With Brave Wings (24 page)

"Pardon me?" His brow furrowed. Of course, he did have something to tell her, but how the hell could she know?

"I gave birth to you," she said pointedly. "I know you. Now, spit it out."

Well, all right, then. "Sophie and I are together now." He paused, gauging her reaction, but it was mostly blank. "I plan on asking her to marry me."

She sucked in a breath at that, her hand going to her chest. "Oh, Tennyson."

He didn’t know what the hell that meant.

"Why are you not happy?" Margaret frowned and gave Mom's arm a light whack. "They already have a child together. Don't you live together, too?" She turned to Tennyson.

"Basically." He inclined his head, keeping his mother in his sights. "I have a room at her place, though it's become a second home." He didn’t actually dislike the loft. It was only the outside he could be without, and he hoped with his entire being Sophie would like Mendocino. At least for when they were off work.

It was only a matter of time before they'd need to find a school for Kayden.

"I did see this coming, dear." Mom sighed and looked down. "I'm not upset, and—as you've told me, and you're right—it's none of my business. I'm only worried."

"About
what
?" He didn’t fucking get it. Holidays, birthdays…Sophie tried so damn hard, and she was a total sweetheart. But for some reason, his mother saw another version of Sophie, one who didn’t exist.

"It's her age," Mom confessed, turning to Margaret. "She's only twenty-four. Seventeen years is a big difference."

Possibly, but it was a difference Tennyson had come to like very much. He enjoyed having two vastly different perspectives in their relationship. Two sets of experiences, two views on society…a sex life that was out of this world.

He had a feeling he and Sophie would never become the same person, like many married people did. They had their own lives too, different interests and philosophies. And it was one of the things he loved the most about their relationship. There was always something new.

"I admit I have given Sophie a hard time," Mom went on with regret in her tone. "She's very sweet and compassionate. Motherhood certainly suits her. But that doesn’t mean I can't worry your differences may become too large one day. With an age gap like that…you could grow apart within ten years, and then—"

"I'm not fucking dying, Mom," Tennyson chuckled. "And you know what? I'd rather have ten years with her than a lifetime with someone else."

"Goodness, I think we need more champagne over here," Margaret decided.

Mom sighed and smiled ruefully. "You really, truly love her."

"I really, truly do."

She nodded and gave his hand a squeeze. "Then I'm happy for you. And I promise to apologize to her." That made Tennyson smile, and he chugged back some beer. "I hope you can keep up with her, though. She's an energetic little girl, and you're not getting any younger."

He coughed and spluttered.

*

It was late when Tennyson dragged Noah back to the hotel. The younger man was drunk and talking about how much he missed his girl, which was both funny and frustrating. Because Tennyson was only used to babysitting his son, not his assistant director.

"I've changed, boss." Noah moped as Tennyson helped him into the elevator. "I don’t like that I like it."

"I'm beginning to feel sorry for Emma." The woman certainly had her work cut out for her. Then again, Tennyson was sure she could handle it. The spunky redhead loved sports as much as Noah did, and seeing her at work during filming, he knew she was confident, had thick skin, and was as nice as she was ballsy.

He wouldn’t be surprised if Sophie got along well with her, either. Brooklyn already did.

The elevator was almost on their floor when Noah jumped and started patting his pockets.

"That could be her." He fumbled with his phone and read the message that must've been sent to him, but then his shoulders slumped. "Wasn’t her. Fuckin' Josh again." He scowled blearily at Tennyson. "Y'know, he should take his anger out on you instead—not me. You're the one who swooped in and took Sophie away from him—
not me
."

"What did you just say?" He narrowed his eyes.

"What?" Noah looked as confused as Tennyson felt. Though, Noah's blood probably wasn’t boiling. "You know. You
know
. Josh and Sophie—before… After her birthday dinner."

He clenched his teeth and tried his best not to throw his fist through a mother
fucking
wall, but it wasn’t easy. "They were together?"

