Elizabeth didn't hesitate in giving it to Laura with both barrels on the entire drive to the docks and Laura stayed quiet for the most part, knowing there wasn't a good enough excuse for how she had just literally walked out on Kevin and most especially the things she had said to him. She couldn't even articulate her reasoning to Elizabeth if she could hardly articulate it to herself.
She wanted Kevin, she wanted to make love to him and be with him in the most trusting of ways like that, just as much as he wanted her. She wanted nothing more than to fall asleep in his bed with his arms around her and wake up with his arms still around her, but she couldn't see herself taking that step with Kevin and letting herself be so happy with him when Lulu was so obviously unhappy. Laura turned to the car window so Elizabeth couldn't ask questions. Kevin was right. She didn't want to admit it but he was. It was time she started prioritizing herself and her own happiness no matter what her daughter might think. And, despite the last half hour, Kevin was first on the list of people that made her happy.
Elizabeth left her on the docks with a stern admonishment to at least text Kevin to tell him she got back to Wyndemere safe and to call him tomorrow and apologize for what she had done. Laura thanked her for the last-minute ride and promised to text him when she got home.
The first instinct Laura had when she woke up the next morning was to call Kevin. He'd appreciated the text she'd sent him when she got back to Wyndemere the night before and said that it was late, they both better be getting to bed. He hadn't sounded like himself and had cut off conversation quickly. Laura suspected he had been still mad at her. But today was a new day and if he was willing to listen she wanted desperately to see him face-to-face and apologize. Maybe if he wasn't busy she could meet him for lunch somewhere close to the hospital or she could even pick something up to-go and bring it to his office and they could eat there. (The privacy of his office got her vote because they could kiss and not have to worry about wandering hands. Whatever allowed her to spend time with him worked for her.) She was pretty sure she knew all or most of his favorite orders and could get him something he liked without having to call him and ask him what he wanted. Laura rolled over in bed and reached for her glasses, a smile spreading ear-to-ear when she saw the little envelope that signified she had a new text message. He couldn't still be that mad at her or else he wouldn't have texted her and it thrilled her and humbled her again that no matter that they had fought horribly only eleven hours earlier he had still reached out to her. He hadn't forgotten their game.
She knew without even looking the message was from Kevin. It was always from Kevin this early in the morning.
Laura lost count of the number of mornings the last two months that she'd woken up to reach for her phone and found a good-morning text from Kevin, complete with some odd and random factoid he'd heard on one of those Ripley's Believe It Or Not programs. (He'd tried to play it off as his daughter being the main reason he watched the show but she'd been at his apartment one night when one of the reruns was showing and quickly she learned the show was one of his guilty pleasures. It was adorable to see him so geeked out and excited and she still couldn't bring herself to tease him about it.) Or a long voicemail on his lunch break or a text in between his patient sessions and afternoons of paperwork to tell her nothing except that he was thinking about her and he missed her. It had shocked her completely a couple of weeks ago when Kevin had called her from the grocery store saying he was standing in the aisle that had all the coffee and it had occurred to him just then that he didn't know if the coffee he had for himself at home was the kind she liked. It had taken her even longer to realize he was asking her what type of coffee she liked so he could buy it and have it at his home. When she had finally found her voice and asked what he thought he was doing wanting to buy her favorite coffee for his apartment, he'd easily said that he wanted her to be comfortable in his apartment when she came over and that included creature comforts like coffee.) It had all been a stark reminder of how different being in a relationship with Kevin Collins would be, but in a good way. In a wonderful way, Laura thought as she swiped to unlock her phone. It was wonderful to have Kevin showing her how much he cared about her, and in turn it wasn't scary as much anymore for her to admit how much she cared about him. Cared was enough of a word for now for how she felt about him; she didn't want to think yet about those other words, three to be exact. She thought she might get there someday in the future, but not yet.
Laura wasn't surprised to watch the phone update itself after she unlocked it and watched as the single text message icon turned into several, but the time-stamp on the first message did give her pause. It was Thursday morning, Thursday was a weekday. Kevin took his professional commitments and thus his sleep during the week very seriously and it was a rare occasion he stayed up past eleven, what was he doing awake at three in the morning and texting her? Of course if he needed something urgent he could have called but surely he had to have known she'd be asleep at that time and not in the mood for idle chit-chat.
