Someone to Watch Over Me (34 page)

“I’m sorry I freaked out. I lost it.”

“Do you want to abort this pregnancy?”

“What?” I gaped. He couldn’t be serious. My
hand went immediately to my abdomen, though what I housed was only
a zygote that looked something like a lychee fruit about now.

“It’s not something I want, but it’s your
body. You have a choice.”

“No. No, I don’t.”

Every muscle in Tate’s body loosened. His
eyes fell closed. Lifting his hands, his scrubbed his face from his
eyes to his shadowed jaw. “Oh God, thank you. Christ All Mighty, I
can breathe again.”

Since I didn’t want his mind wandering to
dark and hopeless again, I decided I’d better talk. Setting my
laptop down, I threw my leg over his hip and straddled his waist.
“I couldn’t abort the child of someone I hate, Tate. How could I
abort the child of someone I love?”

“You’re not taking it very well.”

“It’s not just the pregnancy, Tate. Do I
need to remind you that my ex is trying to kill me. My car was just
totaled. I was fired from my job. Your friends don’t like me. I
just found out the few people I trusted took me on as a pity case.
And perhaps, just perhaps, I’m waiting for you to figure out I’m
more trouble than I’m worth?”

“I love you. That negates everything
else.”

“Do you see what I mean?” I raised my hands
in exasperation. He still didn’t get it. Confusion clouded his
eyes. I was going to have to spell it out for him.

“No.”

“You’re too good to be true. It’s as if
God’s playing a cruel trick on me. I’m just waiting for the punch
line.”

“I’m a person, Coop. Just like you.”

“You’re not just any person.” Demurely, my
gaze dropped, where I traced small circles across his chest with
the tip of my finger. “To me, you’re amazing.”

Tate awarded me with a winning smile and
guided my head down until our lips met. The kiss was
sweet-tempered, tender. “I love you, Cooper.”

“I love you too.”

Rolling so that I was beneath him, Tate
worked his hand beneath the hem of my boxers. He cupped my ass and
lifted so that I could feel his erection as he rolled his hips. A
soft moan rumbled in the back of my throat. I pivoted my hips,
responding to his appeal. Hastily, we shed our clothes, aware that
we had only a short time before Levy finished his breakfast.

Just before Tate entered me, he hesitated,
the satiny head of his cock poised between my slick folds. “I’m not
going to get anymore pregnant than I already am, Tate.” He nodded,
smiling sheepishly. Thrusting in, his grin faded, his expression
growing solemn, dreamy.

“Holy fuckin’ shit.”

Yeah, that’s what I said. It came out
something like ‘Mmph.”

Pulling his bottom lip between his teeth,
his hips began to piston, those eight packs of his rippling beneath
his flesh. “Reach on down there between those legs, strawberry
girl. Stroke yourself for me. Quickly. Now. I’m not sure how
long…oh fuck…you’re so damn warm…and wet. I can feel everything
without those damn gloves on. Every. Fucking. Thing.”

Lifting my fingers, I pushed them into
Tate’s mouth. He swept his tongue over them, wetting them. A moan
rolled up my throat over the sensation. Warm. Wet. Indeed. Quickly,
I pulled them from between his lips and slipped between my thighs,
using the moisture from his mouth to slip easily back and
forth.

Tate’s gaze dropped to my hand. He swore
again and pinched his eyes shut. His hips stilled, though he was
buried deep inside me. Watching his lips move with whatever
distraction he began mentally reciting, I pressed on, my fingers
slipping back and forth, up and down, in feverish little circles. I
felt wicked and wanton.

Before long, my thighs gripped his waist,
pulling him toward me, deeper, demanding. On cue, Tate withdrew and
thrust forward, bringing me to peak. Again, he stilled, reveling in
the spasms, the sensation unhampered by the usual contraceptives.
When they finally died down, his hips began to piston again until
the breath exploded from his lungs and he pinned his hips to me
with one deep thrust. A small moan escaped him with every frenetic
pulse.

Dropping beside me, Tate rolled me into his
arms. His hand skimmed over my side and rested on my abdomen, just
below my belly button. His chin rested over my shoulder as we lay
back to front and cheek to cheek. I steeped in the silence,
welcoming the reprieve from insanity.

“Now that you’re calm, can we discuss what
just happened?”

