Catching Preeya (Paradise South Book 3) (35 page)

CHAPTER 53

S
he saw the
headlights soar up the front curtains.
Ben.

Then her phone buzzed in the center of the table. Both Gigi and Preeya could see the message.
Gigi’s
here?

Preeya smiled at Gigi. “Have some more ice cream, Geej, and give me a few minutes.”

“No, Pree.” Her best friend slammed her last spoonful of ice cream and slid her chair back at the same time. “I’m gonna go.”

She’d insist Gigi stay to chill with her and Ben, but she and Ben wouldn’t be chilling. They’d be clearing the air. Discussing stuff, a lot of stuff. And without a word of explanation, Gigi already seemed to understand. Her friend kissed Preeya on the cheek, collected up the pages of notes they’d taken, and stuffed them in her purse—a little haphazardly, Preeya thought. “Why the rush, Geej? Relax, you really should slow down a bit, like you tell me to.”

Gigi nodded as she brought her empty bowl and spoon to the sink—fast, faster than Preeya’d seen Gigi move since their twentieth week—then moved to the side kitchen door, blew Preeya a last kiss, and left.

She heard the front door bolt flip. The door opened, then shut a moment later. His sigh—a sigh of relief to be home—met her ears, and her chest rushed with pounding heat and soft flutters. Of all the things she’d wanted to say to him that morning, then more from new realizations she’d been hit with throughout the day, the only thing she died to do was hug him. Hold him. Be held by him.

She dropped the kitchen towel she’d wrung in knots and marched out to meet him.

But he was already heading up the stairs. Away from her.

*

Alone, but not by choice this time, not like earlier in the powder room, she got the old
chest-squeezing
sensation again. Preeya paced and counted and breathed. For what felt like forever. He wasn’t coming back down? His note, and his text, said they’d talk.

What the hell?

Don’t make things bigger than they need to be, Preeya. Remember, he buries things, hates conflict, hates opening
up.

And when he had confided in her about Jamie’s death—in Vallarta—she’d exploded at him. Could she blame him now for the avoidance? He had been hurt by her this morning, and hell, the man fled to the third world for more than a year to process his loss, his pain over Jamie.

Just give him space, Pree. A day and a night. And try not to take it
personally.

Wait, don’t take it
personally?

That’s all it is—personal!

And it had been—she looked at her phone—twenty minutes. She didn’t hear the pipes kicking and creaking, so the shower wasn’t running. Had he…gone to sleep?

That’s it.
She tramped up the stairs, huffing the entire way.

*

At the doorway, she caught her breath.

He’d folded down the comforter for her, a neat triangle, and had placed a fluffed pillow for her head and two long body pillows like she liked along the length of her side of the
king-size
bed.

He lay on his side, snug under the covers, facing away from her. His chest, the blanket, lifted and fell with every deep, soft breath he took.

Officially asleep.

Sweetly asleep
and home
. In their bed. Only after he’d arranged her pillows for her. She could’ve just melted to the floor then and cried.

Pretending to be a single light feather as she crawled beside him, she fell into the
turned-down
bed more like an entire bird—an ostrich, maybe. She froze. He stirred, grunted, and shifted an inch away.

Away?

What is this? And what am I
doing?

She
wanted
him awake. She couldn’t take another second without clearing things up, opening up. She needed his heart and arms open to her now, and holding her through the night. She just couldn’t end the day this way.

She reached over with some effort and gripped Ben’s shoulder.

“Ben,” she whispered. “Ben…please wake up. Talk to me.”

He groaned and rolled over to face her, his golden eyes still mostly hidden behind sleep.

“I get it. I understand. Please, I am so sorry, God…” She sighed and scooted closer to him, then pushed her belly up against the small of his back, took his arm, and draped it over her hip and thigh. He inhaled, his eyes closed, nostrils wide, then he sighed and engaged his arm, pulling her into him tighter.

“I should’ve… I should’ve asked you, discussed it with you, the whole Gigi
godparent
thing. I mean,
of course
I should’ve. But, then again, I had promised her the day I found out I was pregnant… Then, when you and I got back together, it just didn’t come up. We’ve been so busy, I guess.”

