2 Weeks 'Til Eve (2 'Til Series Book 3) (22 page)

The Best Gift

Tuesday, December 12
^th

“I can’t wait ‘til Christmas vacation starts.” Cara
paced boot prints into some unadulterated snow next to the driveway.

“Neither can I,” Catherine seconded.

“Gramma Lizzy and Pop-Pop said that we can go out and
do Christmas things all day long then.”

“Did they?”

“And just plain winter stuff too. Like sledding and
making snowmen and even building a snow castle.”

“Whoa, that’s a lot of stuff.”

“That’s what I’m saying!” Cara exclaimed, but then her
face fell into a thoughtful pose. “How long will Gramma Lizzy and Pop-Pop be
here?”

“Until after the baby comes.”

“And when is the baby coming?”

“The nineteenth.”

Cara continued to babble on about her plans for her
time off and Catherine let her mind wander, shocked when the bus rumbled to a
stop and the doors squeaked open, yanking her back to the present.

“Bye, Cat! Have a gr-r-reat day!”

“You have a gr-r-reat day too, sweetheart!” She watched
Cara climb the tall steps and head down the aisle, the top of her head bobbing
in the windows. Like always, she waved until the bus receded into the distance
before turning to head back toward the house, but the sound of a whining motor
behind her had her spinning around again just in time to see a car careening
into the driveway, almost taking out the mailbox with the side-view mirror.

“So what are you up to today?” Tara asked out her car
window, the words hitting the air in a puff of steam. The mannerism was so
elementary—so saw-you-outside-and-had-to-pull-in-and-say-hi.

Is this what I have to look forward to?
Catherine
cringed, not thrilled at the prospect. Just as she wasn’t thrilled about
sharing her true plans. The last thing she needed was for Tara to know she had
an OB appointment today and then follow her there, or show up in the waiting room,
or heaven forbid the exam room while she had her feet in the stirrups and her
hoo-ha hanging out. “I don’t know, probably trying to finish my Christmas
shopping.”

“Yeah, I wonder, what do you get for the friend who
has everything?”

“You want to exchange gifts?” she blurted.

“Are you going to tell me you
didn’t
get me a
gift?”

“But we never exchange gifts.” Bewildered. Maybe Tara
assumed her show of kindness in handing over Cara’s letter to Santa deserved
something more than a thank-you text, which was as far as Catherine had gone.

“Then what was that one on my doorstep last night?”
Tara demanded.

“If you had something on your doorstep it wasn’t from
me. And I’d be careful opening any kind of package that just shows up. Even if
it
is
Christmastime,” Catherine cautioned, completely serious.

“Not even if it’s a someone?”

“Excuse me?”

“So you had
nothing
to do with it?” A
challenge.

Catherine returned a blank stare.

“Jason.
Jason
was on my doorstep. And he wanted
to know about the baby.
Our
baby.
His
baby. What did you do,
Cat?”

Her stomach churned, or maybe it was Eve moving around
in empathetic squirming discomfort for her. “I—I didn’t do anything.” She
wanted to mime zipping her teeth, buttoning her lips, locking them, and
throwing away the key—the full gambit for really big secrets when she was a
kid. Because she certainly hadn’t said a word to Jason. Drew, yes. And Fynn
too—
Fynn! Oh my God!

“Obviously Jason didn’t just come up with the story on
his own,” Tara asserted.

“Well…” Catherine turned her head, suddenly distracted
by the passing clouds overhead. It wasn’t good to throw your husband under the
bus. It wasn’t like you could do that and collect the insurance money
afterward.

“Of course it was you.”

“By proxy,” she admitted lowly, not sharing anything
more about the actual culprit. “But you’re the one who told me you were having
a baby. I only just found out the truth myself. And, on a good note, isn’t he
relieved that you aren’t?” Like that solved any problems.

“Relieved to find out that he drove several hundred
miles to see his ex-girlfriend only to find that she lied about being pregnant
to scare him into talking to her?”

