Hothouse Flower

< 51 >

RYKE MEADOWS

I put more salsa in my taco while Rose glares at Connor, and he stares back in challenge. They’re usually strange, but they’re being really, really fucking strange right now.

He says, “Buvez avec moi.” Drink with me.

Her nose flares as her eyes drop to the tequila. She snatches the shot glass, not backing down, and she raises it towards her mouth.

I bite my taco, and when I glance at them, I notice that Connor’s jaw has tightened, his gaze darkened. I feel like they’re playing a risky game of chicken. Like when I was at the bar with Lo, back in Paris. I sense the similarities in that and this, but my mind barely has time to add these facts together.

Rose puts the rim of the shot to her lips. Connor grabs her wrist and forces her hand down, the shot splashing as the glass meets the table.

Lo’s brows furrow, holding his chicken taco. “What the fuck?”

Daisy freezes, a lime in her hand.

Connor stares harshly at Rose. “Vous êtes allée assez loin.” You’ve taken this far enough.

Her eyes pierce him.

Connor shakes his head. “Dites-le tout simplement.” Just say it.

She inhales sharply. “Ne faites pas ça.” Don’t.

Connor edges closer to her, and she surprisingly doesn’t pull away. He cups her face, his thumb stroking her cheek as he says, “Vous n’avez rien à craindre.” You have nothing to fear.

She tries to glance at us, but he forces her head straight at him, making her come face-to-face with whatever she’s been hiding.

Rose has trouble surrendering and letting him win this long, drawn out game. Her eyes glance down at the spilt tequila, and he puts his hand over the top, telling her no. I finish my taco and grab my water, taking a large swig.

Connor pinches her chin between his fingers, and he says, “Vous êtes enceinte.” You’re pregnant.

I spit out my water.

Just like that. One word. Enceinte. And my cover is blown.

Fucking fuck.

They both turn their heads to look at me. For fuck’s sake—my brother gapes like I’ve grown horns, and Lily might as well be catching flies with her mouth.

Connor’s eyes continue to darken, his expression so rare that my neck starts to heat uncomfortably.

“Why are you fucking looking at me like that?” I ask defensively, backtracking. My efforts are useless. It’s Connor Cobalt. If my brother figured out that I understood their conversation, then he definitely has.

“Vous savez pourquoi.” You know why. He keeps shaking his head like he can’t believe this. Maybe he’s upset that he got something wrong. That he misread me. That I’ve been fucking overhearing his dialogs for years. All of the above, once again.

My muscles harden, and Daisy puts her hand on my leg underneath the table in comfort. I lace her fingers with mine and then nod at Connor. “You should be less focused on me and more fucking concerned about your pregnant wife, who almost drank a tequila shot to fucking one-up you.”

“What?” Lo says. He leans back like a hurricane just knocked into him.

Rose glowers at me. “Go choke on your water again.” That is an insult usually reserved for Lo.

I flip her off and she does the same thing in return, which is an awful fucking rebuttal to the middle finger. It’s not like I’m asking her if she knows how to do it too.

I’d love to remove myself from this whole awkward situation, but we’re stuck at the same table together, forced to deal with serious issues that we’ve kept from each other.

Lo has his hands on his head, his eyes darting between me and Rose. “You both take birthday surprises to a new fucked up dimension.”

Rose blinks back tears. No wonder she’s been emotional this whole trip. I’ve rarely ever seen her cry, and she’s shed probably more tears in the past two weeks than she has in the past five years.

“Christ,” Lo says, realizing this too. He cringes, looking a little guilty. She’s been hormonal, obviously going through something, and he’s picked on her a lot. I mean, she didn’t even fucking tell Connor. She made him figure it out.

But their relationship—that’s just how they do things, I guess. I wouldn’t know unless I was in their heads. I’d rather a girl scream at the top of her lungs and throw things at me, telling me she’s pregnant than spend months solving a mystery.

Connor rotates a fraction to look back at Rose. “You’re five weeks along.” He just states it, not as a question.

She holds her breath. “No.”

He frowns. “Seven?”

She shakes her head once.

He looks fucking pissed. He rubs his lips to hide the emotion, but I see the hurt and anger pulsing in his eyes. “Eight weeks?”

She glares. “Ne me regardez pas comme ça.” Don’t look at me like that.

They glance at me with agitation, realizing I understand them now.

Rose sighs heavily, reaching for her water.

“What’d they say?” Lily asks.

“I’m not getting into it,” I tell her.

Rose says, “You’re mad, Richard, that you were off on your numbers. I’m sorry you weren’t right—”

“No, darling,” Connor tells her with conviction. “I’m upset because it took you this long to talk about it. I thought you would have conceded a month in.”

“How long have you known?” she asks quietly.

“When you had a flat tire, I was almost positive. Your GPS was set to the gynecologist, and you purposefully had a fight with me the next day so I’d sleep on the couch. I figured the doctors confirmed what you already knew, and you were too stubborn and afraid to tell me.”