She waited…for Ben to respond. It took him a second to open his eyes. He swallowed; she watched his Adam’s apple bob up and down. A beat, still no words. He just looked at her—no, looked through her. Not from drowsiness, it seemed. His eyes were distant,
zoned-out
. Resigned.

“Ben…listen, even though I feel strongly about Gigi being the,
our
baby’s godmother, I know it isn’t solely my decision. It’s
our
baby, our decision, our lives. And I love you,
us
. God, so much, Ben.”

The corners of his lips lifted to form a half smile while his gorgeous golden eyes remained glazed over with a glint of hovering doubt.

Couldn’t he see she was trying here?

And that
us
is a
two-way
street?

“Ben.” Sick of the silence now, her pulse spiked. “You know, while we’re kind of, not really talking here, you really should’ve told me about the night terrors.”

“Gigi,” he grumbled. His stare shifted to the ceiling.

His first word to her—
Gigi
? So her best friend told her about the dreams. Like
he
should have.
What the hell is his deal?
He still held her tight to him, but God, where the hell had he gone? A fortress stood between them.

“Talk to me, Ben. How long have I been…or, rather, what all did I say? In my sleep?”

He sighed while shaking his head then shifted, and kissed her forehead. “Fucking Gigi.”

“Hey!”

“Preeya…you haven’t had one of your… episodes in nearly a week. I didn’t tell you—and yes, maybe I should have—but I decided not to because you were working through it. You
are
working through it. The natural course of things, Pree—and time—heals all. I didn’t understand that when Jamie died. Everyone tiptoed, pretended, skirted topics and conversations and events that might trigger things. I hated it. Fucking despised it. But now I see the purpose. There are stages, Pree, and they need to be respected. Your world was turned upside down with the truth about your mom, then the loss of your sister. Add the start of you and me, the baby. Things this deep can’t be rushed—no shortcuts, Preeya. And as for Gigi—she shouldn’t have told you about the nightmares. I told her in confidence.” He huffed and flared his nostrils, as if ready to punch a wall. He closed his eyes. “That was stupid of me.”

“It is my right to know, though, Ben. It’s my—”

His fingers pressed her lips. “The nightmares were
your
body’s way of working through the trauma. What if I weren’t here during your unconscious
night-fits
, not lying next to you to hear you screaming, your
seven-year
-old self wailing away? No one would be there to tell you, anyway. And if you were ready, you’d have had waking thoughts, not REM episodes. But you weren’t ready. And now they’ve stopped, Pree. Like I said, you’re working through a cluster of shit, and doing it naturally. In
your
time.”

She grimaced, nothing to throw back in her defense.
Fine, but…
“What about this morning? You think I’m too delicate for you to voice your anger about my choice of Gigi as the baby’s godmother?”

“Yes, Preeya, you’re fragile right now. I don’t want to argue while you’re pregnant and
knee-deep
with school, on top of the other shit I mentioned.” He blew out a stream of air, then lowered his voice to a whisper. “Getting you upset, stressed—babe, that’s not okay for you, and it’s potentially harmful to the baby.
Fact.
It’s just fact.”

Preeya had heard every word, let each one sink in, but she couldn’t ignore the airy feeling in her stomach, slightly queasy. “Okay, I get it. You didn’t want to argue this morning. You don’t want to set me off. But our relationship, Ben, it needs to be open and honest. We…we have so much ahead of us…and so much behind us…and just so much going on in our
present
, we can’t dance around things, each other, or…or we’ll lose
us
in the process. I mean, we’re just getting to know each other, really. And, like
I
said…yes, I’m learning to think
us
versus
me
, but I can’t have you treating
me
like…like a child with kid gloves. That’s also not
us
. If you believe in me, then trust I can handle things…life—especially with you by my side.”

“First off, I don’t doubt you, Pree. Physics, biology, the science of the body and birth, those are the variables that concern me. I never doubt
your
strength. I—” He paused there.

“What, Ben? See? This is what I mean. Just tell me.” She huffed. “Let me in, Ben.”

He squeezed his eyes shut. His head shook, holding something back. Keeping something from her…assumedly something that might just
upset
her.

