"Well you look amazing," O'Doul complimented his teammate's daughter. "Don't dance with any boys or your dad will have to fly back from D.C. and knock some heads."
Elsa gave the team captain an eye roll, and a couple of other players laughed.
The loudspeaker crackled and then a representative of the charter company announced the boarding of their flight. As Lauren watched, Mike put a hand on his daughter's head and said, "Be good for Hans."
"Don't blow game five," was her reply, and everyone laughed again.
Smiling, Mike gave his daughter a quick, hard hug, and Lauren's heart skipped a beat. As angry as she was at him, he was a good dad. Watching him with his child made her heart sting. It hadn't been too long ago when they'd whispered together in his bed about having a child of their own.
Ouch.
Spending time within range of him had made it painfully clear to Lauren that she was still upset about the cold way he'd broken things off. She didn't like to think of herself as bitter, but there it was. Seeing him with Elsa helped a little, though. At least he was there for his daughter. Lauren couldn't imagine what the last year of this girl's life had been like. Nobody should bury her mother at age twelve.
Now Elsa waved to her father. Players were moving toward the Jetway now, so Lauren took a couple of steps toward Mike, because his was the last boarding pass she held in her hand.
Elsa's gaze turned in Lauren's direction. The teen gave a little jerk of surprise, and then her eyes narrowed. "What's she doing here?" she demanded. Loudly.
Stunned, Lauren froze right there on the institutional carpeting, the plane ticket in her hand.
Mike's head whipped around, and when he saw Lauren, his eyes widened. "Elsa, Jesus," he scolded. He palmed his daughter's shoulder and turned her toward the door, whispering something in her ear.
Embarrassment crept up Lauren's neck. She fixed her gaze on her shoes. There had been a time when Lauren was good at ignoring any of the stares she received for being the Other Woman. Not that she ever was the other woman, but that's what many people had assumed.
She hadn't cared about the stupid rumors, though. She was too busy being happy. When she and Mike were a couple, they behaved as if there weren't any other people in the world.
There were, though. And some of them were staring at her right now. And the damn plane was boarding.
A large body moved into Lauren's line of sight and she looked up to find Patrick O'Doul watching her with a soft expression. "Can I take that?" he asked.
"What?" she croaked, her cheeks still flaming. He pointed at the boarding pass in her hand, the one reading MICHAEL BEACON on it. "Oh. Yes. Please. Thank you," she stammered.
Doulie slipped the paper from her hand, gave her elbow a quick squeeze, then turned toward his teammate.
Lauren took a deep breath and gathered her wits enough to turn toward the boarding plane, handing over her own pass and then following Leo Trevi and Georgia Worthington down the Jetway. Nobody batted an eye when those two got together. Then again, neither of them had a not-yet-final divorce or a kid at home.
Really, she knew better than to let a grieving child upset her. But April wasn't over yet, and if the team did well the play-offs season could run until the second week of June. It was going to be a long month in close quarters with Mike Beacon.
It had been years since she read Dante's Inferno for a high school literature class, but one of the nine circles of hell had probably been a place where you saw your ex every single day.
On the jet, she took the first empty row of two seats to herself. It was doubtful that anyone would sit beside her, but she put her briefcase onto the empty seat just in case. The jet was a good place to get some work done-and not just for the team.
As soon as the flight took off, Lauren slid a file folder from her briefcase. This was her secret project, and exactly what she needed to get the taste of unhappiness out of her mouth. She held the folder close to her body, even though nobody could read her pages from this distance. But this was her private endeavor, and she sure as hell didn't need any prying eyes on it.
Inside were five profiles of sperm donors. Lauren intended to become a mother next year, without a man's help. No man she knew, anyway.
In the next two weeks, she needed to select one of the donors on her short list and have the surprisingly expensive vials of sperm shipped FedEx to the clinic of the reproductive endocrinologist she'd been seeing in Manhattan.
And truly? Shopping for your baby daddy was a pretty weird experience. Take donor number 87455, on top of the pile. The fertility lab didn't provide a name or a recent photo-those were kept private. But there was a picture of 87455 at age four. He'd been a cute preschooler, with shiny brown hair and a slightly devious smile. Currently twenty-four years old, he was pursuing a graduate degree in chemical engineering. He'd played lacrosse for a division III school. His parents were of English, German and Latvian descent. His hobby was playing the ukulele.
He was 5'11", dark brown hair, 187 pounds. His father had been treated for prostate cancer, but there were no other significant medical issues in the family. Her gaze lingered on that baby picture. A science nerd who liked music-that was appealing.
The process was oddly like reading profiles on a dating site. No matter how cute he'd been as a toddler, donor 87455 was a real, flawed person out in the world somewhere. He might be charming and kind. Then again, he might have an irritating laugh and a mean streak.
Did it matter, though? If she had a baby, it would be the two of them against the world. She squinted down at the smiling boy on the page, imagining what a blend of her genes and his would look like.
She turned the page and read the next profile again. She'd narrowed it down to these five finalists, out of the thousands on the sperm bank's website. Once she made a decision, the winning sperm would be FedExed to her doctor in time for her ovulation date.
Each vial of sperm cost a whopping $600, and the insemination procedure itself would set her back more than a thousand more. Luckily, the Kattenberger corporation had excellent health benefits, including fertility coverage. During the open enrollment period last fall, she'd switched to the Platinum plan specifically with this strategy in mind.
A shadow fell over her page. Lauren slammed the folder shut and glared in the direction of whoever had disturbed her.
Of course her visitor turned out to be Mike Beacon, who didn't seem to take notice of her obvious wish to be left alone. The jerk even lifted up the satchel she'd left guarding the empty seat and tucked it under the chair in front of him, sitting down beside her.
Damn. It. All.
"Hi," he said quietly.
Lauren spread her hand onto the cover of the folder and stared down at her shiny fingernails. If she had a child in a year or so, weekly manicures would have to fall by the wayside. But she was ready for a change.
"Lauren," he said, his voice rough. "I'm so sorry for Elsa's rudeness. I chewed her out, and I'm going to make her apologize to you."
"Don't," she said quickly. "It's nothing."
"Lauren," he whispered.
The sound of her name on his lips scraped her insides raw. And when she lifted her chin to meet his dark eyes, she got a little trapped in the warmth she found there. "What?" she said a little sharply, if only to break the spell.
"It's not nothing. You shouldn't have to take any flak for what happened a long time ago."
"Seriously?" She shouldn't pick a fight with him. That way lay the abyss. But could he really be so clueless?
He blinked, and the light in his eyes dimmed a little. "Yeah. I don't want her making you feel bad."
"Riiiight," Lauren said slowly. "Elsa is a child, and I feel nothing but sympathy for her. Whatever angry thoughts she has, I don't blame her. But you have no idea what other people said, Mike. What they still say."
His rugged brow furrowed. "About what?"
"About me." She knew she should just let this go. But discomfort had churned in her gut for weeks now. "Last night I went into the reception room"-that's where the wives and families wait for the players after the game-"to distribute the comp tickets to game six. Those women still look at me like they smell something rotten."
"Why?"
Why. Jesus. "Because I'm their worst nightmare. The other woman. I'm the evil bitch who nearly wrecked your fairy tale."
Mike's jaw dropped. "What fairy tale? And you were never the other woman."