Lo frowns and looks at Lily. “You knew?” She had been in the car with Rose.

She nods, her shoulders turned into her body. “Moral support.”

Connor glances at Lily cautiously before setting his gaze back on his wife.

Rose sits stiffly, and her chin trembles. “This wasn’t the plan. I’m not thirty-five yet.”

The waitress returns, cutting into possibly the most bizarre way a pregnancy can be announced. At a Mexican restaurant. With a tequila shot standoff. In French.

“Ready to order?” she asks.

“We need like ten minutes,” Daisy tells her.

She nods, her eyes lingering on Daisy’s scar before she disappears. I can’t tell if the waitress recognizes us or not, but Daisy ends up resting her head against my arm. I comb my fingers through her hair.

“You’re not aborting the baby,” Connor tells Rose.

“I know,” she retorts, fire coming back to her eyes. “You want a lineage. Eight kids, I remember.”

“We’re married,” he says. “We have billions of dollars. We may be young, but we can be the best parents. You just have to trust that you’ll be a great mother.”

I’ve seen Rose around kids. She’s about as maternal as a fucking brick wall, her nose curling in disdain when a baby cries or acts out. But I do know one thing—when she loves someone, she invests her whole fucking heart and time into them.

After a long stretch of silence, Rose says softly, “I thought about getting rid of the baby.”

Connor’s face stays unreadable. “I know.”

She swallows hard. “Lily talked me out of it.”

Lo kisses Lily’s temple. I think we’re all glad Rose didn’t choose that option, even if she thought about it.

And I would feel worse for Connor if he didn’t already know everything beforehand.

“I just…” Rose lets out a deep breath. “I figured that I had a couple of months before my body started to really change. Two months to ignore the fact that my world is going to flip upside down and a creature is going to grow inside of me. Give me that.”

He smiles. “I did, darling.”

“So,” Lo says, holding his water, “how exactly do two geniuses accidentally get pregnant?” He sips his drink in amusement.

Rose starts putting her frizzy, wet hair in a sleek pony. “Why don’t you answer this one, Richard? You’re friends with Satan’s spawn.”

Lo laughs. “I think you’ve mistaken me for the ‘creature’ growing inside you.”

Connor raises his hand to quiet them. Rose looks ready to pelt my brother with the contents of her purse. There’s probably a canister of pepper spray in there.

“We have unprotected sex,” Connor announces.

Rose points at me at this. Fuck. “You better be wearing a condom with her.”

My face hardens. I already told her I’d be safe with Daisy. They all need to chill the fuck out. “That’s none of your fucking business, Rose.”

Daisy ends up saying it anyway, just to appease her sister. “I’m on birth control.”

“So was I,” Rose snaps. “And I never missed a day.” She prides herself on this fact.

“Then what the fuck happened?” I ask, extending my arm in confusion.

“Birth control is only ninety-nine percent effective,” Connor says. “We’re, of course, in the one-percent.”

Rose smacks him on the arm for that comment, and he grabs her wrist and kisses her deeply. She melts. I stop fucking watching.

And then I meet eyes with my brother, with Lo. He has his arm wrapped around Lily, and even with the news, he looks more at peace now, in this moment, than he did three days ago.

“So you know French,” he says to me.

“Yeah, I know French.”

Connor holds Rose’s hand on the table, and he nods to me. “Where’d you learn?”

“Tutors as a kid, like you and Rose.”

“I taught myself, actually,” Connor says with a million-dollar grin.

Lo claps slowly. “Congratulations, love.”

Connor only smiles wider, and I share it as well, surprisingly.

Lily perks up. “I’ve learned some French too.” She clears her throat. I think we’re all laughing internally, not at her, just fucking with her. She’s goofy as hell. In a more American accent, she says, “Comment allez-vous?” How are you?

Connor replies with a genuine smile, “Je ne pourrais pas être plus heureux.” I couldn’t be happier.

Rose relaxes into Connor’s body. And Lily looks really fucking confused. He’s already lost her.

Daisy slides her misshapen pumpkin napkin over to me. I squeeze her hand beneath the table. And for a brief second, I think about after California, after my climb. Back in Philly. Her parents… it doesn’t seem like they should be a big roadblock. I’m twenty-five. But your family doesn’t just leave when you become an adult. They’re a part of you forever.

I add to the whole table, “Je serais génial, mais je sais ce qui me fait toujours obstacle.” I would be great, but I know what still stands in my way.

Lo claps again. “Color me impressed,” he tells me. He turns to Lily. “You’re almost fluent, love.”

She punches him in the chest, and he mock winces, acting like it hurt. They’re both smiling.

My eyes flicker up to Connor, who stares at me with understanding and more compassion.

He says, “Tout ira bien, mon ami.” Everything will be fine, my friend.

Connor has said that he doesn’t believe in magic, but his words hold a possession all on their own, filling me with serenity, a temporary calmness, that I am grateful to have before my climb.

Everything will be fine, my friend.

I nod a couple times.

Everything will be fine.