Two in Winter (3 page)

“Yeah, well, that ship has sailed. Back to spending my Friday evenings with Lucky and the Doctor, cultivating a few Rose Tyler fantasies.”

“I never imagined we’d be like this in our thirties, Bub.” Erica sighed. “Alone. Me a single mom. You a divorcé. It’s not how we planned things to go, is it?”

“Well, you do live next door, so we got that part right.” He grinned. “And Nossie is awesome.”

“Les I am.” The cherub on the floor smiled at him.

“Les you are.” Erica scooped her daughter into her arms for a kiss.

Chapter 4

Getty lay on her back, feet in the stirrups, the paper hospital gown crinkling around her. Her tests had all been normal, careful ultrasounds of her ovaries had shown she was approaching ovulation. They’d decided on intra-uterine insemination, a process that would inject the donor’s sperm through a catheter, directly into her uterus, from there to hopefully fertilize an egg and get her pregnant.

She shook with nerves. She hadn’t seen the doctor who was on the schedule this morning, didn’t know him. She felt vulnerable, something that was not like her. Give her a conference room full of corporate buyers and she was confident, self-assured. But lying here, wrapped in paper, waiting for a stranger to impregnate her, all that confidence disappeared.

“Gerd Gymirsdottir?” A sharp knock on the door behind her as it opened. She looked back over her shoulder and her face flooded in horror.

Dr. Freyr was Dr. Eric Freyr, the brown-haired, blue-eyed sex-on-a-stick she’d danced with just three weeks before. A nurse trailed in behind him.

“I told you a nickname was necessary for survival.” If it was possible, she blushed even more as she said it.

“Getty?” His voice was incredulous. “What on earth are you doing here?”

She swallowed. “I’m sure any information you need is in my chart.”

“Yeah. I’m sure it is.” He nearly spit the words out as he shut the door. The nurse gave him a questioning look. “Forgive me. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were a patient here. Would you like me to ask one of the other docs on rotation today to do your insemination?” Blue eyes met hers, full of questions. She didn’t owe him any answers.

She shook her head. “No, you can do it.” She turned to the nurse. “Dr. Freyr and I are acquainted socially.” She wasn’t embarrassed. She wanted a baby. She didn’t have—or want, she reminded herself—a man in her life. This was how single women got pregnant without sex. He of all people should understand that.

He sat on the stool, brought the paperwork over. She was vaguely aware he was sitting between her legs as he handed her the pen and the chart.

“This signature line is for your consent to the IUI procedure. The one below is your acknowledgment that we are using anonymous donor sperm.” His voice was cold and professional, but her response to it wasn’t. It brought back memories of the dance floor and she felt her breasts harden under the hospital gown, her nipples tingling.

She quickly signed the forms and handed them back. She lay back down as the nurse prepared the catheter and Eric—Dr. Freyr—put on the gloves. Some twisted little imp in her brain wanted to tell him to leave them off and she stifled a giggle. Hysterics. She was on the edge of hysterics. She closed her eyes tightly and counted to three, trying to quiet her nerves.

“Getty, I’m going to insert the speculum now, it will be easier if you relax.” She looked down to where his face was framed between her knees, and she let out the breath she didn’t realize she was holding. His expression had softened. He gave her a half smile as he held up the metal instrument.

She took another deep breath and looked back at the ceiling, trying not to think about what he was doing, though the feel of his sleeves brushing her thighs and his gloved hands on her skin broke through the little barrier she’d tried to throw up in her brain.

“And the catheter—this might feel odd, almost like a pinching feeling as it goes through the cervix.” He warned.

She winced. It didn’t hurt, but here she lay, her legs spread, his hands inside her, and it was the most coldly clinical moment of her life. Certainly not how she’d ever imagined conceiving a baby. She swallowed against the tide of emotions rolling over her as she felt first the catheter, then the speculum being removed. Eric freed her feet from the stirrups, gently lowering them.

“Just lay here and relax for a bit, okay?” His voice was quiet and soothing. “You did great. I’m going to ask to have a couple of minutes of office time added to your visit today—you won’t be charged for it—I’d like to talk to you.”

“I really don’t think that’s necessary, Dr. Freyr.” She kept her voice cold. Who did he think he was to want to “talk” to her about her life decisions? He was just a guy she danced with, a guy she let kiss her in a moment of weakness. He wasn’t even
her
doctor.

