Beholden (The Belonging Duet, #2)(37)

She looks up, playing coy, “I have no idea what you mean. I started the timer when you told me to and then you ran it. You must’ve had an off day.”

Off day my ass.

“Catherine, if you don’t ‘fess up, I promise you’ll be running daily and it won’t be because of a bet.” My brow rises as I try to imply what she’ll be running from.

I gotta hand it to her though. She got me—and good.

“A lady never reveals her secrets.”

“I’ll figure out what you did.”

“You can try, Muffin.”

“Okay, that’s fine. You know you never specified what play, when I had to take you, or what kind of spa treatments.” I tap her nose knowing it drives her nuts. Let that sink in …

Her eyes light up when she realizes the hole in her plan. Like I was ever going to let that happen. “Oh, no. You’re not going to loophole your way out of this. I won! I beat your ass. I mean, you are at over twelve minutes. I’m under. I win. You lose.” She’s talking so fast I have to try to keep up. I love getting her riled up. It’s so easy.

I shrug and grab the book, not knowing what the hell it even is but anything to keep pissing her off. “I didn’t make the bet. I’m just adhering to the rules.”

Catherine scoffs and looks away, “I swear.”

“A lady never swears.”

She grabs her phone and starts fumbling through it.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Looking up what plays have tickets for tomorrow.” She gives me a snarky smile.

I cough and grab her phone out of her hand. “Not happening since you cheated.”

“We’re going to see a play tomorrow.”

“The hell we are.”

I’ll take her anywhere she wants to go, but this is almost too much fun. Her eyes glow as she gets more and more frustrated.

“I hate you.”

I laugh because she’s so cute when she’s petulant. “There’s a very fine line between love and hate. I’m pretty sure you love me. I’m pretty loveable.”

“You’re also a giant pain in my ass. But …” Her eyes light up and I see it all right there. “I do love you. Even though you feel the need to drive me insane. However, tomorrow there are seats available for The Lion King or we can see The Vagina Monologues.”

My mouth drops slightly and I wait for the punch line.

“Are there vaginas in the show?”

“None that you’ll see.” Catherine smirks and slides up to my side. Her voice drops into a seductive whisper, “It’s all about menopause. So are we going to see that or are you going to pay up and take me to see The Lion King?”

Leaning up, I grab her hand and hold it in mine. I love the way she feels against me. She links her fingers with mine and I pull her forward. “I love you, and I love driving you crazy … in every way. There’s no way in hell we’re going to see a play about pussies.”

Her grip tightens and she leans forward and kisses me.

I get lost in her. She makes it a little easier to breathe. Shit doesn’t suck so bad and my head gets a break when she’s in my arms.

“I can’t lose you,” I say out of nowhere.

She pulls back and her forehead wrinkles as she looks at me. “Why do you think you’d lose me?”

There’s so much of my life that she doesn’t understand. The constant fear that when she walks out the door in the morning she won’t return.

It keeps me up at night.

Haunts me in my dreams. I see her walking away. Asking me for things I’m not capable of giving her and deciding she’s had enough. Each night they’re the same dreams only different ways of losing her.





“Jackson?” I ask him again. He’s staring off and seems lost. Leaning up I touch his face. “You okay?” The concern is evident in my tone.

“Just remembering something that bothered me. I’m fine,” he says, trying to dismiss my worry.

“You know you can talk to me, right?”

Jackson nods and closes his eyes, “Natalie called yesterday.”

And there it is.

“She said you guys talked the other day too, right?”

Since Aaron’s passing I’ve grown close to his wife, Natalie. We spoke once while Jackson was in the hospital and since then I speak to her every few days. At first, she didn’t want to speak to Jackson or Mark. I understood, considering they were his closest friends, but she said they used the same phrases and it hurt too much. So we talk about life, her pregnancy, and how she wants to go back to work. My heart breaks the most when she tells me about what life is like as a widow and how much she prays this baby will be a boy.

Jackson pulls me onto his leg and attempts to get comfortable. “I sent a large check and arranged the plane to pick up her parents to bring them in. I don’t want her to have to worry about anything. She’s due this week. Mark has been keeping in touch, but he said she doesn’t want to see any of us.”

I can’t even begin to imagine the pain she’s in. Plus, I remember when Neil’s sister was pregnant, she was a mess. Crying over toilet paper commercials and then the next minute she was screaming over the way you buttered toast. I wish there was more that we could do for Natalie, but she refused to do a memorial or anything until after the baby is born. I sit and listen to him as he finally starts to open up about Aaron and his death.