*

“Listen, Pree,” he said, then pinched his nose in thought. A beat, then another, flitted by. “Wait a second.” He scooted his body up to a sitting position but then made sure to help her shift with him. He needed to maintain a physical connection with her for this. He’d gone over it all in his mind, God, for so many hours. He’d been at the office to check his mail then escaped to Gas Works Park across town for the rest of the day. A perfect distraction. Another
people-watching
haven, and the entire scene had helped him to both take his mind off and put his thoughts on his situation. His life. The situation from that morning with Preeya, tiny but enormous at the same time, really had him reeling.

Preeya glared at him, reaching her breaking point, he knew. He brought his hand to her face, sliding a loose strand of her silken black hair behind her ear. “I—”

“Benjamin Trainer, I swear. Here, I’ll start. You can follow my lead on how to talk openly—a new precedent for
us
, I know.” Said with a
not-too
-subtle hint of sarcasm. “I won’t even talk about the godparent thing again…that we can put off for a little while.” She sighed. “How’s this, a light topic. I’m”—her eyes got wide, like she hoped to incite anticipation in Ben, but he had trouble finding the energy, the mood—“going to locate my abandoning mother so that I…”

The rest of Preeya’s words floated off into the room. He could only see her mouth moving, her eyes and head and hands animated, demonstrating her intense enthusiasm. Why couldn’t he hear anything? Not even the usual clanking of the wall heater. Foggy, all sound. His thoughts, too. Until his rage settled in, then the beating of his heart thudded in his forehead. A deafening
thump-thump
-slam.

Her mother?

Goddamn you, Gigi.

Preeya said she understood, the
us
. But no. Too young or too naive or too goddamn selfish. He couldn’t speak. She’d stopped talking now—just a blank stare into his
burning-hot
face.

He rubbed the top of his head. His hair, curls now, felt surreal. Like, not his own hair, not his own skull. He blinked to try and reset, to mend the sudden separation between him and his body. And between all of him…and all of Preeya.

“What, Ben? You’re scaring me…you look ill.”

“You, Preeya, are scaring
me
. This is a
light topic
? You…thinking about your mother, let alone learning about her, finding her—now? Of all times?—is goddamn scary. Dangerous, even! It can only lead to stress. Serious trauma like what you’ve experienced, Pree? I mean, you can’t even talk about it when you’re awake—only in your goddamn sleep. Scratch that; you can only scream and shriek about it in your nightmares. Awful things you’d say without the slightest memory in the morning. Like you were seven again, then you’d jump to now, scared of the things…the things you’d do to the baby. You need a therapist, Pree, not your goddamn vacating coward of a mother.”

He ignored her tears. He just…just couldn’t get logic past her naive bubble, hers or Gigi’s.
Gigi.
“Fucking Gigi!”

“Stop saying that,” Preeya whispered through her sniffles.

“No. She’s selfish,
self-absorbed
, self—”

Preeya covered her ears and shook her head at him. Like a child. “She’s anything but, Ben,” she yelled. “She’s anything but selfish.”

“I told her not to bring her asinine idea up to you. I explained the dangers. I’m not just your fiancé and—
fuck!
—I’m not just this child’s father—that jealous,
passive-aggressive
bitch—I’m an MD for God’s sake. A surgeon. Pediatric, Preeya. And I’ve seen
you
faint twice in the six months I’ve known you. That’s without another human being growing inside you.”

Preeya scoffed.

“Okay, you want me to scare you? Fine. I’ve seen birth defects that would turn your stomach, Preeya. I’ve seen—”

Her hands flew from her ears to his mouth. Her cynical expression had morphed into sheer horror. “Stop, Ben…about the goddamn birth defects. I am a third year.”

Exactly, goddamn it
. Why then was she acting like an ignorant moron?

“Fine…
never mind
the medical aspects since you
know
already. Bottom line—Gigi posed the idea and I said no. Absolutely not now, and not even after the baby. Not with the baby
breast-feeding
, the most dependent on you that he or she will ever be. Communication with—or worse, meeting—your mother could send you into a tailspin, forget standard postpartum depression, Preeya. I mean, God, you’re brilliant…and even Gigi isn’t stupid. But, well, here we are. She went ahead anyway and you bit.”