“Getty…”

“No.” She closed her eyes.

“Fine. Just stay here and relax for a few minutes before you leave, okay? There’s no hard proof that it helps, but it certainly can’t hurt. Two weeks from today, if you haven’t started menstruating, you should take a pregnancy test. If it’s positive, call us and we’ll get you in same-day for a blood draw.”

She nodded, eyes still closed, heart pounding in her chest.

“Getty.” Something in his voice, something warm and melty, made her open her eyes, turn to look at him.

“Good luck.” He smiled one shining, beautiful smile before he disappeared through the door, his nurse trailing after him.

Chapter 5

“Skip, did you know Getty was a patient here when you hit on Stacey?” Eric cornered his friend in the break room.

Skip’s face got weird, evasive. “No,” he said finally, looking at Eric.

“Are you sure? You didn’t recognize her?”

“Dude, look at her chart. Look at the date on her new patient paperwork. She came in for the first time the week after I met Stace—who doesn’t know about this by the way, if that’s your next question.”

“I see you did the ultrasound four days ago, you must have recognized her.”

“Yes.”

“And you didn’t think to mention?”

“Eric … I love you like a brother. You and Erica and Odie have been my best friends since college. But I feel weird talking about a patient like this.” Skip shrugged and walked away.

Eric buried his hands in his hair—shaking. His gut kept clenching at the shock he’d felt when he walked into that room and saw her lying on the table. A jolt of attraction had sliced through him, followed by all those questions—questions he knew damn well he had no right to ask. A very small, very primitive part of him had wanted to tell her he could think of a preferable way to get her pregnant.

Right, like he could have said one of the million things that popped into his mind with a nurse in the room? No way. Even thinking them, he was ashamed of himself. He had spent the last weeks thinking about Getty almost non-stop, but she was the last person on earth he wanted to see in his clinic.

The gut-curling, cock-hardening, oh hell, just once, just-let-me-get-her-out-of-my-system kind of lust that raced through him when he thought about her showed no sign of abating. She was his own private temptation incarnate, and she was now irrevocably off limits.

To say he didn’t sleep that night would be an understatement. He tried, God knows he tried. He tossed and turned in his great big empty bed, in his sterile, empty house, torn between hoping Getty’s insemination worked so he’d never see her again, and hoping it didn’t so he’d have an excuse to see her again.

And the more he thought about Getty and insemination and babies and pregnancy, the more confused he got. Not to mention the raging hard-on he’d been sporting seemingly non-stop since the night he’d danced with her. That’s what he got for missing his date with Dr. Who: an inappropriate obsession with an unattainable woman.

And now he had the entirely inappropriate knowledge of how smooth the skin on her inner thighs was, how perfect and pink her pussy was, that she was blonde
everywhere.
As if he needed those sights and smells to collide with his memory of one sweet strawberry-lip-gloss-scented kiss in a dark dance club. He groaned into his pillow, reaching for his dick and a hurried, fantasy-driven release as his only hope for sleep.

* * * *

The next morning he stalked into the break room, desperate for a cup of coffee. He heard Skip’s voice on the phone and he scowled as he tried not to eavesdrop. Easier said than done once he realized Skip was talking to Stacey.

“No baby, I mean it. I’m cooking supper tonight. Yeah. I’ll see you then. Yeah, you too.” Skip flipped his phone closed and walked over to the coffee pot.

“Hey. Listen, Skip, I’m sorry about yesterday.”

“Just don’t… Look. Getty’s friends don’t know. I really like Stacey, and it’s hard enough dating her and knowing this great big secret about one of her best friends. Please don’t make it more complicated.”

“I know. I’m sorry. I was wrong to put you in that position. I’m sorry. But if you see her…”

“Dude. You missed your chance. You blew it with this one. I’m sorry.” Skip patted his shoulder awkwardly as he walked around him.

“Skip, please.” Eric looked at his shoes, then back up at his friend. “Just tell her … I’m not judging her. If she needs someone to talk to about all this, I … I could be that guy.”

“Yeah. Okay.” Skip nodded.

