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Michael squeezed Suzie’s arm and then turned to me. His smile turned slow and sensual. “How’s it going, Nora?”
My face heated. The last time I had seen him, we had engaged in a quick and dirty—superdirty, actually—bout of car sex after a quick run. Which I hadnottold Suzie. But I was going to do that today, when she was in a good mood from someone rubbing her feet.
“Good,” I choked out. I cleared my throat and tried to sound like I wasn’t thinking about what he looked like naked. Because I totally was. My own private porno screening right here in my brain. “We won’t be gone long. Two hours, tops.”
“No rush. Take your time.”
He said it like he meant it and it occurred to me that one of the reasons I liked him was because he was so good to Suzie. Which, not for nothing, was also why I liked Sam. The men in Suzie’s life didn’t suck. She was lucky that way.
There was only one beauty salon in Hart’s Ridge, but thankfully it was a good one. Bella’s was owned by Annabella Blainswright, daughter of the richest man in town, and as such it rivaled anything we could have found in Asheville or even Charleston. Bella had agreed to close the shop for an hour and a half to allow Suzie a private experience so that there would be fewer people to pass on germs to the new baby—and we kept the windows open.
While Suzie enjoyed an all-the-frills pedicure, I cuddled Andy close, breathing in his baby smell. Heaven. When he fussed and squirmed, I walked him back and forth in front of his mama, bouncing him in my arms.
“You want one,” Suzie said softly.
I didn’t pause in my bouncing. “So much it hurts.”
It was the truth, but not one I often spoke on. No one wanted to hear it; it was all too pathetic. Infertility garnered sympathy, but I didn’t have that issue, that I knew of—although now that my ovaries were fuckinggeriatric, it might be a different story.
No, all I had to blame were my own stupid choices.
I rested my cheek on Andy’s downy head.This could have been mine. Well, not this exact baby, since Andy was a genetic mashup of Suzie and Sam, but I could have had one of my own. Maybe that’s why I had been so drawn to Suzie when I first moved here. Suzie had everything I had always wanted. A husband who loved her, a close-knit family, a life she hadchosen. I didn’t have any of that, so instead I lived vicariously through my friends.
“It’s not too late for you,” Suzie said. “Lots of women have babies at your age.”
“It’s not too lateyet,” I agreed. “Buttoo lateis getting closer and closer.” I drew in a deep breath. “I’m going to try. On my own. I’m going to climb Hart Mountain and then I’m going to get inseminated.”
“You’re—what?” Suzie blinked rapidly. “You’re going towhat? What does Hart Mountain have to do with anything?”
I shrugged. “It’s a metaphor or something. A green light from the universe that I’m ready for this.”
Suzie looked mystified. “Isn’t the fact that you want to have a baby enough of a sign that you’re ready?”
“I just want to climb the mountain first, okay?” I knew I sounded defensive and that the whole thing was weird and maybe a little crazy, but to me? It made sense.
“Okay. You go do that, then.” Suzie was always supportive, even when she thought I was nuts. “Anyway, Michael will make sure you get there and back again in one piece.”
Michael. Right. I still hadn’t told her I was sleeping with her brother. I needed to rectify that. Now. I cleared my throat. “Listen, Suzie—”
“But what if you meet someone?” she interrupted. “What if you get inseminated next month, you’re pregnant, and then you fall in love?”
“I don’t…I don’t think I want that. Love, I mean. Or that kind of relationship.” It was hard for me to talk about my failed marriage. Hard to put into words the lived trauma of it all. The end had been mercifully quick. The divorce itself? Yeah, that was easy to talk about. Grant had left me for his girlfriend. Everyone understoodthat.
But before that had been twelve years of something I didn’t have words for. When I looked back, all I saw was darkness and confusion. The discovery that Grant was cheating should have been the worst day of my life, but instead it had been such a goddamn relief. Signing the divorce papers had been like stepping into the sunshine after a decade of winter.
I couldn’t go through that again. I wouldn’t survive it. Not the divorce—that had been easy. I couldn’t survivemarriage.
Suzie stared at me, uncomprehending. “You don’t want love? Everyone wants love.”
I gave her a withering look. “Who am I going to fall in love with, Suzie? I’ve met probably every single man between the ages of twenty-nine and forty-nine in Hart’s Ridge, and I just don’t see love happening.” Andy snuggled into my throat and I smiled. “I want a baby. If I wait to fall in love and get married, I might lose my chance.”
“I get that, I do.” Suzie made a sympathetic noise. “But you never know who you’ll hit it off with. A friend of a friend. A friend’s brother. Who knows? Don’t rule it out, is all I’m saying. Seriously, Nora, I want you to be happy. You should get everything you want.”
I shook my head. “You don’t have to get everything you want to be happy, Suzie. I want kids, absolutely I do. And I’m going to do everything I can to make that happen for me. But if it doesn’t—if I never get to be a mom—well, okay, then. That would suck, but that doesn’t mean I would be sad forever. There are lots of paths to happiness, and my life is pretty damn great.”
Suzie seemed satisfied with that. She flashed a strange, smug little smile at me and then settled more deeply into her chair and gave a contented sigh. “This is perfect. Thanks for getting me out of the house. I’m actually starting to feel human again instead of like a milk machine.”
The technician left off massaging Suzie’s right foot and started in on her left. Andy picked that moment to make unhappy noises and started rooting around my chest. I laughed, knowing what that meant. Suzie agreed.
