For His Pleasure: The Boxed Set, Books 1-6 (For His Pleasure, For His Taking, For His Keeping, For His Honor, For His Trust, For His Forever) (53 page)

Lying in bed was all she wanted to do right now, and Red was letting her do it. He brought her food, stroked her hair, spoke to her softly and held her hand in his own. He told her it would be okay, that she would be okay again at some point. He told her to take her time.

But today she couldn’t take her time anymore, because her mother was visiting the house. It would be her mother’s first time at the mansion and Nicole didn’t know how she would react to it all.

“You’re mother’s at the front gate,” Red said to Nicole as he came in the bedroom.

“Do you want to come down or should I just bring her up?”

“No, no, I’ll get up and come downstairs.” Slowly, Nicole pushed herself into a sitting position.

She needed a shower but wasn’t going to have time right now. Even though she’d known since yesterday that her mom was coming, Nicole still hadn’t been able to get herself moving. She was like a toy robot whose batteries were running down.

Red left the room and Nicole got up, went to the bathroom and washed her face, brushed her teeth, put on deodorant.

Then she changed into some baggy cargo pants and a comfy sweatshirt. She tied her hair back in a ponytail and surveyed herself in the mirror. She looked yellowish, sickly, and you could read the depression in her eyes.

She put on some makeup—nothing fancy—just to give her face some color.

And then Nicole went downstairs to wait for her mother to arrive.

Red was brewing coffee when Nicole entered the kitchen. He looked up at her, his expression hopeful. Nicole knew what that expression meant. She knew he was waiting for the real Nicole to come back to him. This walking, talking ghost—this strange phantom was not the Nicole he’d fallen in love with.

“Want some coffee?” he asked, his voice a little too chipper.

She shook her head and sat down heavily at the breakfast nook.

“Well,” he continued, watching the pot brew, “your mother will probably want a pick-me-up after the drive from Syracuse.”

“Yeah, probably. That’s nice of you.”

He smiled. “Well, I’m kind of awesome so…”

Nicole tried to smile back at him. “You are awesome.” And then she thought what a great father he’d have made to their little Renee and the tears came to her eyes before she could stop them.

“Hey, you okay?” he asked, moving quickly toward her.

She waved him off. “I’m fine. I’m just being silly.”

“No you’re not, Nicole. Don’t say that.” He stood by the counter and looked at her. The concern was written all over his face. “You’ve been through something horrible.

Of course you’re sad.”

She sniffed, taking some tissues out of her pocket and wiping her eyes and nose. “I just feel like enough is enough already.”

“It’s been less than a week,” he said. “Go easy on yourself.”

“I still can’t believe it,” Nicole said, shaking her head. “I was so sure she was going to be ours. I was certain of it.”

“She was ours—she’ll always be ours,” he said, coming over and taking her by the shoulders. Red’s eyes looked into Nicole’s and his voice was firm. “And for the short time she was a part of this world, inside of you, she was loved. We’re never going to forget about our baby girl. Never.”

Nicole hugged him then, because he’d just uttered out loud the very thing she’d promised herself. She hadn’t thought anyone would understand her need to remember such a little thing—a little baby that had barely even existed to the rest of the world. But she did need to remember, and apparently so did Red.

As they were hugging and taking comfort in each other’s arms, there was the loud chime of the doorbell.

“My mother,” Nicole whispered.

“Now just relax and try not to get worked up,” Red cautioned. “You know how she can be.”

“I’ll try.” She smiled an over the top, clownish smile. “See how good I am?”

“Oh, boy.” Red took a deep breath. Then he went to answer the door. Nicole heard them speaking in low tones that echoed to her from the foyer.

A minute later, in strode her mother looking like she’d been shot out of a cannon.

She was always energetic, but it seemed that much more over the top now that Nicole was so depressed.

“Honey,” her mother said, smiling sadly and rushing over for a hug. She had a purse on her arm but also a large plastic bag with something large in it that Nicole couldn’t yet identify.

Red followed behind the older woman. “I’ve made a pot of coffee.”

“Oh, you’re such a dear. That would be lovely,” the older woman told him.

