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“Are you trying to get me drunk?”
“I’m a wild child, remember? I’m living down to my reputation.” She slid off her shoes, curled her legs under her and moved closer, pressing her body against the solid strength of his.
Unlike her, his body hadn’t changed much in the past decade. Greg believed exercise helped control mood and set an example to the community by spending time in the gym and running on the beach. As a result his body was as good as it had been at eighteen.
She thought about what Andrea had said earlier.
Would her marriage to Greg be different if they’d had other relationships? “Do you ever wish you’d sowed your wild oats?”
“Excuse me?” He shifted so he could look at her. “You want me to become a farmer?”
She laughed and took another sip of wine. “You’re not a morning person. You’d be a terrible farmer.”
“So why the ‘wild oats’ question?”
“No reason. Ignore me. Let’s go to bed.”
He looked at her quizzically. “It’s not the right time of the month for you to get pregnant, is it?”
She felt a flash of guilt, and that guilt was intensified by the knowledge that she’d done those calculations, too. “It’s not the right time for me to get pregnant, but that’s not the only reason to have sex.”
“Isn’t it?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Only that lately that seems to be the only reason you ever want to climb between the sheets with me.” He put his wineglass down and then took her face in his hands and kissed her.
Greg had been the only guy she’d ever kissed if you didn’t count that one session behind the bike sheds with Will Jones, which she didn’t because that had been part of a dare. Sex had changed over time. Being with him didn’t give her the same dizzying thrill she’d had when they’d first gotten together—Take that, Mom. Saint Greg and I had sex before we were married—but in many ways it was better. Familiar. Intimate.
As he deepened the kiss, his other arm came round her waist. She shifted closer to him and felt something hard dig into her hip. “Is that your phone?”
“No, it’s my giant penis and the reason you married me.” He nuzzled her neck but she shoved him away and put her glass down on the table next to his.
“Wait! Greg—why is it in your pocket?”
“My penis?”
“Your phone!”
He sighed. “Because that’s where I always carry my phone. Where else would it be?”
“Anywhere else! You’re supposed to be keeping your testicles cool and your phone out of your pocket. We agreed.”
Greg swore under his breath and released her. “This is crazy, Jenna. You’re obsessed.”
“I’m focused. Focused is good. Focused gets things done.”
“Getting pregnant is all you think about. When was the last time we talked about something not sex or baby related? And I don’t count talking about your mother.”
“Over dinner.” She smiled triumphantly. “We talked about decorating the upstairs bedroom.”
“Because you want to turn it into a nursery, even though you’re not pregnant.”
Oops. “Last week we had a long conversation about politics.”
“And the impact it might have on any children we have.”
That was true.
“It’s possible I might be a little overfocused on pregnancy. It’s what happens when you really want something you can’t have. Like being on a diet. If you can’t eat a chocolate brownie, all you think about is eating the chocolate brownie. You dream about brownies. Brownies become your life. You’re a psychologist. You’re supposed to know this!”
Greg breathed out slowly. “Honey, if you could just—”
“Do not tell me to relax, Greg. And don’t call me ‘honey’ in that tone. It drives me batshit crazy.”
“I know, but Jenna you really do need to relax. If something is taking over your mind, then the answer is to focus on other things. The way to forget the brownie is to think about something else.”
“Cupcakes?”
His expression was both amused and exasperated. “One of my clients is opening a new yoga studio in Oak Bluffs. Maybe you should go. You might find it calming.”
“I might find it annoying.” She thought about the girl in the magazine. “It will be full of serene people with perfect figures who are all in control of their lives. I’d have to kill them, and that wouldn’t be calming for anyone.”
Greg retrieved his wine. “Okay, no yoga. Tai chi? Kickboxing? Book group?”
“My mother runs the book group, and given that the last book I searched for was How Not to Kill Your Mother, I don’t think I’d be welcomed as a member.”
“Go to a different book group. Start your own. Do something. Anything to take your mind off babies.”
“You’re saying you don’t want babies?”
“I’m not saying that.” He finished his wine. “I do want babies, but I don’t think all this angst is going to help.”
She remembered the way he’d looked when she’d glanced out of the window. Thoroughly despondent.
She was about to ask him how he felt about the whole thing when her phone rang.
She ignored it.
Of course Greg wanted babies. Didn’t he?
He glanced from her to the phone. “Aren’t you going to answer that?”
“This conversation is more important than my phone.” Her phone stopped ringing but started again a moment later and Greg reached down to pick it up.
“It’s Lauren.”
Jenna stared at him stupidly. “What?”
“Your sister.” He thrust the phone at her. “We can wish Ed a happy birthday.”
Why did she have the feeling he was relieved their conversation had been interrupted?
“But isn’t it the middle of the night in London?”