She clicked on Kevin's name in her text message inbox and his first message appeared right away. Laura, I'm leaving Port Charles. I'm so sorry to do this over the phone after what happened between us last night, but -
Tears immediately pricked her eyes and she felt her heart hammering beneath her ribs. No. No, no, no. She'd had so much fun getting to know Kevin these past eight months and dating him for the last two - he was the only person to make it bearable to relive all of her Cassadine memories the way she was forced to in order to help Kevin uncover the meaning behind Helena's mystery clues - that this couldn't be how it ended between them. Not because they'd had a fight. Not because of her. It seemed like it was going to take forever for her to open the rest of her messages from him and for as long as it took her to do so she was without a doubt certain this was his way of breaking up with her.
But it took her only a few seconds to close her eyes and conjure up Kevin's face in her mind and remind herself that she was being stupid, that he was better than that and she was too important to him to warrant such an impersonal breakup. He said last night that she was important to him. Kevin was good to her, he made her happy and he made her smile and he made her laugh. But above all of those wonderful things was the equally wonderful thing that he was kind. Gentlemanly and courteous.. Old-fashioned and romantic, especially these last few weeks in the privacy of his apartment. All qualities she wasn't used to in a man but she wanted to think she understood Kevin well enough to understand that if he wanted to break up with her he'd do it in person and not over the phone. She didn't want him to break up with her. Not so soon, certainly, but she wasn't sure that she would be able to be okay with him breaking up with her ever.
She scrolled through the entirety of the message chain frantically, they were all time-stamped within a ten-minute period, and as soon as she read them she wiped her eyes and felt so embarrassed and self-absorbed to think he was worrying about her at all when he had written those messages. Something's wrong with my daughter, I have to go be with her. It's three o'clock in the morning and Christina called me sobbing so hard she couldn't even talk to me but her roommate took the phone and told me she's been throwing up for two days straight. She's sick, Laura. I'm booking myself the first flight to Paris as I write this and I don't know how long I'll be gone. I'm sorry for dropping this on you last-minute but whenever I get back I'll come to you and we can talk about last night. I'll call you or text you when I can. Please get in touch with Monica Quartermaine for me and tell her I'm taking emergency personal days. I'll call her myself but want someone to know as soon as possible and I'm going right to Christina when the plane lands.
Another message, time-stamped twenty minutes later than the others. Will you take a rain check for that date on Friday?
And another message, two minutes after that one. I care about you, Laura. Very much. I promise we'll talk soon.
She called Kevin right away without knowing what time it was in Paris or if he was even there yet and his phone went right to voicemail. Laura wrote a short text and told him she'd talk to Monica first thing today and tell her what was going on and that she was there for him for whatever else he needed her to do. She told him to check his email when he could, she'd send him a longer message there where she could tell him everything she needed to tell him and not have to worry about limiting character requirements.
Laura immediately created an alarm to go off in an hour to remind her to call Monica, and then pulled up her email to type up a long message to Kevin. The most important thing was to tell him that she cared about him very much and she hoped his daughter would be happy and healthy soon. She knew he and Lucy must be worried about her, but Laura was confident Christina would be fine. (She didn't want to think about the alternative for Kevin's sake.) She went on to tell him that when he got back they'd have that long talk he wanted and they could absolutely have a re-do of their date when he came home, if he still wanted. She needed Kevin to know most of all that he could call her anytime if he wanted or needed to talk, no matter what time it was for her. Kevin had been there for her faithfully the last eight months, he deserved for her to be there for him now. Especially if something was seriously wrong with his and Lucy's daughter. (Laura rightly expected that Lucy would soon be in Paris, too, but tried not to think too much about Lucy and Kevin together for what might be a significant amount of time in the city of love and romance.) Laura knew how frightened she would be if Lulu or Nikolas called her in the middle of the night because they were hurt or in the middle of some kind of crisis, she couldn't even imagine how hard it was for Kevin to have Christina halfway across the world. Lucky was in Ireland but he had always been independent like his father. Lulu and Nikolas were here in Port Charles and still she worried about them more than was probably needed.
A few days turned into a week which turned into three weeks and Laura was diligent about having her phone charged and with her at all times. Kevin had answered her initial email within hours that first day and she had assured him she'd gotten everything squared away with Monica. They talked on the phone at least every other day though she was mindful of the time difference and the cost of international phone calls so she always tried to keep it under ten minutes. The rest of their talking was done through texting and old-fashioned email. She and Kevin texted so much she hoped Nikolas didn't happen upon her cell phone bill for the month.
