Jake Undone(107)

We heard the doorbell ring and let Skylar’s mother answer it while I touched up her makeup. From the top of the staircase, I could see that Mitch was standing there next to Jake, who had A.J. on his chest in the Baby Bjorn.

Mitch looked extremely handsome in a black suit, his unruly brown hair sculpted to perfection. He had matured a lot since the pictures I had seen of him when I first met Skylar and now had a decent amount of chin hair. He was turning into a man.

When Skylar walked down the stairs, the look on Mitch’s face showed a love that had been bottled up, finally set free. If there was any doubt about his true feelings for her, it was wiped away in that moment when I looked at his bright blue eyes upon seeing her.

“Skylar…I…” He was speechless.

In typical Skylar fashion, she broke the ice. “Yeah, yeah…you look hot, too. Let’s get out of here.”

After stopping to take pictures, Mitch and Skylar walked toward the waiting white Hummer limousine that would be headed to pick some of their friends.

Jake stopped Mitch before he got in. “Hey, Bitch. Don’t forget what I said.”

Mitch looked back at Jake and smiled. “Alright, man.”

I wondered what that was all about, as I walked over to the other side of the limo to give Skylar a final hug goodbye.

“Thank you, Sissy,” she said and I couldn’t help letting the teardrop that formed in my eye loose.

“I love you,” I said, now fully engulfed in tears.

Jake, A.J. and I stood in the middle of the empty suburban street as the sun was starting to set, watching the limo until it was completely out of sight.

I turned to Jake. “What did you say to Mitch anyway?”

“I told him not to waste time with bullshit…to tell her exactly how he feels. Did you know that dude started to tear up when he was talking to me about how he feared she wouldn’t even be alive when his prom came around, let alone be able to go with him? He has some deep-rooted feelings for her, and it’s just stupid to hold them in, you know?”

“Wow.”

He looked at me. “I know how scary it can be to love someone that strongly, but you can’t live in fear.”

I loved him so much.

Ask me to marry you now. I swear, I’ll say yes.

“And I also gave him some condoms,” Jake said.

“You did what?”

“Come on, don’t be naïve. It might not happen, but he damn well better cover it up if it does.”

“I suppose you’re right, especially with the way he was looking at her. I had a talk with her too.” I kissed A.J. on the head as he sat quietly in Jake’s arms in the carrier and said in a baby voice, “We know all about the surprises that unprotected sex can bring.”

“Speaking of unprotected sex…I plan to have a lot of it tonight,” he whispered in my ear.

I couldn’t wait to get to our room either. “Let’s get going then.”





CHAPTER 31





When we arrived at our hotel in the city, Jake had surprised me with a two-bedroom suite, so that we could have some privacy when the baby was asleep. It must have cost him a fortune. The front desk clerk handed us two key cards. “This one is for you, and you can give this one to your wife,” she said.

Jake stared right through me when he took them and corrected her. “My girlfriend. Thanks.”

Ouch.

We hadn’t said anything to each other on our way up to the room. Normally, whenever we were in an elevator, Jake would start cracking jokes about our first experience together in one. But tonight, he didn’t say a word. Something was upsetting him.

The suite was small but nice, decorated in cozy warm colors. It had a smaller bedroom off of the main room and a kitchenette. The hotel had set up a crib in the second bedroom for A.J.

I had to feed him before putting him down, so I warmed a small jar of pureed carrots in the microwave.

“Let me do that,” Jake said curtly, grabbing the carrots. “Go take a shower.”

He seemed tense.

“Okay.”

As the water beat down on me, I kept thinking about how his mood seemed to have dampened compared to earlier in the day and how the word “girlfriend” had rolled off of his tongue with disdain down in the lobby. I hoped that tonight I could undo some of the damage my actions had caused these past couple of months.

When I exited the bathroom, the steam poured into the bedroom as I held the small towel tightly over my chest, barely able to wrap it around me. My breasts were full, needing to be emptied since A.J. was overdue for his nighttime feeding.

Jake had finished giving him the carrots and had laid a now sleeping A.J. back down in the car seat carrier, so I’d have to wake him up at some point to nurse before putting him in the crib.