“But that’s not true.”

“But it sure the hell’s the way Jason’s looking at
it.”

“Oh.”

“That’s all you have to say?
Oh?
” Tara
unlatched her seatbelt and opened her car door, leaving the engine running, and,
judging from the way it started moving, still in gear.

They both watched the car roll forward in slow motion,
until the driveway curved and thankfully the hardened curb of snow from Fynn’s
last plowing stopped it altogether. Tara turned to her, gesturing at it like
that was her fault too.

“You had no right to butt in to my life!” she charged.

“Like you haven’t butted in to mine?” Righteous now.

“I’m trying to
live
my life.”

“Moving here? Into my town? Showing up at my house? At
the mall? Everywhere I go… In case you don’t get it, that’s
hyperactive
butting in.”

“I wasn’t planning to move here,” Tara growled.

“You were driving a U-Haul packed with your stuff,
Tara.”

“I wasn’t coming to you.”

“But you said—”

“I was moving to Illinois.”

Catherine’s mouth could have fit a village inside it.

“Jason asked me to move in with him.” Now it was
Tara’s turn to look elsewhere, scuffing her boot on a rock poking up out of the
snow, frozen in place.

“
You?
But I thought you weren’t ‘compatible’.”

“I didn’t go, did I?” Point proven. “He wants the
house and the wife and the kids and I—”

“Freaked out?”

“I took the first exit I could find and ended up
here.”

“Did you tell him?”

“Sort of,” Tara eked out.

“Don’t tell me you broke up with him through a text.”

“I just said I needed space.”

“And that space is a house,” Catherine clarified,
saying it slowly for effect.

Tara sighed, head down.

“You bought a house because you were scared that he wanted
you guys to get a house together.” Shaking her head at the shame of it.

“I panicked.”

“Most panicked people take up residence on a friend’s
couch, or if things are really bad, in a white Ford Bronco on the highway.”

“You wouldn’t let me use your couch,” she mewled.  

Catherine rolled her eyes that Tara would blame her for
her fling with Coldwell Banker that produced a house baby. And how did she buy
one so fast anyway? Houses were supposed to take time. With waiting periods,
like gun purchases, just to make sure people were fit.
 

“I still don’t get it, though, you never told me it
had gotten that serious with Jason,” Catherine insisted.

“You were busy.”

“Not too busy for something like that.” And as in
that,
she meant normal and well-adjusted life living that she supported
wholeheartedly.

“Yeah right,” Tara pffted, denying her. “You wouldn’t
return a phone call or a text or anything.”

Catherine ignored the charge. “So this space you need,
does it have room for other men in it?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know how I feel. I haven’t had
sex in a while and I don’t think straight without regular orgasms.”

“Come on, Tara. Sex is just sex and love is… well,
love
.”

“And never the twain shall meet?” Tara snorted.

“I didn’t say that.”

“But if the sex is bad then love can’t work.”

“So the sex with Jason is—”

“O-mazing! He has a fucking PhD in ME.”

“Then what’s the problem?”

“Being with him makes it hard to breathe. I feel all
weak and squirrelly in my stomach. Honestly, he makes me sick. Just the sight
of him.”

“Mmmm-hmmm,” Catherine nodded knowingly, a glimmer of
a smirk on her face.

“What?” Tara demanded. “You look so smug I could slap
you.”

“You love him,” she said simply, shrugging. “You. Love.
Him…. You do.”

Tara shook her head uncertainly. “I can’t be in love.
I’ve never been—I mean, it was all just a gag to bother you… the whole hooking
up with Fynn’s best man thing. Just a harmless little wedding gag.”

“But you’ve been seeing each other ever since.”

“Yeah, ‘seeing’ each other. And even that, only sparingly.
It was a nothing. Like having a vacation house I used occasionally and then
back to my life again. It wasn’t supposed to be anything more. I mean, I never
expected—”

“I guess life is real, not ideal,” Catherine said,
trying on her mother’s famous phrase for whatever bit you in the ass. “So if
the truth fits, you might as well wear it.”

