A “just because” present.
It made the romantic girl inside her sigh and melt.
Smiling deep within, she went to leave… and the petite bitch blocked her path.
“You really think he’s into you?” the woman said, her words a sneer. “Fat and pregnant isn’t a turn-on, you know.”
Far from being hurt, Sarah was furious. “What the hell is your problem?” she snapped.
Jerking back, the other woman clenched her jaw. “He would’ve married me if you hadn’t trapped him the first time around,” she hissed. “No wonder he was driven to drugs.”
“I’d worry about your own drug use,” Sarah said, no longer feeling like being polite. “A collapsed nose isn’t particularly attractive. You should talk to your surgeon about that.”
Leaving the other woman spluttering… and surreptitiously touching her surgically perfect knife blade of a nose, Sarah pushed out the door and made her way to the balcony. Her cheeks felt hot, as did her body.
“Sarah.” Abe’s voice from behind her the instant after she stepped outside. “I was looking for you.”
Breathing in, then out, Sarah was expecting his hand on her hip. Abe had a way of touching her when they were out, branding his claim on her. She liked it. “I just met the nastiest woman,” she said to him. “Petite, black, about five two, tight curls in a bouncy cut, razored cheekbones.”
When Abe looked blank, Sarah wanted to smile in smug satisfaction. Yes, she wasn’t feeling the least bit polite or nice right now. “She said you would’ve married her if I hadn’t come into the picture.”
Abe snorted. “Then she’s high. I wasn’t ready to marry anyone—then boom, I got hit by the Sarah-hammer and that was it.” Scowling, he looked over her head as if searching for the bitchy woman. “She upset you?”
Sarah had no hesitation in answering. “Nope. I was furious, not upset.” She was just touching his chest in a calming gesture when she spotted warm brown eyes and a wide smile heading in her direction. “Molly!”
“Hey.” The other woman drew her into a hug. “I was hoping you’d still be here. We got held up by a breakdown that caused gridlock.”
Fox was already bumping fists with Abe, and pretty soon, Noah and Kit were there, with Thea and David arriving soon afterward. The entire Schoolboy Choir family.
Her family.
Then Lola arrived, Abe having finagled an invitation for Sarah’s best friend and her current plus one, and things turned even more wonderful.
Despite what she’d said to Abe in the limo, Sarah had such a good time that she stayed for far longer than she’d expected. She even danced with Marty, who snuck her away to admire his cuff link collection.
“My husband thinks I’m mad,” he confided to her. “But he still gets me a pair every time he travels. Usually they’re ridiculous, the most chintzy, touristy things—but I adore them.”
Only when her body began to protest did she ask Abe to get them home.
That night, as she lay in bed with him spooning her, she smiled. She’d taken that powder room bitch down a peg and not allowed her to do the same. It had felt good. And frivolous as that incident was in the grand scheme of things, it had reached the fear inside her, as if it was the final piece of a complex puzzle.
Maybe because it had shown her, once and for all, that she wasn’t a hostage to fate, that she had the ability to fight for her happiness. “Abe?”
“Hmm?” Yawning against her, he ran his hand over her belly and up to cup her breast.
Her smile deepened. Fat and pregnant, my ass. She was hot and pregnant, as demonstrated by the rock star in bed with her, one who couldn’t keep his hands off her. “The first time around, with us, I wasn’t confident.”
“You were young.” A pause. “So was I.”
Yes, she thought, he was right. They’d both been so young then, struggling to find their place in the world. She could forgive that young couple, forgive the wounds they’d inflicted. Lifting Abe’s hand, she pressed a kiss to his palm. “Be honest with me,” she whispered in the darkness, confronting a large part of the fear head-on.
“Always. What is it?”
“The drugs—have you felt the need to go back on them?”
Abe blew out a breath. “I’m an addict, Sarah. I always will be.” Another deep breath, another exhale. “That’s the only way sobriety works—if I admit that, if I accept it.” He pressed a kiss to her shoulder. “That demon whispers to me from time to time. You know it; you’ve seen me working out at all kinds of random hours. But no matter what, I’ve never, not once, felt tempted to give in. You know why?”