“It was obviously a great party.” He rose to his feet and walked toward the door.
“Where are you going?”
He smiled. A normal Greg type of smile. “To pack. If you’re going to talk to your sister, it means I have time to take a six-month sabbatical. Your conversations aren’t exactly brief.”
“We’re not that bad.”
“No, you’re right. A two-week vacation should cover it. In the meantime I’ll make us coffee.” Greg walked to the kitchen and Jenna watched him go.
Everything was going to be okay. Of course it was.
She was married to Greg, and Greg knew how to handle every situation.
Who needed yoga when they were married to their very own therapist?
Picking up her wineglass and stretching her legs out on the sofa, she settled in to have a long chat with her sister. It was true that one call last month had reached the two-hour mark, but she and Lauren lived thousands of miles apart! What did he expect? And she was pleased Lauren had called. She’d be able to tell her about the pregnancy test. “Hi, Lauren. Happy birthday to Ed! How was the party? I was going to call you tomorrow. Did our gift arrive?” Because she was expecting everything to be perfect, it took her a couple of minutes to absorb what her sister was saying. “What? Lauren, I can hardly hear you—are you crying?” She sat up suddenly, spilling her wine over her jeans. “Say that again!”
By the time Jenna ended the call she was in shock.
Her hand was shaking so badly she almost dropped her phone.
Greg walked back into the room and put two mugs of coffee on the table. “Did you lose the signal or something?”
“No.”
“Then why so quick? I was going to speak to Ed.”
“You can’t.” Her lips felt strange, as if they didn’t want to move. “Ed is—” She broke off and he looked at her.
“Ed is what?”
Jenna felt shaky and strange. Her eyes filled. “He’s dead. Today was his fortieth birthday. He was found at his desk by one of the cleaners. They think it must have been his heart. My poor sister.” She remembered the agony in her sister’s voice and didn’t even try to hold back the tears. How would Lauren live without Ed? What would she do? “I have to go to her.” She felt her sister’s loss as keenly as if it were her own.
Looking shaken, Greg took the glass from her hand and tugged her to her feet. “I’ll call the airline while you pack.”
Her brain was moving in slow motion. “We can’t—I can’t—” She couldn’t think straight. “There’s school, and—”
“I’ll call them. I’ve got this.”
“What about the money? We already decided we couldn’t afford to go away in the summer.”
“We’ll figure it out. Some things are more important than money.”
She didn’t argue. There was no way she wasn’t going to be with her sister.
Only hours before she’d been envying Lauren, and now her life was shattered.
It was unbelievable. Unfair.
And to think she’d been about to off-load her own problems.
Jenna sleepwalked to the bedroom and pulled out her suitcase. Without thinking about what she was packing, she stuffed random clothes into it. All she could think about was her sister, her big sister, who had always been there for her through thick and thin.
There was nothing her sister didn’t know about her.
Not a single thing.
“It’s all booked.” Greg appeared in the doorway, his phone in one hand and his credit card in the other. “Take sweaters. And a coat. It’s cold in England. And an umbrella, because it will probably be raining. And don’t forget to charge your phone so I can call you.”
“What? Oh yes.” She pushed some thick socks into the case and paused, helpless and more than a little scared. She felt inadequate. “What do I do, Greg? What is the right thing to say to someone who has lost a husband? I wish you were coming with me.”
But they both knew he couldn’t. He had people counting on him, and no one who could cover for him.
“I’ll call you every night. And you can text me. I promise not to give my phone to Pamela.”
It seemed like a lifetime ago that they’d laughed at that.
Jenna glanced round her bedroom and tried to work out what she’d forgotten. Lauren would have made a list. She probably had a list already on her laptop entitled “for emergency travel.” Everything would be checked off. Red ticks for the outward journey, blue ticks for the return journey.
Jenna didn’t have a list to tick.
She was the disorganized one. Lauren was the perfect one.
Except that her perfect sister’s perfect life was no longer perfect.
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_51c19f3d-816c-51d7-88ca-c5df87be4372)
Lauren
Widow: a woman whose spouse has died
SHE’D NEVER EXPECTED to fall in love when she was eighteen. That hadn’t been part of her plan. She’d had her life mapped out in her head. She was going to college, and after that she’d get a job in New York City. She was going to soak up bright lights and busy streets and learn everything she could about design until she was ready to start her own business.
That had always been her dream.
And then she’d met him.
Their relationship started with a single look. Until that moment she hadn’t realized so much could be conveyed without speech. It was more than interest. There was a connection.
It was the summer before she left for college and she was spending the long, hot humid months doing what all the other local teenagers did, namely working hard to make money for the winter. She had three jobs, one of which included bussing tables at a seafood restaurant.
She was clearing one of the tables on the sunny deck, counting the hours until she could go home, when a man strolled up to the takeout window.
