Just Beginning (30 page)

A baby now was right. They could do it. She could fill the hole in her heart with a new little soul, if Gabe was willing. Uneasiness prickled her conscience. He’d been supportive when she hadn’t wanted children. He was happy with their life the way it was. He’d been adamant they couldn’t foster children—would he find the energy and time for their child if she asked? How could she ask?

Jenny’s gaze wandered next door. Steve was a man. He was Gabe’s friend. He might be able to give her valuable insight into Gabe’s reaction to changing her mind. He might know a good way to broach the subject and persuade Gabe.

He was a lawyer; manipulating—Jenny frowned, poor word choice. She didn’t want to manipulate Gabe; she wanted to approach the discussion the best way possible to optimize her chances of a successful outcome. That was better. Getting people to agree with him was Steve’s job. And he was good at it.

Slowly rising, Jenny wiped moist hands down her jeans, slipped her feet into her flip-flops, and crossed through the hedge. She had at least a half an hour before Gabe was due home. Plenty of time for a consultation. She knocked on Steve’s door, and then turned the knob to let herself in.

“Hey, Grant? You home?”

No answer. Jenny padded through the silent house. “Steve?”

He was home; she’d seen him come in about an hour ago. Jenny passed the guest room on the way to the garage, thinking he might be working on his motorcycle, when she abruptly backed up and entered the bedroom. There she found Steve sprawled barefoot, face down across the bed.

His cheeks were flushed with sleep and his features relaxed. He lay with one big hand fisted beneath his chin and one bent leg pulled up toward his chest. Jenny sighed.
Not going to get any answers today
. Turning to leave the room, she jumped at the sound of his sleepy drawl.

“What d’ya want, Jen?” He rolled to the side of the bed, scratched his head, then rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

“I...it can wait,” she fumbled, feeling awkward. “Go back to sleep.”

He glanced at his watch. “Can’t. Got to be at Annie’s in an hour.”

She backed out of the room as he stood. Barefoot, jeans, and wearing a worn navy polo shirt, Steve suddenly seemed intimidating. This was a bad idea, like her mere presence with him in this bedroom was a step over a line she didn’t want to cross.

“Okay. Well...we can catch up later. Have fun tonight,” she tossed over her shoulder as she rushed down the hall to the kitchen.

Steve hurried after her and grabbed her wrist, just long enough to halt her flight and make her face him. “Wait a minute. What’s your hurry?”

“Ah...” Jenny shifted her weight from one leg to another. She folded her arms.

All of a sudden, this feels weird. I know things have been strained between us lately—not exactly sure why, I guess you’re mad I don’t like Annie, but I need a friend. I’ve got a problem and that’s what we do. I whine to you, and you come up with some sage brotherly advice to make me feel better. But this isn’t going to work. Something’s wrong. It doesn’t feel right and I can’t talk to you—not about this. And that makes me so unbelievably sad. I’ve gotta get out of here
.

The words raced through her head in a giant whirlwind, yet she just couldn’t get them out. Jenny ducked her head and batted her eyes against hot tears.

Steve waited patiently, and she wished he’d look at something—anything—besides her. His waiting for an answer made her feel like a particularly ugly bug under a microscope, and it was hard to come up with a credible lie under such intense scrutiny. Finally she couldn’t take it anymore.

“I want a baby,” she blurted.

Well, that was tactful
. Jenny peeked at him, sure he must be as shocked as she by her bald declaration.

Steve leaned back against the counter and crossed his legs at his ankles. Though he controlled his expression, he couldn’t conceal the glint of amusement twinkling in his eyes. “Isn’t that something Gabe should help you with?”

“That’s the problem; I don’t know how to tell him. I’ve never wanted kids. Before we got married, I told him I didn’t want children.”

“And now you do?”

Wincing, Jenny raised her head and nodded. “I know it’s not fair, but I’ve been obsessed with it for months. I tried to talk myself out of it.” She lifted slim shoulders. “But I still want a baby.”

“So have it.” This was her big problem? Wanting children seemed a natural marital progression, not cause for the misery lining Jenny’s face.

“I told him I
didn’t
want kids. It’s not fair to change the rules now.”

“Then don’t.”

“But I
want
a baby.”