Nicole watched her mother with dull suspicion. Her demeanor was strange—far too friendly to be real—especially towards Red. Hadn’t she hated the man just a week ago?

The older woman took a seat alongside Nicole at the breakfast nook as Red poured her a coffee, as well as one for himself.

“How do you take it?” he asked.

“A dash of cream and one sugar,” her mother said.

Red fixed it up quickly, stirred it and handed the cup to her with an easy grin.

“Hope you like it.”

“I’m sure I’ll like it. Is it some specialty brew?”

“Starbucks French Roast,” he said.

Nicole thought her mother seemed nonplussed, as if she’d been hoping for something more exotic. “I could never afford to have Starbucks every day,” she said, sipping from her mug. “I have to settle for Folgers mostly.”

Red nodded empathetically.

Nicole stared at her hands.

“Honey,” her mother said softly.

Nicole looked up at her. “Yes?”

“You seem depressed.”

“I guess I am depressed.”

Her mother nodded thoughtfully. “I know this is a difficult time. It’s awful what happened. Your father and I were crushed when Red called and told us the news.”

Red walked over to the counter, holding his own cup of coffee and surveying the tense scene unfolding before him with trepidation. “Nicole and I truly appreciated your condolences and the flowers that arrived yesterday,” he said.

Barb nodded to him. “Of course, it was the least we could do.” She brightened visibly and turned to Nicole. “Anyway, I brought something along that should cheer you up.”

Nicole looked on doubtfully as her mother opened the plastic bag and took out swatches of different colored cloths with different designs on each.

“What’s that?” Nicole asked.

“These are some possibilities for your table cloths—for the wedding.” She laid them out on the counter. “I particularly like this pattern.” She pointed to a white tablecloth swatch with gold and blue stripes.

Nicole couldn’t even focus on it. She felt a complete and total sense of disinterest in what her mother was showing her. “I…I guess it’s nice,” she murmured.

“Do you? Do you really like it?”

“It’s okay. Yeah.”

“Just okay?”

“Mom, I don’t really know how I feel about the tablecloth designs. I can’t focus on this stuff right now.”

Her mother was growing frustrated and her happy-go-lucky façade appeared to be crumbling. “Now’s the exact right time to focus on these sorts of things. You need to get your mind off all of this depression and into something healthy.”

“I’m just not interested.”

“Fine. Fine.” She grabbed the swatches and swept them all into the plastic bag.

“I’m going to leave this bag here for you, and you can let me know when you’ve had a chance to look at it. How’s that sound?”

“That sounds fine, Mom.”

Her mother sucked in her cheeks and subtly shook her head.

Red sighed deeply, as if sensing what was coming. “You know what? I haven’t even given you the tour, Misses Masters.”

Nicole’s mother looked at him and flashed a smile. “You know better than to call me that. My name is Barb.”

“Barb, would you like the tour?”

“That would be wonderful. I can’t believe how much land you have at your disposal, by the way. When I was driving in, I thought I’d somehow been transported to another country. It’s so beautiful here.”

“Thanks,” Red said, taking her by the arm and leading her out of the kitchen.

“Nicole?” her mom asked, looking back over her shoulder. “Are you coming?”

“No, I think I’ll just hang here until you two get back.”

Nicole saw the look of annoyance mixed with worry that flashed over the older woman’s face as Red escorted her out of the kitchen.

Nicole knew he was doing this “tour” primarily to give her a break from her mom, and she was grateful to him for that kindness. But she couldn’t even smile a little—not even when she thought about how amazing Red was and how safe she felt with him lately.

Nothing could shake her from this desultory state.

About twenty-five minutes later, Red and her mother returned to the kitchen. They seemed to be getting along famously. Her mother was blushing and laughing like a teenage girl, and Red was chuckling right with her.

“And they let you say that on television?” her mother asked, in response to some story that Nicole hadn’t been privy to.

Red nodded and grinned. “They let me say it because we paid them enough to let me say it. But I didn’t do it just to be controversial, I did it because I believed it was important.”

Her mother nodded. “I think you did the right thing, Red.”

“Apparently the network agreed with you, because they asked me back the following year.”

