shoulders, holding me a body length away from her as she examines me from head to toe. “So, no limbs missing, no obvious disfigurations, and you don’t seem sick to me. So, what’s with the disappearing act, Mac Attack?”

“I knew I couldn’t get anything past you,” I say with a small grin.

“It’s taken you fifteen years to realize this? Now, take me to the nearest café, hole in the wall, anywhere that serves coffee, and you’re gonna spill your guts to me, missy. We’re not going back to the farm until I know and understand every single last detail. Because, honey, it has to be big to make you run.”

“Yeah, it’s kinda big.”

“That’s what he said!” Kate and I shout at the same time, cracking up laughing with each other as we entwine arms and walk towards my mom’s car.

We find a coffee shop in the middle of town and after ordering hot chocolate and a latte, we claim a couch in the far corner of the shop.

“Spill, Mac. Tell me what’s going on? You never call in sick for work, and the last time you came running home for mom and dad comfort was after leaving Ohio. What happened?”

I reach into my purse and pull out one of the pamphlets that the OB doctor gave me, handing it over to my best friend’s outstretched hand. I watch her reaction as she reads the front page of the “Pregnancy – What to expect” pamphlet and her eyes widen before she looks up at me, tears welling in her eyes.

“Babe.” She wraps her arms around me and envelopes me in a huge hug. “Wow,” she says, her voice cracking.

“Yeah, wow,” I say quietly with a small smile.

“You’re okay with this?”

“I’m actually more than okay with it amazingly.”

“Have you told him?”

“No.”

“What?” she says a bit too loudly, drawing attention from people sitting around us.

“I couldn’t. Not yet anyway.”

“He’ll be over the moon, you know that. He’ll be with you 100%.”

“I don’t want him to be with me just because I’m carrying his child. I want to be with him for me. The baby is just an awesome bonus.”

“He already wants to be with you. You’re the one dragging your feet.”

“That’s what I want to change, but I don’t know how. And what if I lose this baby too? It would break his heart all over again. I can’t do that. I’ve hurt him enough.”

“So what? You’re going to wait until you give birth and turn up on his doorstep saying ‘surprise!’,” she adds, sounding annoyed.

“No. I just want to wait until I’m past the first twelve weeks, when I know that I’m actually going to be a mom and not another miscarriage statistic.”

“Mac, babe. That’s unfair,” she says straight away.

“No, it’s protecting myself, and Daniel. But you know what I’ve been doing the past few weeks. I’ve been sorting my life out, trying to grow the fuck up. It’s been a long time coming. I want to be worthy of him. I want to be in the right head space so that I’m not tempted to run again.”

“You think you can run away from him again? You think he’d even give you that chance?”

“I wanted to change for him. I needed to change. My vow was rash, and I’ve been holding onto it like a crutch to protect my heart.”

“Daniel won’t hurt your heart. If anything, you’re the one who’s been hurting yourself, and him.”

“I know, but it’s time to let it go and take a chance. This baby is my chance, Kate. I believe that more than you know.”

“Well, I’m gonna be there for you every step of the way. You know that, right?”

“I was counting on it,” I say with a smile. “Aunty Kate has a nice ring to it, don’t ya think?”

“Hell yeah, it does. I’m gonna be the cool aunty. The one who paints her nails and takes her clothes shopping. The one who takes her out for spa days and mommy free time. I’m gonna rock this Aunty gig.”

“Her?”

“Of course!” she says with a cheeky grin.

“Do you think I’m doing the right thing by waiting to tell him?”

“No, I think he has the right to know now. But it’s not my life, babe, it’s yours. Though, if I see that you’re fucking this whole thing up and that you’re going to lose him by not stepping up, I will call you out on it. You can bet your lily white ass on that.”

“I’d expect nothing less.” I smile over at her before hugging her again. With Kate by my side, I feel like I can conquer anything. That is the beauty of having a best friend. They’ll walk over hot coals with you, they’ll tell you when you’re being dumb, and they bail you out of trouble, unless they’re sitting right beside you in the cell.

“You wanna go back home tomorrow and face the music?” she asks, finishing up her coffee.

“I think I should. I’m still not telling him yet, but I need to start living my life. No more excuses, no holding back, no crutches. It’s you, me, and baby makes three. “

“Yep it is, but fingers crossed it will be the four of us in this together. I have a good feeling about this, Mac. I always have.”

“The Story”

Kate and I headed back to Chicago the next day. My morning sickness was still hitting me hard, but with the tried and true combination of saltine crackers and ginger ale before I got out of bed in the morning, it was lot more bearable.

It’s been a few weeks since I found out about my little superhero, and every day I wake up without blood in my panties is a good day. As each day has passed, I’ve been feeling more and more confident that this is my time. My turn. This baby is meant to stick.

Daniel has been texting and calling me off and on, but I’ve been ignoring him. I know, I’m a coward. I should have ran over there and told him as soon as I got back in town, but why set myself up for disappointment? I feel like I’ve taken a good step forward in getting myself ready for him. There are no loose ends now. Sean, Noah, and Zander know that I’m moving forward with my life and that the impossible has happened.

Makenna Lewis has fallen in love with a man.