Kevin had been in Paris for three days when Laura got an urgent text from him asking her to please, please find Lucy and have her call him immediately. Laura got more worried for Christina and Kevin and even for Lucy when he said that but Kevin wouldn't tell her anything else but they were going to stay in France until she recovered. Laura was pleasantly surprised that he even thought to run his plans by her and keep her updated on when he planned to be home. He certainly didn't need her permission to care for his daughter.
Something did happen out of the ordinary while Kevin was away that Laura kept meaning to ask him about. She had chalked it up at first to Lucy being stressed out about her daughter being so far away from her while sick but the more she thought about it the more she wanted to tell Kevin about it when he got home. But not yet. She kept their conversations short and encouraging and promised him she'd be there waiting for him when he felt he was ready to come back to Port Charles. It wasn't her business or her place - Lucy was Christina's mother and deserved to be kept in the loop - but Lucy hadn't been very nice to her. The first time Kevin brought Lucy into the conversation when he returned she would mention it.
Laura kept herself busy the rest of the time Kevin was gone and went through several drafts before finishing a handwritten letter to her daughter. She would drive by Lulu and Dante's place and stick it through the mailbox at a time Lulu was sure to be at Crimson with Maxie or at PCPD headquarters with Dante. She had time to think with Kevin away and agreed with him that she needed to prioritize him and their relationship. This would be a good start.
The look of surprise that flashed across his face when he saw her waiting for him at the baggage claim was well worth the worry she'd had initially about whether or not she should pick him up from the airport. The way he immediately started walking faster to close the distance between them and enveloped her in a hug and murmured soft enough only for her to hear that he missed her so much and was so happy to see her here waiting for him meant the world to her. As did the way his hand reached out for hers and pulled her away from the hustle and bustle of the airport crowd to give her a proper hello kiss.
Kevin had told her on the drive back to Port Charles that he had spoken to Monica and wasn't scheduled to return to work until the next week so he had two days off in addition to the weekend and he would very much like to spend a good chunk of that time with her. Laura squeezed his hand in silent agreement; she wasn't going to say no to spending time with him. She wanted to talk to him as soon as possible about the important decisions she made while he was away. Talk, she reminded herself, talk. They needed to talk first and then she could show him the rest.
He didn't want to talk about Christina, she noticed. She also had noticed that Lucy had arrived back in Port Charles a week before Kevin had and hadn't spoken to her once.
He picked her up at Wyndemere later that day and from the docks they had a wonderful forty-minute car ride to the restaurant - the same Italian restaurant he'd had to cancel on her three weeks earlier - where they easily caught up on all the little things about each other's lives that hadn't made it into their emails, texts, or phone calls. When they got to the restaurant and pulled into the parking lot, however, Kevin had intentionally parked them away from other cars and unbuckled his seatbelt and hers, pulling her into his arms for what quickly turned into intense and heavy kissing. Laura only hesitated for a brief second before wrapping her arms around his neck and they proceeded to make out like teenagers - in his car, no less - for ten minutes. She attributed it to not seeing each other in person for three weeks why he was clinging to her a little tighter and holding her like he was afraid that if he let go she might disappear, but she wasn't going to say no to kissing him. He had a look in his eyes she hadn't seen before when he finally let her go and reached for the handle on his car door and she couldn't explain the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach that he hadn't told her everything that had happened in France.
Kevin and Laura walked hand-in-hand to the restaurant, Kevin immediately seeking out her hand to curl his fingers around hers when she had closed her car door, and Laura took the few seconds she had while Kevin was speaking to the hostess about their reservation to gently take away her hand and reach inside her purse for her phone to turn it off. Tonight was going to be all about Kevin in more ways than one and she for sure didn't want a repeat of their first date. She went to turn off the phone and blinked in surprise when she saw the message on her screen from Elizabeth Webber, in all capital letters. IMPORTANT AND URGENT RE: YOUR DATE WITH KEVIN. PLEASE CALL ME.
Laura stepped into a tucked-away corner, called Elizabeth and spoke with her for a few minutes, and hung up the phone and tucked it in her purse. Kevin was waiting for her and she told him everything was fine. Because it would be.
Laura might not have known more than the bare basics Kevin had told her about what happened between him and Lucy at the Nurses' Ball, but she knew enough. She knew enough to know that, despite Kevin's pleas to her to get in touch with Lucy for Christina's sake and that Lucy would be joining him in Paris, his ex-wife's infidelity and shameless flaunting of the affair had deeply wounded Kevin to the point where friendship between the former spouses was out of the question and they didn't talk unless it concerned Christina. She also knew that Kevin was one of the kindest and gentlest men she'd ever met and she was determined to protect him tonight if what Elizabeth had told her was true. Lucy simply wouldn't get the chance to get close enough to Kevin to ever be able to hurt him again, not if Laura had anything to say about it.