“So why’re you telling me?” He tried to temper the impatience in his voice, but seriously, what did she expect him to do about it? “Gabe’s the one you should be talking to.”

“I can’t. He doesn’t want more children.”

“You don’t know that.” Although Steve suspected she was right. His buddy was pretty happy with life the way it was; Gabe probably wouldn’t welcome a change—especially not one of this magnitude. But he might. He adored Jenny, and if it was that important to her, he’d probably be willing to start over again. “Talk to him. Make him understand how important it is to you.”

“I can’t. He’d never understand.”

“Why not?”

She scowled and looked away. “Because he thinks I’m good. I... Oh, forget it, you wouldn’t understand.” She turned away and rushed toward the door.

Oh, no. Not tears
. Jenny never cried. Damn it.

Steve clenched his jaw. Her issue was personal; he didn’t want to get involved. But she was upset. Jenny was his friend, and she’d come to him for help. She didn’t know that her problem was scoring his heart, like dozens of painful paper cuts.

The woman he loved wanted to celebrate her love for another man, her husband and his best friend, by having his baby. She wanted to create a beautiful new life with her husband. It shouldn’t hurt so much, but it did. It felt like somebody smashed his chest with a three-hundred pound sledgehammer and then left it over his heart to crush him. And she had no idea.

Taking a deep breath, Steve forced air into his lungs to push aside his pain and caught Jenny at the door. He wrapped a brotherly arm around her shoulders and redirected her toward the couch in the family room.

“What wouldn’t I understand? I know you’re not perfect, but what’s your big faux pas?”

“You can’t tell anybody. Not another living soul.”

He held up his right hand as if being sworn in. “I swear.”

She studied him carefully, frowning as she sized him up. “When I was fourteen, I got pregnant. Michael’s my adopted brother—and my son.”

“Oh.”

Brilliant response, numbnut.
But Steve seemed incapable of anything more coherent. As faux pas go, that was a pretty good one. Jenny, a teenage mother? At fourteen? She’d always seemed so innocent and unworldly.

“Yeah, ‘oh’.” She rolled her eyes. “I was so naïve. Ridiculously young and stupid. Contrary to popular belief, you
can
get pregnant the first time—even doing it standing up in a lake.”

Steve slowly nodded. “Good to know.”

“Yeah. My mom and I may have had some issues, but it’s
entirely
my fault. She sacrificed...” Jenny pursed her lips and slowly nodded. “She sacrificed a lot for me and Michael. My ‘accident’ screwed up the whole family’s life for three years—at least.

“I mean, they’d always wanted more kids, but not enough to adopt when Mom couldn’t get pregnant after me. So she threw herself into raising me and her career. She was in line for VP of HR at Merrill Lynch, but she gave it up because of me.” She pursed her lips.

“So when I was ten weeks pregnant, Dad got a sudden transfer to San Diego. Mom found renters for our house, and we moved. She homeschooled me and when Michael was born, they adopted him, and voilà, I had a baby brother. It was two more years before Dad could get us transferred back.”

Holy shit. Stuff like that only happened in the movies, not real life. How’d they pulled off a deception like that? “Not even the family knows? Your aunts and uncles?”

Jenny shook her head. “They thought Mom didn’t let anybody know about her pregnancy because she was embarrassed and worried about having a healthy baby at her age—if she could even carry him to term.” Jenny shrugged. “It made sense to them.”

“What about the father?”

“Not in the picture. He and his parents wanted me to have an abortion.”

“That must have been hard.”

She shrugged. “Not really. Made the adoption easy.”

Pregnant at fourteen and abandoned by the asshole boyfriend. Then she had the isolation of being homeschooled in San Diego before moving back. Geeze. “Must’ve been lonely. None of your friends knew?”

“Nope. Not friends, not family.” She hesitated. “I didn’t have any real friends. My situation was hardly conducive to making friends. We moved back to Grosse Pointe the middle of my senior year. Mom and Dad enrolled me in Liggett to finish out my senior year, hoping I’d make some friends and have a fresh start.

“It
was
a relief not having to worry about facing Michael’s birth dad—luckily he’d been older than me and graduated the year before. But making friends when all the other kids had been bonded since pre-school and then everybody was going away to college...” she trailed away. Jenny looked at him and smiled. “It was hard, but it turned out okay.”