Noah's expression paled. "You didn’t know."

Tennyson just glared. Holy fuck, he was raging. "How long—How long were they together?"

"Um, fuck—I don’t know, a few weeks, I think. Yeah." Noah rubbed at his eyes. "I thought you knew, boss. I'm sorry. Josh wasn’t exactly secretive about it. He said they started dating after her dinner, and then they split on your birthday."

Revulsion tore through Tennyson. On his birthday—oh, Jesus Christ. It was the same night he'd slept with her.

Chapter 21

Munich
 

"So it's really okay?" Sophie asked. Daniel was on speaker so she could hear him while giving Kayden a bath in her hotel suite. "You mentioned the placements on my body and everything?"

"It's fine," Daniel assured her. "The studio says as long as you don’t cut your hair—in case they need retakes."

"No plans to cut my hair," Sophie chuckled. "Hey, did you find me a Realtor yet?"

"I did. Right now, I'm hunting for someone who can run the foundation for you. You need a tax attorney and new financial advisor¸ too." Daniel hummed, the sound of keys tapping in the background. "Perhaps I should give Asher a call. How many buildings were you thinking?"

She shrugged and poured baby shampoo in her hand. "No idea. You've told me how much I can spend a year, and I wanna stretch it—but not to the point where the residents are forced to live in shacks."

Her vision was simple: affordable housing in the city for single parents. Sophie would cover half the rent and raise money to expand and be able to help more. She had the right income, and she would never be one of those who just sat on their fortune.

So. Central Living was born. At first, LA had been in the name, but her hope was to do this in other cities, as well.

She couldn’t wait to tell Tennyson.

*

Munich
 

It hurt. It hurt so bad. This one hurt more than the other. God, she was glad she'd left Kayden with Angela.

She gritted her teeth as the tattoo artist finished the last little bird on her shoulder blade. Three of them in total, small silhouettes of them, to represent Tennyson, her, and Kayden. All the metaphors about flying—they'd fly together from now on.

She felt like a moron, being on the verge of tears. She'd given birth, for chrissakes. Maybe it sounded badass to go in for three tattoos at once, but they were all small. The birds on her shoulder blade, an infinity symbol with a feather and the word "Love" on her hip, and soon, a tiny heart on the inside of her ring finger with "Family" written in a cursive font.

"All done," the tattoo artist said when he'd covered the ink in plastic. His friend, who spoke better English, explained they were ready to do the last tattoo now, and Sophie sat up carefully and followed the instructions.

"No light-headedness?" the friend asked. "Some need sugar—they can get dizzy."

She shook her head no and managed a smile. "Just hurt like a son of a bitch."

He chuckled.

"The things we do for love, huh?" She grinned.

She couldn’t wait to show Tennyson.

*

Munich
 

All the way down to the hotel restaurant where the wrap party was being held, Kayden giggled and touched Sophie's new earrings. She was pretty sure he was proud too, since he'd picked them out. Apparently, it made her cool to have Minion earrings.

They didn’t match her cocktail dress, but so what? Sophie was on cloud nine. Nothing could ruin her evening.

Okay, one thing could. A waiter passed with a tray of hors d'oeuvres, and it made her stomach roll. She made a mental note to stay away from those, unless she wanted to run off to the bathroom to throw up her dinner from before.

"Are you not feeling well?" one of the actors asked her.

She lowered Kayden to the floor and nodded, then took a sip of her water. "I'm fine, thank you."

"Hey, have some champagne." He grabbed a glass for her, and she shook her head with a smile. "No?"

"Don't really feel like it—maybe later." In six or seven months, give or take.

She really couldn’t fucking wait to see Tennyson.

*

"See Pup, Mathh?" Kayden asked sleepily.

"Not yet, baby." Sophie carried him toward their gate. "Pup and Max are with Uncle Ash and Maliah, remember? We'll see them in a few weeks." Not that he could grasp the concept of weeks. "You excited to see Daddy?"