"We could have done this another night, you know," she murmured twenty minutes later, after they had been seated and gotten their drinks and been served their appetizers - stuffed mushrooms to share. The waitress had just left the table after taking their entree orders and Kevin was as polite and well-mannered as always but Laura knew something was bothering him, and she was pretty sure that something involved Christina. She would give him the same respect he always gave her though, and wait until he was ready to share. "Not that you're not good company, but you're quiet tonight. Is the time difference and the jet lag catching up to you?"
Kevin shook his head and used his knife and fork to split the last stuffed mushroom between them. "No jet lag and I honestly don't think I slept enough the entire three weeks to even notice the time change. Lucy and I were with her in the hospital and then when she was released we alternated one of us doing her errands and one of us staying with her in the apartment so she was never alone. Lucy and I slept in different bedrooms, don't worry. Lucy actually left a couple of days after Christina got released and so for the last two weeks it was just me. Believe me, I slept from the minute the plane left the tarmac in Paris to when it touched down at the airport here." He laughed a little. "Christina and I must have stayed awake until three AM watching her favorite movies on Netflix and while she is in the age range to be able to pull all-nighters and be fully functioning at eight, I am sorry to report that that I am too old for that sort of thing." Kevin passed Laura her half of the last stuffed mushroom. "I answered your question and then some, my dear. You, on the other hand, have very admirably ignored every one of my attempts to get you to talk about Lulu and whether things have changed on that front since you wrote her that letter."
"Yes, I have, and a smarter man would take the hint to stop asking," she said lightly, taking a sip of her wine. He got the same clouded expression in his eyes he'd had for most of the evening so far and Laura reached across the table for his hand, stroking gently the inside of his palm with her fingers. "Hey, Kev, look at me," she murmured. "We never were able to get into it much when we talked, but is Christina okay? She must be because you felt comfortable leaving her but I got the feeling when I talked to you that it was worse than you thought it would be." Laura knew how scared he had been because that had been one of the first things he admitted to her when they first were able to connect on the phone - how he hadn't felt that helpless as a father in a very long time and how it terrified him that something might have been wrong that he wouldn't have been able to fix just because he and Lucy weren't Christina's biological parents. "Kevin? They did say it was just food poisoning, right?"
Kevin sighed, and Laura thought sadly that there must be something otherworldly fascinating about the tablecloth pattern the way he kept his focus on it and nothing else. "The most severe case of food poisoning he'd seen. She was in the hospital for four days and I don't think Lucy or I slept more than two hours at a time for those four days. For the first two days she was there they couldn't figure out what was wrong and kept running all these tests -"
Laura continued to stroke his wrist with her fingers. "There's nothing quite like the overwhelming fear you get when your child is in the hospital, is there?"
Kevin didn't let go of her hand and Laura knew there was more she hadn't yet been told. She squeezed his hand in silent support and waited for him to say it. "When I first got her to the hospital she was asked by the first nurse we saw if she was sexually active. She said yes and their first action was to run a pregnancy test because they thought she might be having a miscarriage or it was an ectopic pregnancy." He squeezed Laura's hand even tighter. "Ectopic pregnancy, Laura, I didn't even know she had a boyfriend or was having sex."
"But it wasn't, right? She's not pregnant and it was just supremely awful food poisoning?" she asked after a few seconds of silence, cautiously. She wanted Kevin to be able to focus on the part where his daughter was healthy and happy now. "She's not pregnant?"
Her words didn't make him look any less miserable. "No. She's not, but just the idea that it was a possibility…" He struggled to come up with the right words. "I don't care how old she is, Laura, she's still my little girl. I don't want her to be old enough to have sex."
Laura hesitated. "She's twenty-four years old, Kevin," she said quietly. "I'm sorry to say that she's an adult and doesn't need your permission. She's old enough and I'm sure if she's anything like you she's responsible enough to make the right decision for her and be safe." She was quiet for a few moments while she waited for him to say something and when he didn't she hesitated once more before she said anything. "You texted me one day that Lucy couldn't deal with seeing Christina in the hospital because it brought back bad memories." Laura brought his hand to her mouth and kissed his knuckles softly. "Clearly Lucy isn't the only one that had bad memories about something. What happened, Kevin?"
