Page 17

Rebecca

I n the night, Rebecca turned over and bumped Mitch with her knee. His warm body spooned her from behind, and she had definitely awakened him, but he didn’t seem to mind as she kissed him in apology.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to bump you.”

He kissed her cheek and then her shoulder, then his arms tightened around her. Smoothly, he rolled her body so that he was on top of her and then took possession of her mouth.

“I don’t mind at all. I like being touched by you,” he said as he began kissing and nuzzling at her breasts. “Do you realize this is the first time we’ve officially spent the night together?”

“I don’t know if I can spend a night without you ever again. I like having you next to me in bed.”

“Good, so you’d better get used to me, Bex,” he said, sucking on her nipple.

Before long, she had wrapped her legs around him and guided him inside of her. Soon, they were making love again.

“Fast or slow?” he asked as he began a gentle rhythm.

“Slow, because I want you to be there a long time. I don’t think anything in the history of my world has ever felt as good as you do when you are inside me,” she managed.

“That is where I want to be. I love you, Rebecca Alexandra Stark,” he murmured.

“I love you too, Mitch Wilder,” she managed as he thrust into her. “Oh…oh…promise me this isn’t some wonderful dream.”

He nuzzled her neck and said, “It is real.”

“I don’t want it to end,” she murmured.

“It doesn’t have to. Let’s make this permanent. Will you marry me, Rebecca?”

“Yyyyyes,” she said and then was lost to her in her climax. He joined her in the release. So much for slow. They were still a little too ravenous for each other to enjoy a slow session of lovemaking.

Minutes later, she rested her cheek against his shoulder, her fingers running through the hair on his chest.

“When?” he asked as he pulled her closer.

“Tomorrow or later today?” she asked, thinking that he couldn’t possibly mean getting married, but if he was, she was game. The years apart had almost killed her.

“Okay,” he said, running his fingertips along her spine.

“I’m serious. I’ve wanted to marry you since I was fourteen. I’d marry you anywhere, any place, any time. I want to be able to call you, my husband.”

“I’m serious too,” he said, as he stopped moving his hand from the patterns he was making on her skin.

“I’d like to marry you later today. I want to be your husband.

I want you to be my wife. Enough of this bullshit.

I love you. Those last few years have almost killed me too.

Not one more day without you, without this.

I want you in my bed every night. I want to make love to you every night, and I want to make it legal.

I want the world to know that you are the woman I love. ”

“You’re serious,” she said, raising her head off his shoulder. “But we live in different countries.”

“Pick one you’d like to live in, and I’ll follow you there,” he said. “I don’t care where we live, just that we are together.”

“You’re serious,” she said again. He really had decided that they were to be together forever.

“Rebecca, I’ve been lost since I left for London.

I can’t tell you how many times before I left that summer after graduation that I almost turned around and drove to your house.

I was obsessed, and I told myself it wasn’t real.

Then I got this gift of having another chance.

I won’t blow it. I’m not letting you go.

I’m not letting you out of my sight ever again. ”

“Good. I don’t want to spend another day without you, but I think there is something I need to tell you,” she said, placing her hand on his cheek. She paused, then got up her courage to tell him something she had told no one.

“I hope it won’t make a difference, but I need to tell you. It happened a long time ago, and I’d deal differently with it today than I did then. I need you to know that. I could have handled it better, but I’m telling you now because I don’t want secrets between us.”

“You have a boyfriend? It better not be that Luther guy who took you out for sushi,” he said as his arms tightened around her.

“No, you kind of set the standard, and it hasn’t been easy to find anyone I like as well as you. You are it for me. And I have a confession to make,” she said with a laugh. “I made up Luther. A very nice lady named Bethany Ann kicked my butt that first night. Later, I kicked her butt.”

Mitch laughed and said, “I was jealous.”

“Good. No, I need to tell you about something that happened when I was eighteen.”

“Okay, six years ago. Is it something to do with me?” he asked as he snuggled against his pillow and looked at her.

“I should have told you,” she said. “Well, one person knows, but I haven’t seen her in years. This involves the two of us, and I’m sorry I didn’t tell you at the time. I’m sorry. I was scared. Hell, I was terrified.”