“Must we? I really don’t want to ruin this
with talk of Carter’s damn phone.”

“I could give a shit about Carter’s phone. I
meant with Mini Cooper. Did you see his face when I yelled at him?
Damn, that was traumatizing. I don’t think I can do it again.”

“I told you parenting isn’t all shits and
giggles.”

“I’m realizing that. So how ‘bout we come to
an agreement. You handle him if he’s bad, sick, needs to be bathed
or changed and I’ll handle the rest.”

“I don’t think that leaves much else.”

“Perfect.”

Chapter
18

“W
atching Carter
square up his new toy for yet another photograph, I grimaced. The
thing was a monstrosity that looked closer to a tablet than a
phone. I knew because ninety-nine percent of the time, he had the
device pointed toward me. It was penance for throwing his old phone
under the bus tire. I was half-tempted to douse it with my ice
water. One clumsy grasp, an accidental tip of my glass and I could
render the thing completely nonfunctional.

“Smile for me one more time, guys.”

Tate pressed his cheek against mine and
smiled. For him, I flashed my pearly whites and complied. Smirking,
Carter pressed the shutter. The flash went off, temporarily
blinding me. By the night’s end, I was going to have permanent
floaters in my field of vision.

“How many does that make now,” Tate asked,
“three…four…sixty-six?” Lifting his glass, he took another swig of
beer. We had stopped at some newfangled rock bar to stretch our
legs and grab some dinner. After New York, we had hit New Hampshire
and then headed back down toward Boston, where we spent the week
before heading west to Buffalo and Pittsburg. We were now in
Columbus Ohio in that lull between press interviews and sound
checks.

Anyhow, during that week in Boston, Carter
took the time to purchase a new cell phone. He was still toying
with the thing, or rather toying with me. I seemed to be the sole
focus of his amusement.

“Test shots,” Carter explained, reviewing
the image. “I have to figure out all the bells and whistles. Since
someone dropped my other phone and broke it.” His fingers swiped
over the screen, a hint of glee in his eye as he glanced up at me.
“Thanks for that by the way. This new one’s
so
much
better.”

Perhaps I should’ve thrown Carter under the
bus tires instead of the phone.

“This thing’s state of the art.” Turning the
steroidal phone around, Carter offered us a peek. “Good huh?”

Actually, it was a freakin masterpiece. The
composition and lighting were flawless. My eyes were blue, not red.
He even removed the freckle under my right eye. “I’m
impressed.”

“I know it’s great, isn’t it? Watch this.”
Another tap of the screen and the image came to life. Good lord, he
made a slide show, with music and everything. “I can post this,
right?”

My God, the guy had a one track mind. There
were images of me, me, me, Levy and me, me again, Tate and me, oh,
and me. I must’ve made a face, because Carter went on defense.

“What? I asked first!”

“But they’re all of me!” I exclaimed. “Why
don’t you take pictures of the guys? You could post pictures of
them getting a cough test and they wouldn’t care.”

“I’ve been taking pictures of them for ten
years, Coop. How many more do we need of Shane playing the drums or
Jake on keyboard? I need fresh subject matter. Besides, you owe me
after going all ‘
I’ll get you my pretty, and your little cell
phone too!
’”

“Cooper.”

Oh, there it was…the name. Tate was using
both syllables. They were ganging up on me. This was two against
one. Where was the justice? “What?”

“There’s nothing in those pictures that he
doesn’t already know.”

He.

Grant.

I hadn’t given a conscious thought to why I
was reluctant to post the images. Lying low was ingrained after two
years of harassment and innumerable threats on my life. But Grant
already knew about Levy, and the whole world knew that Tate and I
had eloped to Vegas.

So what was I actually hiding?

“Ok. Fine.” I dropped my napkin on my lap,
where I had been wringing it anxiously around my fingers.

“Coop,” Carter apologized, backpedaling, “If
you don’t want me to…”

“No, he’s right. Go ahead and post ‘em.” I
guess Grant couldn’t want to murder me more than he already did. It
was a particularly atrocious philosophy and the fact that I
contemplated and drew that conclusion was disturbing. I felt like
Grant was dragging me down the path of insanity with him, and even
should I survive when all was said and done, I would never be whole
again.