Kevin shook his head. "I will tell you one day, I promise, but not now and not here. It's not something I like to talk about." His face brightened. "But, you know, when Lucy and I brought Christina back to her apartment and we had to wait on her hand and foot for a few days - she'll tell you she didn't but I will maintain to my dying day that Christina enjoyed bossing us around way too much," he laughed. "Lucy and I were on our best behavior but I think it hurt her feelings a little bit that Christina wanted me a whole lot more than she wanted her. The two of them haven't been close for a couple of years, but Christina practically had a panic attack those first few days if I tried to leave the room. It reminded me of when she was little and I tried to get her to take her naps." He sighed and shook his head again, staring at Laura. "I'm sorry, honey, I don't know why I'm telling you all of this."
Laura found herself smiling at the picture in her head of Kevin unsuccessfully trying to get his toddler daughter down for a nap and not being able to leave the room because Christina wanted her daddy, and didn't have any doubts whatsoever that Kevin must have been an incredible father. She was all of a sudden hit with an unexpected pang of regret that she and Kevin had found each other late in life that a pregnancy and parenthood wouldn't ever be in the cards for them. He would be so good with another child, as good as he was with his daughter.
"Your subconscious must be telling you that you want to talk about it," she said matter-of-factly, enjoying entirely too much the look of amused surprise on his face. "I like listening to you when you talk about psychiatry and I promise some of what you talk about does sink in," she laughed. The waitress approached to bring their food and once they had their meals in front of them and Laura offered Kevin one of her shrimps she opened her mouth again. "You brought up Lucy four times in that conversation just now so I'm taking it as a sign. I promised myself that if you brought up her name I would tell you. Kevin, I don't want to be the woman that can't handle the fact that you have an ex-wife but - something happened while you were gone."
He immediately looked up from his plate. Laura didn't strike him as the jealous type and she wasn't sounding jealous, but sometimes with women you never knew. She was still holding his left hand so that had to be a positive sign. "Tell me," he encouraged her. "Laura, if something happened with Lucy while I was with my daughter, please tell me. I want to know if she did anything to upset you."
Laura sighed. If only he knew. "Kevin, believe me, I know she's your ex-wife and she's Christina's mother, she's made that quite clear to me. I know you have to have some type of relationship with her. I understand all of that and I honor it, really I do. I don't want to cause trouble. But last week I was at the hospital and I don't know how but Lucy found me, and she cornered me in one of the back hallways -" A smile tugged at her mouth. "It was the back hallway where you kissed me for the first time, I don't think she knew that."
Kevin stopped mid-bite and swallowed, holding up his hand. His instincts were telling him to go across to her side of the booth and hold her but because they were in a public place he restrained himself. His voice was outwardly pleasant, but steely and determined. "I will call her and speak to her. Please tell me she did not put her hands on you. Christina tells me she's having problems with me getting back into dating after so long."
"Oh, Kevin, no, babe, she didn't hurt me physically. I think she assumes I have a more significant relationship with Christina then I do. She took offense to the fact that I was the one to find her and tell her to call you when you needed to get a hold of her for Christina's sake, and she asked me why I thought it was my place to deliver along your messages. She also wanted me to tell her why Christina wanted you specifically to stay with her in Paris and not her. I told her that was best a conversation she should be having with you because you're her father." Laura glanced at him. "I hoped that would be okay with you. I didn't know what else it was my right to say. I don't think she liked it when I said that, but hey, I didn't like being bombarded in the hallway when all I was there to do was pick up my prescription, so we're even."
Kevin leaned across the booth to give her a quick kiss to stop her rambling, something neither of them felt entirely comfortable doing on their Port Charles dates even now, two and a half months into their relationship. One of the many reasons they spent the majority of their dating time outside the city. "I promise you that I will speak to her as soon as possible. I asked you to find her and tell her to call me because she wasn't answering my calls and I should have expected her to put you in the middle. I'm sorry. I'm sorry she she brought you into the middle of this and I'm sorry if she scared you. All you really need to know is that when she and I divorced one of the few things we agreed on was that we needed to make it as easy on Christina as possible. Let's just say that when she found out what her mother did and who she cheated on me with she took my side in a big way and her relationship with her mother hasn't been the same since. Even now when Christina is hurt or upset or needs advice…"
"...she wants you and not her mother," Laura finished. She took a bite of her food and kept her eye on the door. There was a reason she had insisted on sitting on this side of the booth. She'd have to remember to thank Elizabeth later for warning her so she could keep an eye on Kevin. "Honestly, Kev, and I'm sorry if I'm overstepping or I'm too blunt, but I can't say I disagree."