“It is okay, just tell me,” he said.

“I had an ectopic pregnancy that ended with an emergency surgery because I was bleeding internally. They had to remove the damaged fallopian tube, but I still have one. It is just that it might not be easy for me to conceive a baby.”

He sat up and looked down at her. “What? When? Was it our baby?”

She was silent for a long time. She had promised she would never tell him, but circumstances had changed. She said, “Yes.”

He sighed, placing his hand over his eyes. “I’m so sorry… I don’t know what to say. When did you find out? You could have told me. You didn’t need to go through that alone.” He looked at her then, his face pained and worried.

“I should have told you. It was in August, after we were together that June. I was an intern at Stark International in New York for the summer between my freshman and sophomore years at NYU.”

“I remember,” he said moving closer to her.

“Mom and Dad were in Portland thinking about moving Stark Headquarters to the Pacific Northwest, and Alex was off learning the hotel business in Canada somewhere. I knew you were just starting a new job, and I didn’t want to bother you.

Besides, I knew you couldn’t do anything from London.

I had this intense pain, and the head housekeeper, who I had gotten pretty close to, well, she took one look at me, got a cab, and went with me to the hospital.

I had to have emergency surgery because the tube ruptured.

By the time the family all met up at the house two weeks later, no one knew what I’d been through, and I didn’t tell them.

I’d recovered, but I was still a little pale from the blood loss.

I told the family I’d gotten a bad summer flu, and they believed me, but I lied. I broke their trust.”

“I’m so sorry…I…thought you were on the on the pill. I remember we talked about it that first day. I had condoms, but I really didn’t want to wear one. I was worried it would hurt you, then you told me you were on the pill.”

“No birth control is 100%. And if you remember, we made love a few times over the two weeks before you left.”

“A few is an understatement.”

“Well, yes,” she said with a little smile.

They made love at every opportunity they could find, which wasn’t easy with Alex as Mitch’s roommate and Rebecca living at home for the summer in between her years at college.

She had started the internship, but she was with Mitch every evening.

They lied to her family so they could be together, and they were—every night of those two weeks before he left.

And on the weekends, Rebecca told her mother she went shopping with friends but never returned with any shopping bags.

“I’m so sorry. I wish I’d known.” He looked tortured.

Rebecca sighed and said, “You didn’t know. It just happened.”

“What would you have done if you had found out you were pregnant, and the baby was okay? What if you had carried the baby to term?”

“I’ve thought a lot about that,” she said.

“I keep picturing this big coming together of the family. I think I would have told my family and you first, of course. I hoped we could have all come together and come up with a plan calmly, rationally, and civilly. Probably wouldn’t have exactly come together that way, but I’d have done anything to keep our baby. ”

“I’d have married you,” he said without hesitation. “Right after your dad and brother killed me.”

“Mom wouldn’t have let them. You’d have asked to marry me, and I always would have wondered if you were doing it because of the baby or because you loved me.”

“Well, I was in love with you then, so I’d have worked hard to convince you of my feelings.”

“I wonder if we would have lasted, being so young,” she said.

“We’d have lasted,” he said as he moved closer to her and held her hand in his. “I’m just so sorry you went through that.”

“I’ve had a lot of time to think of this. I’ve found my peace. Now you have to. I might never have children. I’m sorry.”

“It isn’t your fault. Most of your happiness in life is who you marry. If we are blessed with children, we will be doubly lucky,” he said and kissed her. Then he said, “I’m really sorry about the baby.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t get to see what we could have made together,” she said.

“I know. I wonder if it was a boy or girl.”

“Too early to tell, so they told me. But those are the kinds of thoughts it isn’t easy to let go of.”

“I should have asked you earlier, but I got a little distracted. What should we do about birth control? Should we use it? Do we need it?”

“I’ve used it sporadically, and I’ve never gotten pregnant,” she said. “I don’t want to use it with you. If we get pregnant, it would be a second chance.”

“Wouldn’t that be something? Our baby.”

“You have to be okay with me not ever getting pregnant,” she said.

“I want you more than anything else. It is hard for me to think that there were other men after me,” he said. “I need to deal with it, but it is hard.”