The two of them walked back to the breakfast nook, where Nicole was still sitting, having barely moved a muscle since they’d left the room.

Her mother turned her attention to Nicole now. “The house is so lovely, honey,”

she said.

“Thanks, Mom. I really like it.”

“Are you going to make it your own after the wedding?”

Nicole thought about it, shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s pretty nice the way it is.”

“But it’s still his house—it’s not representative of your tastes, honey. Don’t you agree, Red?”

Red nodded ever so slightly. “Yes, I suppose it’s mostly mine. But then again, I just had a designer come in and set everything up, so in a way it’s not really my taste either.”

“I’d love to come and help both of you redecorate after the wedding,” Nicole’s mother said, her eyes practically lighting up.

“We’ll see, Mom. Let’s just take things a step at a time.”

Her mother sighed. “I’m really trying my best with you, Nicole. What more can I do?”

“I didn’t say you were doing anything wrong.”

“Then what is it?”

Red leaned over the counter and gave Nicole’s hand a squeeze. “I think Nicole’s just tired and sad, Barb.”

“I understand that this was a disappointment,” her mother replied. “But it seems a bit much, the way you’re moping about like life as we know it has ended.”

Nicole looked up at her, and for a brief moment she actually had the urge to slap her across the face. It was gone as quickly as the urge had arisen, but the feeling of intense anger left her shaken. “I don’t have to justify my feelings to you,” she said, her voice shaking slightly.

“You know, you’re not the first woman to have gone through something like this.”

The older woman shifted into the seat by her daughter and lowered her voice conspiratorially. “It happened to your father and I, many years ago.”

Nicole looked at her more closely. It seemed that for the first time, she saw how her mother’s face truly looked—not just the way she imagined her to be. And she saw that her mother had gotten old without Nicole really noticing. Her eyes had large, deep bags beneath them, and her chin was fleshy and sagging. The skin on her neck was loose and wrinkled.

Mom, you’re old! She wanted to say. When did this happen to you? When did you become this jaded, old lady with rarely a kind word for anyone—including your only daughter?

But just as the urge to slap her had come and gone, so too did this strange feeling of seeing her mother’s age for the first time.

“You never told me that you had a miscarriage,” Nicole said, finally.

Her mother just nodded, as if proud of the fact that she’d had one and also had the guts to keep the pain of it to herself all these years. “Well, you don’t know everything there is to know about me, honey.”

“I’m aware of that, Mom.”

“We were very disappointed when it happened. But I told myself—I said, Barb, it will happen when it’s meant to happen and not a moment sooner. There’s a plan for you and this just wasn’t your time.”

Nicole raised her eyebrows. “That simple, huh?”

“It wasn’t simple, it was just the truth. There’s no use wringing your hands about it.

Sometimes these things happen.”

“I don’t know,” Nicole said, quietly. She didn’t want to have such a clinical attitude about the death of her unborn baby. She couldn’t have that attitude—it would be like a second death of sorts, to put the baby out of her mind forever. Didn’t that sweet little child deserve to at least have someone remember she had been growing and striving to be born, and that she’d never even had a chance to live? Didn’t she deserve to at least have someone think of her from time to time and love her in spite of it all?

“Trust me, Nicole. I’m a lot older than you and perhaps I’ve learned a thing or two about being a mother.”

Nicole nodded her head and tried to accept her mother’s words at face value, while still allowing herself to feel what she felt. She didn’t want to start feeling guilty about being sad on top of everything else she was going through.

And then Red stepped in. “Barb, I think I can speak for both of us when I tell you that we truly appreciate your wisdom. I respect the fact that you went through your own difficult moment, and you came through it stronger than before.”

“I just did what had to be done. I still got up and went about my life. I had to work full-time, even back then. I went to work and did my job and nobody would have known that I’d been through a miscarriage.”

Red smiled with patient understanding. “At the same time, Nicole is a different person and she’s sad right now. It’s okay with me if she’s sad for as long as she needs to be.”

“I never said she shouldn’t be sad.”

“Okay, then,” Red smiled. “So we all agree. Nicole’s going to take whatever time she needs to recover from this. We’re all sad, and we support Nicole one hundred percent.”