Never Can Tell (10 page)

She steps backwards into the hall and cranes her neck up the stairs.

“He's putting Darla to bed,” she tells me which makes me smile, just a little. For doing his best to integrate into my screwed up mess of a family, Ty deserves a Purple Heart or some shit.

I groan as I force myself to my feet and slump against the counter. I am exhausted. Last night, I got absolutely zero sleep, and it wasn't Noah's fault. It was Hannah's. Ty tossed and turned and groaned in his sleep, face twisted with pain and guilt. Why did she have to seek him out and tell him that.
Marin's family has gotten desperate. After all these years, they've finally scraped together a reward worthy of conning even the filthiest souls in the city. They know he saw her. They know he saw who she was with. They know; they know; they know. And they're coming.

I snap to with India's hands grabbing me under the arms as I slump to the floor.

“Never!” she screams which is a little overdramatic but understandable. I don't know what happened, but I was blacking out I suppose. Stress. Fatigue. Flying. Dark souled babies. It could happen to anyone.

“I'm okay,” I tell her as heavy footsteps slam down the stairs and Tyson fucking McCabe comes leaping over the banister like a superhero. Or a villain. Either or. He stumbles into the bathroom, nearly tripping over the laces he never ties. His shaking hands grab my face on either side as he unintentionally crowding my sister out in his worry.

“What happened?” he asks me, completely and utterly serious, terrified even. I look into his eyes and I can see how much I mean to him. It brings tears to my own and sends India scurrying away without another word.

“Stop looking at me like that,” I tell him, trying to push him away. Ty refuses to let go.

“Never, I heard India scream bloody murder. Something happened. I'm not letting go until you tell me what.” I grab onto his wrists and look up, down, around, anywhere but as his face. I'm not going to cry again. I am sick and fucking tired of sobbing like a whiny baby. Almost a year to the day we stood in this same house with this same problem. I survived it then, and I'm in a better place now. Why is this still so hard? Why am I still making stupid decisions and thinking stupid thoughts and acting like a goddamn bitch? Oh, that's right. Because I'm an ex sex addict with mommy issues and a daddy that's six feet under. I have issues. Fine. We all get that. But can we move on? Can
I
move on for Christ's sake?

“You're an asshole,” I tell him firmly. There's no brooking argument with this voice. Ty doesn't even try.

“No, I'm a man that hearts the fuck out of his wife, who worries about her day in and day out, who thinks about her every waking moment every sleeping one, too. I'm a dad that loves his kid and wants to make sure he sees what a freaking awesome person his mother is. I'm a guy that's never loved anything or anyone half as much as I love you.”

“Ty.” That one word, a whisper, a promise. My arms go around his neck, his lips find my throat, and then he's pressing me up against the wall and my body is screaming for it.
Lacey would love to hear about this shit.
“Fuck me,” I beg him.

“No.” I give him a look that's akin to sheer horror.

“What?”

“Not until you tell me what happened.” I roll my eyes and push him away. He lets me go this time and scoots back, so I can step out of the bathroom, putting my hands on my hips and taking long, deep breaths. I don't want Ty to think I'm giving in for sex. If he doesn't want to sleep with me, he can watch while I masturbate on the floor of our bedroom, dressed only in one of his T-shirts. Let's see how long he can resist that for.

But I did promise to be honest with him, so I'm going to, no matter what.

“I blacked out. Sort of. Just for a second. India caught me as I was falling.” I shrug. Ty narrows his eyes on me.

“Are you okay?”

“I'm pregnant.”

“Never … ” I take that cigarette out of my pocket and run it under my nose.

“I'll keep you posted,” I tell him, putting it between my lips and moving out the front door to stand on the porch. Ty follows and promptly plucks it from my mouth, putting it up to his and lighting the end.

“No direct smoking. You can live vicariously through me.”

“Secondhand smoke kills, McCabe.”

“So does a whole lot of other stuff. Tell me about this black out.” I roll my eyes.