He nodded and stuck his thumb into his mouth, his head dropping to her shoulder. Lucy and Angela followed closely behind, and she would've rolled her eyes if she didn’t think they were sweeter than sugar for being protective.

The day after Sophie had gotten her tattoos, she'd woken up nauseated and ran half-asleep and half-panicked to empty her stomach into the toilet. After that, she had asked Angela to buy a pregnancy test, so that was when she'd learned about it. And Lucy had figured it out hours later when Sophie had politely refused coffee with a cheesy grin on her face. But other than them, Tennyson would be the next person to find out.

She was thrilled. This time, she had paid attention to her body's changes. Hell, she'd been obsessed, but she couldn’t help it. She really wanted this.

It would hopefully lighten Tennyson's mood, too. He'd been irritable and too busy to talk lately. Sophie guessed he was swamped with work.

Right before they boarded the plane to London, where they'd middle land and get on the next plane to Cardiff, Brooklyn texted her.

The concealer for your skin tone just arrived. I'm so excited to see you! Counting down the hours.

Holy hell, Sophie was excited, too. A thrill of adrenaline surged through her, which made it easier to push down the exhaustion. The latter could be pregnancy-related, too, she supposed.

It made her wonder how far along she was. Tennyson had visited her once last month in Munich, and then before that…three months ago, after Toronto, before Germany.

*

Kayden was beyond beat when they arrived in Cardiff, so Angela took him to the hotel while Sophie and her assistant drove down to the set.

It was almost October, and fall had arrived in Wales. Leaves were turning orange and red, the air was crisper, and rain clouds filled the sky.

"They closed down an entire grocery store?" Lucy asked as they parked.

"Yeah, for two days, I think." Sophie got out of the car and checked her phone. Brooklyn's crew would be working on her soon, mainly dyeing her hair and double-checking color samples for makeup. And she had to request a second physical too, since she was pregnant, but there was time to say hi to Tennyson first.

Unfortunately, she wouldn’t get to see him much tonight because she was having dinner with Judah, the male lead. Considering she was playing his sister in the upcoming weeks and they'd barely even spoken, they needed to get to know each other a little better.

They passed two trailers outside the entrance, and Noah was there, so they didn’t have to worry about clearance from security.

"You've been missed, babe." Noah hugged her tightly.

"Ditto—so much." She squeezed him back and smiled hugely. "I'm looking forward to meeting your Emma. How about we have dinner tomorrow, you, me, Emma, and Tennyson?"

He ended the hug and cleared his throat, appearing uncomfortable for some reason. "Yeah, uh… I mean, yeah." His gaze darted a bit. "Count me and Emma in, but you should probably talk to the boss first."

Oh, joy. "So he's testy with everybody, I take it?" Poor man. And he complained Sophie worked too much? Clearly, Tennyson fell into that category, too.

"Heh." Noah chuckled and rubbed the back of his neck. "Sure. Uh, so, we're taking a quick break now if you wanna talk to him. He's inside. Just follow the masses."

He was so strange. He'd dealt with Tennyson's temper at work before. Why this was different, she had no idea, but she decided to drop it and seek out her man. Lucy went for some coffee, and Sophie entered the grocery store and located Tennyson in a lit-up cereal aisle.

There was camera equipment everywhere, a handful of people milling around, and Tennyson was speaking to Judah and one of Brooklyn's girls.

Sophie waited. She nodded in hello to a few she recognized before they walked off for their break.

"I want it in your actions, too," Tennyson was telling Judah. "The look in your eyes is perfect for when you lean in. I could sense how close Rory was to losing control." He spoke of Judah's character. "I want to see more of that in your posture, how you move. When you circle your hands around her throat, we want to see all the contradictions. Touch her gently, but look murderous. Be whisper-soft, but sinister."

