What Lovers Do(85)

“Shep World …” He chuckles and shakes his head. “I get it. Feeling weak is embarrassing. Trust me … I get it.”

I can’t imagine Shep ever feeling weak. “Is that why you had to take a friend to help beat up my ex?”

“Shut it, Sophie.” He narrows his eyes, but his lips pull into a beaming smile.





CHAPTER FORTY





SHEP





Over the following months, I download every self-help audiobook that I can find. I’m fairly certain a therapist would tell me I have some sort of unresolved feelings from Millie lying to me. Months of betrayal. All the times we “made love” and I thought (I hoped) we were making a baby, and she knew we weren’t. She wasn’t making love to me. She was fucking me.

I told myself I would never make love to another woman. I would fuck them before they fucked me. Turns out, with Sophie, I may have fucked myself.

Figures.

“Where are you?” Sophie asks as I stare into the distance long after we’ve both teed off.

She’s messing with my head. Her bare legs in that skirt or shorts thingy that she wears … well, they taunt me. It hugs her perfect ass. And her sleeveless tee molds her seven-month baby belly. She’s not swollen. She’s not lost her ability to kick my ass on the golf course. If anything, I’m more attracted to her now than ever before, which sucks because we’re friends. We haven’t done the best friend thing since Santa Monica. It’s all … really messing with my head.

“I’m uh … thinking about your birthing classes. Those start next week. Right?”

“Yeah.” She swings her little ass toward the golf cart. “Why?”

“Do you need a partner?”

“You mean another partner? No. Chloe and Mason will be there. Were you going to offer?”

I shrug. Returning my club to my bag. “Yeah. I thought it would be the nice thing to do.”

“It would be a little weird. I think it’s assumed that one’s birthing class partner will be in the delivery room. And if you think I’m letting you be in the delivery room with me, you are living on another planet, buddy. I’m still not sure how I feel about Mason being in there. I know … I just know he’s not going to stay by my head. He’s going to see ten centimeters of my vagina.”

I can’t hide my grin, so I cough into my fist. It’s never enough. I will never get enough of Sophie Ryan. My sun. Always the brightest star. Warm and comforting. I miss her when she’s not with me. And every day, she’s the first thought in my head, my sunrise.

“It’s not funny, Shep.” She grimaces, holding the side of her belly as she climbs into the cart.

“What’s wrong?”

She shakes her head. “I’m just getting kicked in the ribs. No big deal.”

I stare at her belly. I love her belly. I love her. I really really need to tell her that, but I don’t want it to stress her out if she’s not ready to deal with a pregnancy and me falling in love with her. “Can I … would it be weird if I uh … felt the baby kick?”

She lifts her brown eyes to mine and smiles. Without saying anything, she takes my hand and presses it to the side of her belly by her ribs. It moves. I feel it.

Fuck … I feel so much.

“You’re …” I curl my lips together, second-guessing what I want to say. What I want her to know. “You’re amazing, Sophie.”

Her lower lip does that little quiver thing. And I know behind her tinted white-framed glasses her eyes are filled with tears. It’s been a common occurrence lately. She blames it on the hormones.

“And if I ever introduce you to Howie, you have to promise not to tell him that I like you more than him.”

“Stop it.” She coughs a nervous laugh, sliding her fingers behind her glasses to wipe her eyes.

“I will never stop.”





Over the following weeks, I find any excuse to be with Sophie, even when she calls it quits on golfing because she’s so close to her due date.

When she answers her door, just after nine at night, my pack and I greet her with a bouquet of pink flowers. I also find any excuse to bring her flowers. Anything with echinacea, her favorite, but hard to find sometimes.

Just because is my favorite excuse for bringing her flowers.

“I think I’m done walking.” Her lower lip juts out, so does her belly and popped out navel where there’s a two-inch gap between her black hip hugging cotton shorts and white tank top that I don’t think is an actual maternity top. Her royal blue-framed glasses are low on her nose.

“Are you in labor?”

Sophie shakes her head, hair a little matted on one side like she’s been napping on that side.

“Then we walk.”

“Shep …” She pouts a little more. “The flowers are beautiful, but I don’t deserve them.”

“You do. Let’s walk.”

“I’m too fat or…” she cringes “…bloated to walk tonight.”

I hand her the flowers and push her glasses up her nose. “You’re pregnant.”

“I’m gross.”

“You’re beautiful.”