“I lost consciousness for a split second. I didn't even know it was happening until it was over. I feel fine. I'm tired, a little dizzy, nauseous and horny as hell. Basically, I'm infected with your seed again.” Ty blows smoke out of his nostrils, and I have to look away because it makes me want to jump his ass right then and there. I figure he's going to keep teasing me, so I sit down on the porch swing and wait. When the barbs don't come, I look up at him and see that he looks miserable, stretched thin. It only lasts for a second and then he's blinking it away, focusing on me and running his tongue across his lips.

“Never, I can't wait anymore,” he tells me as I look up at him, confused. “I want to make a decision. No, I
need
to. Are we keeping this baby?”

The question surprises me although it shouldn't, really. This is an important decision, something I don't take lightly, but that needs to be made. Last time, it wasn't really much of a choice at all. In my heart, I knew all along. Just like I do now. I might be insecure and a little damaged, but if you give me some time, I get it. Eventually, I figure it out. I look down at the dirty fabric of the swing and start to pick at the fraying fibers with my fingernail.

“Why?” I ask him. “I mean why right now, why this second?”

“Because I love you more than fucking anything, and if it comes down to you or her, it's always going to be you.” Ty gestures angrily with his cigarette and then falls down to his knee in front of me, leaning his forehead against the front of my legs. I tangle my fingers up in his hair and inhale deep, tasting smoke and the promise of rain, the whisper of snow. It's like last year all over again, but this time, I'm better prepared, this time I'm stronger and I'm ready to fight harder. If I'm so worried about not being worthy, then I have to prove myself. I have to become worthy and validate myself in my own eyes. I know that in Ty's, I'm already perfect.

“How do you know it's a her?” I ask softly, noticing that our dog is sitting on the foot of the steps looking up at us, eyes brown but wise, like she knows a whole fuckload more about this earth than I do. I don't doubt that for a second.

“Because our son is a freak in the Regali family line, the only boy, the only one without copper hair.” Ty taps my flat belly with his knuckles. “If we don't have a copper clone in there, I'll be surprised.” Ty pauses and inhales sharply. “If you think you can do this, if you want to do this, know that I'm right there with you.” Ty doesn't say it so many words, but I know he wants this baby, that he'll want all our babies because each one is a symbol, a physical manifestation of
us.
I swallow and try to speak as Ty adjusts himself, filling the ear the sound of bells as his bracelets hum down his arm and clank against the bars of the swing. He looks up at me and waits patiently, his young face pretty and perfect, his eyes filled with old soul.

“You … ” I start to speak, and I choke. I try to talk, and I stumble. Ty is there to catch me, always and forever.

“I promise not to put an eye patch on her,” he says, completely and totally serious.

“Are you sure you want to make that promise?” I ask him, also serious. “Because I don't know if it's one you're necessarily going to be able to keep.” Ty smiles and he knows without hearing my answer that he's won.

“I get to see you all cute and preggers again?”

“Ty … ” I begin as he takes my hand in his and kisses my wedding ring with ardent fire raging through his mouth and infecting me through the skin, heating me up to my boiling point and right over the edge. I have to hold back a gasp and a wave of dizziness.

“Never.”

“Ty.”

“See a doctor for me?”

“McCabe, I think you'd know by now. I'd do anything for you.”

15

It's no secret that after highs, come lows, that after hills, come valleys, so it shouldn't surprise me when I wake up early the next morning with shaking hands and fearful thoughts. I imagine giving birth to a daughter, one with hazel eyes and copper hair, and I imagine her hating me with every ounce of herself the way I hate my mother. I imagine Ty becoming disgusted with me when he sees what a horrible person I am, when my true colors come out around my kids and I fuck it. Fortunately, I make it into the bathroom and switch on the shower before I start sobbing. Off I go again, crying even though I shouldn't, acting like a little bitch when I should be strong for Ty. I sit there on the tiles with warm water streaming down the sides of my face, soaking my pajamas and dragging me down in folds of heavy fabric.

When I finally pull myself far enough out of my slump to get undressed, I find red in my underwear. White splotches cover my vision and I slump back against the wall.
What is this? What's wrong with me?
I stare at the fabric for so long that the shower watches most of the stain away and leaves me wondering if I imagined it all along.

