“I wanna know, Merc,” I whine in a way that’s very unbecoming of a rough-around-the-edges hockey player, but hopefully endears me to him.
He takes matters into his own hands, making his way to me and swiping it from me, setting it back in the frame.
“Yes, that’s the new Meyer.”
“Boy or girl?”
“Don’t know yet.” He’s facing me and has laced his fingers with mine, I think to stop me from grabbing any more stuff. He’s far away in his head though.
“Problem?”
He tosses the thought around in his mind as if he’s unsure that he wants to share the information. I’m getting a side of Mercy others don’t see. “I have a bad feeling.”
“That she’ll lose the baby?”
“That we’ll lose her.”
There are two ways to interpret that, but I know which one he means. “You sure you’re not just scared because that’s the way it’s been? History repeating itself?”
“Maybe, but if she is going to leave, she’d better do it before the kid can remember. Listening to Theo cry for his mother is on my list of things I never want to do again. Come.”
He tugs me toward the couch, but there’s more to this so I push.
“How did you end up with that ultrasound photo? Don’t parents usually want to keep that shit for baby books?”
My parents have several albums of me while I was in my surrogate’s womb alone.
“Sandy—the mother—gave it to me. That’s when I got the creepiest fucking tingles. I assumed it was a loan while I was away since it’s the only picture we have of the little peanut, but when I assured her that I’d take good care of it until it was safe in her hands again, she shook her head. Then she walked away without a word.”
Well damn. “You’re important to the family and you’re doing this for them. Maybe it’s her way of saying thank you.”
“Maybe.” He spins me around, trapping me around the waist and walking us awkwardly toward the couch. “I’m not done with you and that conversation is a bummer.”
He sits, arranging me above him so that I’m straddling his legs and gazing down. We can stare openly again so we do.
“We’d better be careful about that,” he says, referring to the “staring thing”.
“Why?”
“People will figure us out.”
I raise a brow. “You abducted me from my condo in the middle of the day. People know, Merc.”
“Good, then they can keep their hands off you. At least while I’m around.”
He guides me to his lips by my neck and there’s no talking for a long time.
Chapter13
Hockey Playing Orangutangs
NOVEMBER
Mercy’s Log
MERCY
Itold you that our arrangement wasn’t different from what I’d been in before. I lied. Everything’s different. It’s worse than different. I’ve trapped myself in relationship purgatory. I don’t know how to act. All my instincts tell me to possess you with everything I have. Tie you to my bed. Handcuff you to me.
