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“‘Straight’? You were being straight with her?” She smacks my arm with the back of her hand. “Why are men so freaking clueless? This is, like, seventy-five percent of the reason I date women!”
I screw up my face into a scowl. “She’s carrying my baby. She needs to know.”
“Yes, but did she need to know like that?! She wasn’t born into this world like you and me, D. She isn’t used to seeing blood and guts on the floor. She’s not used to having knife-wielding maniacs attack her in what is supposed to be a safe place. She was in shock when you brought her in—and you go and drop that bomb on her? I take back what I said: you’d have to get several orders of magnitude smarter before I’d even call you clueless.”
Grinding my teeth, I turn away from Bee. But she’s never been the kind of woman you can turn your back on. She whips around and plants herself in front of me again, hands fisted on her hips the way she’s done since we were children. “Nuh-uh. No, no, and no. You don’t get to tune me out, buddy. This is important. If you put her through much more, she could miscarry.”
My first thought is, Would that be so bad?
The guilt sets in immediately after, though. That is my son she’s carrying. It may not be ideal and fuck knows it wasn’t planned—but it is what it is and I need to protect them both.
“What would you have me do?” I ask wearily.
“Great question. Thought you’d never ask.” She tilts her head to the side and switches to a softer voice. “Make it right. Explain things to her. Give her some context. She needs to understand that you’re on her side. That staying here of her own free will is what’s best for her and the baby.”
I let loose an exhausted exhale. “Fine.”
I’m sweeping towards the open archway when Bee stops me. “Where are you going?”
“Where do you think?” I demand impatiently. “Did we not just discuss that I should calm her down?”
“No, not right now! God, clueless. Clueless. Clueless. I told her to sleep and she needs the rest. She’s not going to be able to process anything you have to say now, anyway.”
“Fuck me,” I mutter, turning towards the skyline like the heavens might have some answers hidden there. “How the hell did this happen?”
Bee comes up to stand by my side. “There’s no point in asking questions like that. It did happen. Maybe one day, we’ll figure out why—but for right now, we just need to make this work.” I throw her a curious, sidelong glance and she buckles ever-so-slightly under my gaze. “What? Stop looking at me like that.”
“Why are you so invested in this?”
“The whole point of this was to make a baby, wasn’t it?”
“Not like this. You’re not in the least disappointed that this child won’t be yours?”
She tries to hide her smile behind an adjustment of her hair, but I know her too well for petty little tricks like that to work. “Well…”
“You’re relieved. You’re fucking relieved.”
A little giggle bursts from her lips. “Oh, come on, Dmitri! Can you see me as a mother? When they made me, they left out the maternal gene. I don’t have the desire or the temperament to raise a human being. I’d just impart all my trauma onto them. This is for the best.”
“You’ve got it all figured out, don’t you? Everything’s coming up Beatrice. Must be fucking nice.”
She shrugs, innocent as a lamb by the looks of her. “It’s a plan-in-progress, obviously, but it has solid bones. You need an heir; she wants a baby; I need to get my father off my back. This little bean solves all three problems. It’s a win-win-win, and lemme tell you, those aren’t a dime a dozen. We ought to be popping bubbly to celebrate.”
I glower at her. “You don’t think your father will get suspicious when my son is calling another woman ‘Mom’?”
“That’s not a hill I plan to die on, believe me.” She taps a manicured nail against her button nose. “He can call Wren ‘Mom’ and I’ll be ‘Mama.’ Or ‘Mommy.’ Or hell, ‘Mother Dearest,’ I dunno. Does it matter? That’s a small detail.”
“So our farce will hinge on an infant’s ability to distinguish between Mother and Mama. ‘Solid bones,’ my ass, Bee. You expect us all to live a lie?”
Her eyes flash to mine, feisty as ever. “How is it any different from what you and I are doing now?”
“You and I have known each other our entire lives!” I remind her harshly. “We’re as good as family. Wren is a wild card who might want more for herself than to lie to dangerous men for the rest of her days.”
“It won’t be for the rest of her days. Just until my father dies,” Bee suggests. “The moment he conks out, we’ll have a party, tell the whole world our truth, and live as a happy, dysfunctional throuple. It’ll be bliss.” Her smile grows wider in direct proportion to how my scowl is growing darker. “What? You don’t like the throuple idea? Don’t worry, I don’t plan on having sex with you. Just her.”
It’s weird how fast I want to bite her head off for even suggesting such a thing. But I rein in my annoyance before I say something she’ll make me regret later.
Bee must know I’m wavering on the edge of an outburst, because she does her damndest to push me right over said edge. “She’s very pretty…”