“…on,” Tate said, sliding from the booth.
Expectantly, he held out his hand. Too embarrassed to confess that
I wasn’t paying attention, I took his hand and let him help me from
the booth. So I was completely caught off guard when he stopped
between the next set of tables and swung me into his arms. With his
right hand, he lifted mine to shoulder height, his left slid around
my waist, keeping me snug against his chest.

“What are you doing?” I asked dumbly.

“I think that’s fairly obvious.” Slowly, he
began revolving us in a small circle, in rhythm to the girl singing
terribly out of tune on the karaoke machine. “Living in the moment,
Coop.”

A smile spreading across my face, I rested
my chin against his chest. “You’re just full of surprises.”
Wonderful surprises.

“I can’t disclose all my secrets at once. I
have to ration them out slowly so that you don’t lose interest in
me. Grow bored. Leave me.”

“I don’t think that’s possible.”

“Because I’m amazing?”

“Because we skipped right to the milestones
in life and missed all the tiny details in between. I still have
much to learn about you.”

“There’s not much to tell. You know all my
idiosyncrasies.”

“Like eating beef jerky even though it gives
you noxious gas?”

“It tastes good.”

“I don’t know when your birthday is. When
did you start singing? What your first or worst job was. Where your
happy place is—”

“That one’s easy,” he interjected with a
lascivious grin.

“Pervert.”

“It’s true. It’s my favorite place in the
whole wide world.”

“Only because you haven’t fucked my mouth
yet.” I smiled widely, half embarrassed, half in triumph at the
shifting expression on Tate’s face as he processed my response.

“Grease,” he said, changing the subject. “It
was the first time I sang. I was in a high school musical in my
sophomore year.”

“Did I catch you up short? I did, didn’t
I?”

Tate placed his foot just past mine and
dipped me back. This also put me in a position to feel his erection
against my hip. “Moving on,” he explained, pressing a kiss to my
lips as he lifted me back up, “before I’m tempted to drag you into
that rather seedy bathroom in the back.”

“Preciate that. Whom did you play?”

“Lead, of course. Danny Zuko. You?”

“Lead, of course. Sandy Olsson.”

Trying not to laugh when Tate’s face
scrunched up, I watched him shrill out the first few lines for the
closing song. “
I got thrills. They’re multiplying. And I’m
losing control. 'Cause the power, you're supplying. It's
electrifying!
”

“I’m impressed. You still remember the
lyrics.”

“Every one of them. All the moves too.”

Teasingly, I pressed my fingers to my lips
with mock incredulity. “Nooo! You can remember back that far?”

“Coop…” Tate drawled, his tone thick with
warning, “Don’t make me show you up in front of everyone here.”

“Is that a challenge?”

“You keep knocking my age…”

“It was—what—ten years ago?”

Rolling his eyes, Tate looked away.
“Something like that.”

“Oh my God, it was
more
than ten,
wasn’t it?” How old was he now, twenty-eight…twenty-nine? Quickly,
I did the math in my head. “That was
fourteen
years
ago!”

“Thirteen. I’m not twenty-nine yet.”

“You can’t possibly remember all the
moves.”

“Trust me, I remember. The whole thing was
horrendous. It’s burned into my memory. Grease. Gah. I’d sooner
sing Celine Dion.”

“Then why did you do it?”

“Belinda Cummings played lead. She had great
tits.”

“Oh? Did it pan out for you?”

Tate grinned crookedly in answer.

“Was she your first?”

“Do you really want to know the answer to
that?”

“What do I care? I was nine and playing with
Barbie dolls.” I bit my lip to hide my smile. “I hadn’t even hit
puberty and you were already having sex.”

“Cooper. Jesus.” Tate rubbed his eyes,
chasing the thought away. “Please don’t put images like that in my
head.”

“So, was she?”

“Yes.”

“Was it good?”

“We were kids. It didn’t take much back
then.” Shooting me a look of warning, he said, “And don’t you dare
say anything. I’ve more than made up for our first time
together.”

“I wasn’t going to.”

“What else do you want to know, the weirdest
place or position? Do you want to know how many I’ve slept with or
if I’ve slept with any celebrities?”

“God, no, I don’t want to know your whole
history. I don’t have all day.”

“Funny.”

“Seriously, though, just the first. The
first is different. It’s somewhat bittersweet, I suppose. Were you
in love with her?”