“What does that even mean?” Tara asked helplessly.

“Talk to him.”

“I can’t. He thinks I’m crazy—”

Join the club.

“—But he’s the one who pushed too hard, forcing me to
choose him or New York,” she accused.

“So you picked Nekoyah. Or was it ‘C’—none of the
above,” Catherine jabbed.

Her friend gave her the hairy eyeball.

“Just
talk
to him,” she urged again.

“I don’t even know where he is. He could be back in
Illinois by now. And maybe it’s better that way,” Tara said hopefully. “There
are plenty of dicks in the land of opportunity.”

Catherine rolled her eyes again.

“Besides, this—
here—
isn’t even about Jason.” She
gestured at the space between them.

“What do you mean?”

“I didn’t come here because of Jason. When I turned
away from Illinois I could have gone a million places. Better places. More fun
places. But I came here, because of us.”

“Us?” Catherine laid her gloved hand on her chest like
she was faint of heart.

“I’m not a lesbian, Cat,” Tara groaned. “I just missed—”

“Aw, you missed me.” Catherine bumped out her lower
lip.

“When you left, you took everyone with you.”

“I came out here all alone!”  

“You were the center though. You were the nucleus of
my whole life.
Everything
was attached to you. You left and so Georgia
stopped coming to the city,” Tara explained.

“You and Georgia don’t even like each other half the
time.”

“And I lost even that half. And it wasn’t like Lacey was
calling to get together like we all did before you got married.”

“You hardly know Lacey.” Bewildered.

“And Fynn has you all to himself all the time, tied up
tight as Mrs. Trager. And Cara and I are pals, but I never get to see her
anymore either.”

“Tara, I didn’t realize,” Catherine breathed, her eyes
tearing up. “I mean, we never even went out that much back in New York. You
always had so much other stuff going on with people I didn’t know. You had a
whole separate life. I thought I was just some square you sometimes hung
around.”

“Seriously, Cat, after all we’ve been through you
thought I had more fun hanging with anyone else?” Eyes wide with disbelief. “And
as for squares, I love them. My favorite shape.”

“I’m sorry, Tara. I didn’t know.”

“Yeah, you’re
kind of
self-absorbed. But at
least I finally got my apology,” she added smugly.

Catherine grimaced and wiped at her eyes with the back
of her hand.

“You know, if you really think about it, you’re the
cause of all of this. If you hadn’t abandoned me I wouldn’t have used Jason to
dull my pain.”

“Oh please,” Catherine sputtered.

“I’m serious, now he’s like a monkey on my back that I
can’t shake.”

“It isn’t a drug addiction, Tara. It’s
love.
”

“Where are my parents?” Catherine asked, standing in
the doorway to the kitchen in her stocking feet, the rest of her winter attire
still on her body, face flushed with the cold, nose sniffling from her trek to
the bus and back. She could have asked Tara for a ride down to the house, but
she didn’t want her mother inviting Tara in for some French toast. Even though she
and Tara had reached a new level of understanding, there still needed to be
some boundaries.

“Is something wrong? Is it time?” Fynn asked, hopeful.
Every burp or hiccup or sigh had him on high alert now, watching and waiting
for his part in the birth, which was merely to drive her to the hospital. Unfair,
really, that all he had to do was sit back and wait and
drive,
something
they had both been doing for two decades, while she had to figure out how to force
an entire human being out of herself.

“Everything is fine, Fynn, I just want to know where
my parents are.”

“They went off to shower and get ready for the day.”

“Together?” she shuddered, not wanting to think of
them that way.

“I didn’t bother asking.” Breezy, like the idea was
anything but gross.

She focused her laser sights on him as she unbuttoned
her coat, the one she’d had to buy several sizes large in order to accommodate
her and Eve. The one she would kill herself if she continued to fit next
winter. “You called him.”

Fynn looked confused.