"I get it." Judah nodded and looked down, pensive. "Should I press up against her, too? Do I look around for fear that others will see me, or am I too focused on my victim?"

Tennyson rubbed his jaw, thinking. "No body contact. You hate these women. The only one you want to be affectionate with and close to is your sister. But you
are
very focused on them. You can flick your gaze a couple times, but once you get into the girl's private space, all you see is your next mission."

Judah nodded again, and they wrapped it up.

Sophie grinned as Tennyson turned around and spotted her, but to her confusion, his features tightened. There was no smile, no nothing.

A thought occurred to her, and it made her queasy: did he not want them to go public yet?

"Hi," she said, approaching warily. "Um, are we keeping us a secret?" It made no sense, and it saddened her if that was the case. But she'd respect it—in case he wasn’t ready.

She'd missed him so fucking much. Not jumping into his arms was all but impossible.

"No," he replied slowly, grabbing what looked like a call sheet from on top of the monitor. "You must have me confused with Josh, the man you actually do keep as a secret."

"What?" she asked softly. She didn’t like this abrupt distance between them at all. It threw her off-kilter.

"Are you going to pretend you don’t know what I'm talking about?" He looked up from the call sheet and grinned at her. "That doesn’t seem like you at all. Technically, you haven't done anything wrong; you were free to fuck whoever you—"

She gasped at that. "Excuse me?" Her mind spun so fast it nearly made her dizzy. It was too much, going from being over the moon with happiness. She was pregnant, for God's sake. She wanted to tell him, hug him, she'd missed him beyond words, she wanted them to spend a month in bed to catch up, she needed his strength… And then this.
Fuck
whoever—whoever she wanted, or what he'd intended to say. And Josh's name had been mentioned.

"Noah told me." Tennyson inclined his head and pulled out his phone. "He thought I knew already—that it was common knowledge."

"What is common knowledge and could someone shed some light on this for
me
?" Now she was getting angry. He was ruining her buzz.

Josh. Fuck. Josh. Fuck whomever… Noah told him. Josh…

"Oh my God." She covered her mouth with her hand, nauseated. "Oh, Tennyson. Oh, no, no. Please don’t think I'd go behind your back." Tears welled up in an instant as memories she'd honestly put behind her resurfaced. "I'd never betray you." She took a step closer, her stomach twisting painfully when he went rigid and took a step back. "Tennyson, you have to believe me. I haven't thought about—" She stopped herself.

She hadn't thought about Josh. Practically since he'd been a dick to her. She'd shut him out, and so much had happened right after. She'd gotten caught up in her dream—a dream that had come true. Finally being on the same page with Tennyson, and then the filming…

She sniffled and averted her eyes, discreetly wiping at her cheek. There were still a few people working near the cameras, and she didn’t want an audience.

"Can we talk about this in private?"

"When I get time," he answered tightly. "I have work now, and you have an appointment with Brooklyn."

It was like a slap to the face, but she wasn’t sure by whom. Him or herself. God, she regretted everything now. She felt stupid and desperate. She hadn't seen him in so long, and he was dismissing her just like that.

"I'm sorry," she choked out. "I didn’t know you wanted me. We weren't together, and I swear, Josh and I never—"

"What did I just tell you?" he snapped. "We can talk about this another time."

Sophie flinched and swallowed hard. "O-Okay." She turned and walked away, shaking, and struggled against the countless emotions bubbling up. Confusion—how had things gone so epically wrong so fast? Her brain couldn’t catch up. Fear—she couldn’t lose him. The thought caused more nausea to roll around inside her. Rejection—despite how little time she and Tennyson had actually been a couple, he had never turned her away. Ever. He'd always been there for her. Anger—she was pissed at herself.

Tennyson had said it himself, she hadn't technically done anything wrong, but technicalities could go fuck themselves. If she hadn't been so lost in their new relationship, perhaps she'd have been smart enough to hash it out with him before she'd jumped him.