Chapter 6

Getty sat in her office with Anna’s latest sketches in front of her. She jotted down a few notes and remarks about them. Anna would be showing at the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York, and Getty would have to sell the collection. From the sketches, she could tell it was going to be a good, solid ready-to-wear collection. But it was missing a certain spark, something that would have people talking about it after the show. This kind of oversight could kill a competent designer. Competent wasn’t enough. She needed to be brilliant. She made a note to let the atelier staff know Anna would be coming by to get started in the next week, and she scribbled a note to Anna.

A—looks great, but … where’s the hook? Something’s missing. Keep me posted.-G

With a final glance over her email inbox, Getty switched off the computer. She looked down at her watch, startled to see it was already seven p.m. She’d promised Stacey she’d meet her for dinner tonight. She’d just started her period and would rather just go home and read a book and eat chocolate and in general be sad about the outcome—or lack thereof—of her first artificial insemination. But, a promise was a promise, and Stacey didn’t know anything about her plans for becoming a mom. With a groan of exhaustion, she reached for her phone.

After letting Stacey know she’d be there soon, she pulled her hair into a ponytail and stepped out into the icy winter air.

The walk from her office to Stacey’s apartment wasn’t long, so a few moments later, she looked into Skip’s face with surprise as he swung open the door.

“Hey, Getty, nice to see you again.” He dropped a kiss on her cheek. “How are you?”

“I’m fine, Skip.” She gave a barely perceptible shake of her head. “And you?”

“Oh, you know, young and wild and free.” He amped up the drama in his voice, but his face said something else. A glimmer of empathy.

“How’s… How’s your friend?” She moved past him into the kitchen, dropping her jacket on the back of a chair. She kissed Stacey’s cheek and reached into the fridge for a bottle of chilled white wine. As she pulled out the cork, Skip fetched the glasses.

“Eric is fine,” he finally answered.

“You guys, I’m gonna be, ten, fifteen more minutes at least with supper. Why don’t you two go get comfy and catch up?” Stacey practically pushed them out of the kitchen. “For real, go.” She shooed them out.

Getty followed Eric into the living room, sitting down on the recliner while he sat on the sofa, elbows on his knees.

“Getty, I’m sorry, you know, that it didn’t…”

“It’s okay, I knew the chances going in.” She smiled at Skip.

“Hey, Eric wanted me to tell you…” Skip paused, grinding the heel of his hand into his forehead. “Look. He knows what a head trip this trying to get pregnant thing can be. His wife, she left him after a few years of treatments. He just wanted me to tell you that if you need someone to talk to, he can be that guy.”

“Thanks, Skip, but I’m really doing this on my own, you know. And I’m okay with that.” She sighed, sipping her glass of wine. She wished she didn’t know that about Eric’s wife. Wished even more she didn’t know Eric had been married. Wished she didn’t know he existed at all.

“He’s a good guy, Getty,” Skip insisted. “And he likes you. Why’d you blow him off that night?”

“You even need to ask? I can’t have a relationship with what’s going on in my life right now. I just can’t. And Eric Freyr is the kind of guy … who makes me want what I can’t have.”

“Why can’t you? Is this a business thing? Protecting assets? ’Cause I can guarantee, Eric is not the kind to prey upon a woman for money. Besides, he’s got plenty of his own.”

“No, it’s not a business asset thing. It’s not about that. It’s about what I went to your clinic to do. I don’t have room for a man in my life right now.”

“That’s fair, I suppose. But Getty…”

“Skip, just tell him no, okay?”

Skip sighed, then nodded. “Okay.”

Chapter 7

Eric was reading a chart as he walked toward his office when he nearly bumped into a woman coming out of the rest room.

“I’m sorry,” he mumbled, not looking up. But then the smell of strawberry lip-gloss hit his nostrils and his head shot up. “Getty?”

“Hi, Dr. Freyr.” Her eyes grew wide. “Excuse me, I have an ultrasound now.”

“Hey…” He reached for her hand, catching her elbow instead. “I was thinking, I can take myself out of rotation on days you’re here.”

“Why would you do that?” Her breath caught.

“Because I want…” He pinched the skin between his eyebrows. “I just want to get to know you, Getty. And this, my job, it makes that impossible. I really like you.”

“But what about what I want, Eric?” A ghost of a smile tilted up the corners of her mouth. His eyes fell to her lips, and he remembered the sweet taste of her, the noises she’d made and the way her hands had run through his hair. If he’d known that was the only taste he’d ever get, he would have dragged that kiss out for eternity.