I bite my lip and toss the panties out with the rest of the clothes, grabbing my shampoo and scrubbing at my scalp like I've got a bone to pick with it. I scrape my skin with my nails, and the pain feels good, makes me feel better for a brief moment, long enough that I can pull my emotions together and get control over myself. I touch a hand to my stomach, drop it down low, feel around my vagina, teasing, probing. Everything was fine last night when Ty and I made love. Everything felt okay, but … I don't know what to do. Tell Ty should be the obvious choice, but then I wonder again if I'm just imagining it. The panties look clean now, and I have been a little off lately. It can't have been as bad as I thought. It was just some spotting. I tell myself to woman up and get over it. Being pregnant is like earning a badge of courage or some shit. It separates the girls from the women.

By the time Ty climbs in beside me, I'm feeling better, but I don't want to lie. Out of fucking everything that's happened, I know that's one sacred bond I won't break. So I tell him about it and he looks sick to his freaking stomach. I promise him I'll go to the doctor at some point in the not too far off future and change the subject, but the fear is still etched around his mouth.

I watch it follow him out of the shower, into a black T-shirt with and jeans, a pair of brown boots. I watch it chase him as he switches out his facial piercings for silver studs. I watch it harangue him while he moves down the stairs and into the living room, searching for his son.

“Hey Mini McCabe,” he says as he takes the baby from India and gives him a kiss on the head. I pause at the bottom of the stairs and feel suddenly shy, like I don't know what to do with these two men. Ty and me alone is okay, but with the baby, I just … I'm not good at family dynamics. I love my sisters, but I've been out of the loop for so long. Ty just stands there and stares at me. “You okay?” he asks, concern lacing his voice. I nod and try to smile, but it doesn't reach my eyes and he can tell. He tries to hand me the baby, but I don't hold out my arms and instead cross them over my chest.

You are a mom, Never. This is your son. This is your baby. Kiss him and hold and let him know that you love him more than you love yourself, that you wouldn't trade him for anything in this world, that you care.

I find myself frozen, embarrassed, ashamed. Ty takes the baby back and presses him into his chest, tilting his head to the side and examining me like he isn't quite sure what to make of this.

“Nev, he wants to see you,” Ty tells me, and I almost breakthrough the storm cloud that's hanging over my head, shirk off the dark for a brief moment, and step forward. But then I see Angelica, and I just go blank. The bitch will always affect me, no matter what I think. I've cut her off, but the emotional ties I had to sever still bleed every now and again.

“Can I see him?” she asks, fairly unceremoniously. Ty looks at her and then back at me, asking what he should do with his eyes. “Hello?” Angelica asks, getting annoyed. Ty waits for another second, but when I don't respond, he spins the baby around and lets my mother look. Just look. Maybe touch. But not hold. Not without my expression permission. Angelica purses her pretty lips and adjusts a copper curl that's fallen into her face. “I'd like to hold my grandson.”

“You forgot your daughter's birthday,” Ty responds, not at all apologetic about it. He's pissed, and he isn't even talking about me. He's talking about Darla. Beth planned a huge party for her last month, decorated the whole house, even convinced Ty and me to get on Skype and participate. She told my mom a hundred times; my sisters told her a thousand; Darla a million.

She didn't show up.

“It was a mistake,” Angelica grounds out between her teeth. They used to be pretty and straight, but now they're starting to yellow, and they look crooked to me. I could be imagining it, but maybe not.

“It was a date,” Ty says with a shrug. “You can say hi to my kid, but you're not holding him. You haven't earned that right.”

“I raised eight fucking kids in this house, and now you're telling me that I'm not qualified to hold a damn baby?”

“I'm telling you that you haven't earned the privilege.” My mother scoffs.

“Now it's a privilege to hold your little brat? Fuck you. I want you out of my house.” Ty gives her a look that says
I'm not going fucking anywhere.
He doesn't even have to say anything. Ty McCabe communicates with his body as much as his voice. He's so animated and passionate and just … God, he's too good for me. Really. He is. “You better be gone by the time I get back,” she snarls, shoving past him, not caring that he's holding my infant.

Darkness descends on me, violent and tumultuous. I want to sob, but I also want to kill her.
Stupid hormones.
I turn away and try to take shallow breaths, so I can get a hold of myself. When I look back, Ty is staring at me.