Hard was an understatement. Interesting the lengths Jenny’s family went to hide the truth. Children born out of wedlock were hardly unusual anymore. But all the subterfuge was necessary given that her parents adopted Jenny’s baby, he conceded. That was hardly commonplace. No wonder Jen didn’t have a lot of female friends.

“And Gabe doesn’t know?”

“Of course not!” Her eyes widened in alarm. “And you can’t tell him. He wouldn’t understand.” She leaned in, pleading. “I was a kid. It was a mistake. I mean, it
wasn’t
a mistake ’cause Michael’s a wonderful kid, but the pregnancy was a mistake. And abortion was out of the question. But Gabe would
not
understand.”

Steve didn’t know what Gabe would think of the story. Jenny was so sweet and bighearted. She was remarkably innocent for having endured such a life-altering experience. Why hadn’t it made her cynical, bitter, or at least wary of men?

“I’m sure he didn’t think you were a virgin when you married.”

“No, but he wouldn’t think that I’d been a teenage mother who gave my baby up for adoption, either.” She sighed. “For a compassionate guy, and a doctor, Gabe’s surprisingly intolerant of moral transgressions and lies—even lies of omission.”

Steve sighed and sank down on the couch next to her. What a mess.

“It was hard pretending to be Michael’s big sister, at least in the beginning.” She blew out a deep breath. “God, turning him over to my mother in the hospital was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I loved him before he was even born, but it was best for both of us.

“The only way I could deal with it was to convince myself that he
really
was my adopted brother. I never
ever
let myself think of him any other way or I would’ve gone crazy. But I remember what it was like to be pregnant. I remember Michael’s first few days.”

She frowned at him, tears thickening her voice. “I want that again. I can care for a baby now. I have a husband, and we could be a family. I want to be a mom, a real mother this time, but how can I convince Gabe without telling him about Michael?”

Steve hurt for the pain Jenny’d endured, yet was proud of her amazing, selfless love for her child. She’d put her baby’s welfare first, an incredible feat for a teenager—for any woman. Why shouldn’t she share this with Gabe?

Gabe was a good man. He was her husband. He loved Jenny. After hearing her story, Gabe couldn’t help but think she deserved a baby. Besides, Gabe should know something this intimate about his wife. If she were his wife, Steve would want to know.

Steve looked sideways at her and held her teary gaze. “Tell him the truth. He’ll understand.”

“That I’ve been promiscuous and lived a lie for the past fourteen years?” She pursed her lips and shook her head. “I don’t think so.” She sniffled.

“He loves you.”

“He
won’t
understand. Gabe values my innocence and honesty,” she said bitterly. “He’d hate me for not telling him sooner. Wouldn’t you?”

“Me? I...”

I’d take you anyway I could get you
.

Actually, a part of him felt a bit relieved that Jenny wasn’t so damned perfect. It brought her down off that pedestal he and Gabe placed her on. Sure, he’d been shocked at first, but everyone made stupid mistakes as teenagers. Just not everyone had living reminders. And not everyone was strong enough to make it come out right.

“Does Michael know?”

“No.” She shook her head. “I’m not sure he ever will.”

He frowned. “He has a right to know. I’d want to know.”

“Why? It’s not like he’s suffered any. He’s had good parents, and I got to love him and watch him grow up. What’d be the point in telling him?”

“He has a right to know. It’s his heritage. And he might want to look up his biological father one day.”

“There’s nothing to gain and everything to lose. He’d hate us. He’d feel betrayed. Think about it, the three most important people in his life have been keeping a secret of this magnitude from him, lying to him on a daily basis.” She paused and bit her bottom lip. “We’ll probably tell him when he’s older, maybe when he’s married and has a wife to love and support him.

“Maybe then he can understand and sympathize with the situation, and realize that we did what was best for him, and me—for all of us. But it’s not just up to me. My parents have to agree.”

That game plan made sense, too. “It’s really none of my business, Jenny, but you should tell Gabe. He has a right to know, too.”

“I
can’t
. It’s not my secret, it involves my whole family.” She looked at him, pleading for understanding.