“Jason.” A pointed word. “Even though you said you
wouldn’t, you called him.”

“I am nothing if not my wife’s humble servant,” he
bowed.

“And now he thinks that she lied to him.”

“Wait a second… you’re mad at me?” Pitched disbelief.

“I told you she wasn’t pregnant, Fynn.”

“You
just
told me. God, Catherine, it was last
night. He was already here.”

Her face was an “O” of shock. “You knew he was here and
didn’t tell me? How could you—”

“Because you would have been on the phone warning Tara
the moment I stepped out of the room.”

True. But still. “I’m your wife, Fynn. No secrets.
Total trust.”

“I trusted that you couldn’t keep your mouth shut.”

“You let her get blindsided.”

“She’s been speaking in riddles and driving you crazy,
so what’s the problem? Let them deal with it.”

“She’s my friend, Fynn.”

“You’ve called her a lot of things recently, and I
don’t think friend was one of them.”

“I was mad at her, but—”

“It’s still chicks before dicks, right?” he said
sourly.

“No. But it turns out that what’s going on is a lot
deeper than I thought. She was really getting serious with Jason.”

“I know.”

“How the hell do you know?”

“I talked to him, remember?”

“I thought you didn’t talk about ‘feelings’.”

“We talked about the missing person report he almost
filed.” A grim statement.

“Missing person?”

“As in Tara. When she didn’t show up at his place. And
didn’t call. And didn’t answer her phone.”

“Oh.” Soundly put in her place.

“He was worried. And then he was pissed. And then he
was worried again.”

“And now pissed, I get it. A whole lot of
feelings.
”

“Just let them figure it out. Seriously, Catherine,
don’t get involved.”

“All I did was tell her to talk to him.” Hands up to
show she had no weapons, not even a spoon to stir the pot.

“Good.”

“So he’s still in town, then?” she searched.

Fynn’s lips held a firm line.

“Good morning, my daughter,” William Hemmings boomed
from beyond the room, a warning alarm in case sensitive information was being
discussed. He’d been asleep when she left with Cara, Elizabeth Hemmings
allowing her husband that much in his retirement, to let each day wake up
first.

“Morning, Dad,” she said brightly, accepting the hug
that he brought with him into the kitchen.

“How’s Cara this fine day?”

“Already off to school and bubbling over with
excitement that vacation is almost here.”

“Ah, Christmas break. My favorite time of year,”
William said.

“She has you and mom lined up for all sorts of fun
things.”

“I’m going to need a vacation from this vacation,
that’s for sure. Makes me feel young while she’s around, and then the next day
I feel every bit of my age and then some.”

“You’re a young grandfather, Dad.”

“Tell that to these bones,” he chuckled.

“I can put a kibosh on the activities,” she offered.

“Nope. We have important things to do. She wants me to
go hunting for hedgehogs.”

“What?” Catherine blurted.

“She’s pretty sure they live around here somewhere.”

“Hedgehogs?” Catherine turned to Fynn, figuring this
must be his doing, telling tall tales. Or maybe there really were such things
roaming the streets of Nekoyah. Other than Sonic, whom Lyle had introduced her
to when she and Fynn babysat their nephews, she’d never seen one. And the
cartoon version was hardly helpful in this case.

Fynn shrugged. “Things could be worse, she could be
out smoking and drinking. I think hunting is preferable to other hobbies she
could take up.”

“You two can have each other.” She waved dismissively
at her father and husband. “I have appointments to keep.”

“What did we do?” William Hemmings asked, all
innocence.

She rolled her eyes. “Mom and I are going out. So we’re
leaving you two to your own devices.”

“I think we can manage,” Fynn said.

“Of course you can. Oh, and we won’t be back for
lunch.”

“Time to hit that diner again.” Her father rubbed his
belly.

Catherine gave Fynn a look that said
please, not
the diner,
hoping he understood, but at the same time figuring there was no
way that he did. He didn’t get the subtleties of her precarious relationship
with Mel.