She should've been up-front. She should have told him.

Right?

Near the exit, she spotted Noah and noticed he was already watching her come closer. He looked uncomfortable and resigned, and she made a beeline for him, needing answers.

She grabbed his arm and dragged him toward an empty part of the store—by the registers.

"Please tell me everything," she rasped out.

"First of all, I'm so fucking sorry, Sophie—"

She shook her head quickly. "You probably have nothing to apologize for whatsoever, but I need answers. What did you tell Tennyson, and, seriously, what is it Josh has told you?"

He stuck his hands into his pockets. "Josh told me you hooked up after your birthday party. Then you had a fight a few weeks later and broke up."

Sophie rolled her eyes and wiped away the tear that rolled down. "Unbelievable. So I'm guessing you told Tennyson I dated Josh for a while."

Noah squinted. "Um. I was drunk. I may have used the word hookup, too. But I thought Tennyson knew. Otherwise, I would've kept my mouth shut, I swear."

"I would've told him if I hadn't forgotten about it." Sophie frowned and looked down. "I guess I sort of shut Josh out of my life when he was an asshole. I don’t know. I just got swept away by work. And Tennyson."

"Did Josh do something, babe?"

Sophie didn’t wanna get into it, nor did she want to play the victim. "He expected more than I could give, and before it got ugly, I slammed the door in his face. We made out
once
." She faced Noah again. "I put a stop to it. End of story."

Noah wasn’t the kind of guy who pressed for details, but before she left, he advised her to just tell Tennyson everything. Considering he believed a lot more than kissing had happened, Sophie agreed. She would definitely tell him—when he saw fit to
summon
her.

Ugh.

She left shortly after that, and Lucy gave her privacy as they headed over to Brooklyn's temporary makeup studio. AKA, one of the trailers in the parking lot.

It was such a relief to see Brooklyn. They hugged for a long time, and though Sophie managed to get her feelings in check and not bawl like a baby, Brooklyn figured out something was wrong. So as Sophie got in a chair and one of Brooklyn's hair stylists got ready with hair dye, Sophie spilled the beans.

She didn’t have all the details yet, so she just told Brooklyn what she knew—exactly what had transpired between her and Josh, how much Tennyson knew, Noah's involvement…

"I wondered about you two," Brooklyn admitted, gently pulling down Sophie's cardigan to uncover the tattoo on her shoulder blade. "You and Josh seemed flirty during your birthday dinner—oh, girl, this is precious. I love the design."

"Thanks." Sophie managed a small smile. "I don’t need the cover anymore. It's all healed, and I spoke to the tattoo artist. As long as I keep it moisturized, there shouldn’t be a problem with the concealer."

"Understood." Brooklyn nodded. "We'll only need to cover it for the scene Judah rips off your shirt, though. Can I see the one on your hip?"

She stood up quickly to show her friend the infinity symbol with the feather and the word "Love." At that point, Brooklyn's assistant returned, and it was time to sit down again.

"Will this one need to be concealed?" Sophie held up her hand and parted her fingers to show the tiny "Family" ink.

Brooklyn hummed. "It'd only take a minute, so we might as well. Just in case." She grabbed the makeup case designated for Sophie and pulled out a small container of concealer. "Shauna, you can get started with her hair. Less shine than Judah but same color." She faced Sophie in the mirror. "When do you have your fitting for the pregnancy?"

Sophie dropped her jaw. "How did you know!"

"What?" Brooklyn's expression clouded with confusion, but then it cleared, and her eyes grew wide. "Get the fuck out! You're pregnant?"

"Well—" She blew out a breath, frustrated. "What the fuck else are we talking about? And what fitting?" If this pregnancy was anything like her first one, she wouldn't be showing for a while.

That was one of the reasons she shouldn’t have been disappointed to test negative the last time. It would've seriously screwed up her filming schedule.