But now, being a gutless wonder, I’m hiding away from that very same man until I know for sure that we will be having a baby together. Our first child, a little caramel-eyed boy, or maybe a brown haired blue eyed girl like me. My heart aches on a daily basis too. I miss him like I miss my next breath. I never thought I’d feel like this.

I thought I loved Beau, but my feelings for him pale in comparison to what I feel for Daniel. I want to be strong for him. I want a lifetime of spooning and forking, lazy Sunday mornings in bed, Bears’ games and tailgating, ferris wheel rides and walks by the lake. I want all of that with him, but I can’t tell him any of this until I’m past the first trimester.

One in four pregnancies end in miscarriage. I’ve been through that pain, and I would never willingly inflict that on anyone. Especially him.

So I’m waiting.

I know Kate doesn’t understand. She’s actually pissed off at me for not telling him. She says he deserves to know and that my reasoning is stupid.

“He wants you now, baby or no baby, Mac. Why the hell would he not want you now that you’re carrying his child? A child you created the night he told you he loved you. It’s not going to change the way he feels about you. He’ll want you even more. Christ, Mac, stop being a fucking martyr,” she said last night before going to bed and shutting her door.

Her heart’s in the right place, and deep down I know she’s probably right, but I’m sticking to my guns. Three more weeks to go and I will tell him. I’ve even circled the date in the calendar.

∞∞∞

It’s another Friday night after a long and tiring week at work, so I’m sitting at home in my Bears’ jersey and my comfy pajama pants with my fuzzy pink pig slippers on my feet, and a bar of chocolate within my reach. I’m just about to get up and start on my second tub of Ben & Jerry’s Chunky Monkey for the night, when I hear a loud and fast knock at the door.

I look up to check the time on the microwave, and realize that it’s only 9 p.m. and way too early for Kate to be back from her first date with Nathan, a personal trainer that she met at the gym who asked her out. The only reason she’d be home this early would be if it had been a bust. I check my phone for the expected SOS text from her, our secret code for when she needs saving with a fake ‘come home urgently’ phone call, but it’s not there.

There is a loud knock at the door again, and I groan as I pull myself off the couch and barrel my way over to the door.

“You should really stop forgetting your keys, Kate. If you weren’t a redhead already, I’d seriously swear you were blonde…”

I lose all my train of thought the moment I open the door.

It’s not Kate. It’s Daniel. Dreamy, gorgeous, and totally edible Daniel. Shit!

“Hi,” I say cautiously. He is rubbing the back of his neck with his hand, the thing he only does when he’s nervous or angry.

We stand there just staring at each other in my doorway, in the middle of winter, not saying a word. I shiver, snapping out of my haze when I realize that we’re still standing out in the cold.

I look up at him, still in shock that he’s standing in front of me, in the flesh. “Ah, you wanna come in?” I ask.

“Kind of the whole point of coming over to see you, Mac,” he replies deadpan. He looks tense and rigid. Not a good sign.

Moving out of the doorway, I gesture for him to come in. “After you.”

“Thanks,” he replies, his voice sounding harder than normal. He sounds pissed off, actually. This is so not the Daniel Winters I know. Where has the confident, sometimes cocky, ex-lover slash boyfriend gone? Hell, right now his new name is baby daddy and he hasn’t got a clue.

We walk back into the living room and I dump myself back into my sunken couch, grabbing a cushion and cuddling it into my chest. I’m trying to act nonchalant, but I doubt very much that I’m pulling it off. Inside my whole body is screaming, wanting me to tell him that I’m about to change his life as he knows it, and to plead with him to take me back; to apologize for everything I’ve ever done to hurt him because it is the last thing I ever want to do. The Angel Mac on my shoulder is clapping her hands in glee, and surprisingly, Devil Mac has left the building.

“You wanna sit down?” I ask, looking up at him as he leans against the doorway.

“Nope, I think I’ll stay right over here. I need some distance from you for this,” he says.

“For what?” I’m confused now. What the hell is going on?

“I think we need to talk, and since you’ve been avoiding me for the past few weeks, face to face seems to be the only way to get through to you.”

“I haven’t been-”

“Mac, you’re not a liar, please don’t start now.” He just stands there, his eyes full of anger.

“Why are you so angry, Daniel?” I ask tentatively.

“Why do you think? Were you ever going to tell me?” His voice rocks through me.

“W-what?”

“Or were you going to just shut me out like you do to every other person that cares for you, that loves you?

“Now hang on, I don’t-”

“Now you’re lying to yourself. You’re so damn snug and secure in your neat little box that you’ve forgotten what it’s like to take a chance. I thought you were going to take that chance on me. When you apologized to me a couple of weeks ago, I thought that you had made a decision and that you’d chosen me, but then you all but disappeared.”

“Daniel, I-”

“Not now, Mac. Now it’s time for you to listen. See,
I just ran into Noah at the bar.” He pushes off the doorway and starts walking towards me, stopping to sit on the edge of the arm chair right by the couch. He leans forward, resting his forearms on his legs.

“And he said the funniest thing to me. He threw his arm around my shoulder and said that congratulations were in order. At first I thought he was just a bit drunk, and maybe he’d got his wires crossed or something. But then he said how he never thought any man would get you to settle down, and how glad he was that it was me who did it.” He still hasn’t taken his eyes off me. I can’t read anything from his expression, and it’s starting to rattle me.