"If you ever do overstep I'll let you know, but overstepping is much more Lucy's style than yours. Forgive me but I don't want to talk about her. We have been apart for three weeks and I missed you." Laura's bright smile and sparkling eyes warmed his heart. "I want to talk about you and me and everything you've wanted to tell me since I've been gone. You mentioned one night on the phone that Dante and Lulu were looking for a new house?"
She nodded and twirled a bite of his pasta around her fork, blushing slightly when he pushed the plate towards her. "They put an offer in on a nice little house not far from the PCPD. It has a good-sized yard for Rocco and the dog and they wanted three bedrooms because they are trying to have another baby. It's a cute house, Dante showed me the pictures." She refused to think about how the only reason she knew this at all was because her son-in-law had called her and showed her the pictures, not because Lulu had told her or even asked for her opinion. Laura knew this was Lulu's way of getting back at her by withholding her own special information, but Lulu would just have to get with the program because Laura couldn't remember being this happy in a long time and didn't see herself giving Kevin up anytime soon. "Didn't I tell you all of this? At least about them looking for a house?"
"Oh, I'm sure you did, but as I said earlier I barely slept when Christina was in the hospital and Lucy left a few days after we got her home so it was two weeks of being a single parent to a very sick child. And Christina isn't the most tolerant person to be around when she's sick. So it's entirely possible you told me this story on one of my most exhausted nights and I blanked it out. Sorry." He gave her fingers a gentle squeeze. "Though I am glad Lulu is talking to you again."
"She isn't," Laura said quietly. "The letter I wrote her didn't help. I only know about the house offer because of Dante and they started seriously talking about trying for a second child months ago. As far as I know they haven't even started Lulu on hormones yet." He looked confused and she explained to him how Lulu being frozen by Stavros - credit to him and the time they had spent together talking out all things Cassadine that Kevin hardly flinched at the idea of her daughter being forcibly frozen and having her eggs taken without her consent by the very same Cassadine that had raped and kidnapped Laura - had done irrevocable damage to Lulu's fertility and how this one remaining embryo they had (fully a biological Lulu and Dante child, she assured him) was their last chance to have a baby and for Lulu to be pregnant. Laura heard herself confessing to him that she hoped so much that she and Lulu could work it out between them soon, that she didn't know if she'd be able to take it if the eventual embryo transfer worked and Lulu told other friends and family she was pregnant before she told her. Kevin didn't say a word while she collected herself and murmured that he was sure it wouldn't come to that. Lulu would come around, he promised her softly. If worse came to worse he'd talk to her himself.
Laura absently ran her thumb across the flesh between his thumb and index finger. "Thank you. But I don't want to talk about Lulu right now, either. Would you put your fork down and look at me, please?" she whispered. She set down her own fork. "Kevin, I need to apologize. Profusely. That night before you left for Paris - what happened between us, you asked me to stay the night and I treated you terribly. I ran away when I shouldn't have when all I wanted to do was to stay. I know we both said some things we shouldn't have...mostly me...but when I woke up that morning and saw that text from you saying you were leaving Port Charles, before I read the other ones, Kevin, it broke my heart because I thought you were breaking up with me. And I would have completely deserved it."
Concern etched on his face. "Laura, I didn't intend for you to think..."
She smiled. "I know you didn't, but you know me, I think the worst about everything. Kevin, I was so worried for you and for Christina while you were in France, but - I missed you so much. And it wasn't just the physical between us that I missed even though that part is great. You've become my best friend and I missed being able to talk to you and see you in person every day. I also have no problem admitting that I did miss kissing you and how it feels when we're alone to have you hold me." Both of their plates of food stayed untouched for the moment, unnoticed. "I thought about it a lot while you were gone and I hope very much that if I ask nicely the offer you made me that night is still on the table." She stroked the inside of his palm. "Because you have the next three days off and I intend to spend at least two of those days with you." She broke off abruptly and happened to see behind Kevin's head to the front of the restaurant where two people were being led to a table on the other side of the restaurant but still in full view of theirs if Laura looked ahead or Kevin turned around and she couldn't have that. "Trust me, please," she muttered. She stood up in her side of the booth, grabbed for Kevin's tie with one hand and the back of his neck with the other, and kissed him hard on the mouth. Kevin apparently got over his surprise awfully quickly and kissed her back and she only pulled away when she remembered what this was for and that they were in a public place. She would be able to kiss him like that all she wanted later - she hoped. If he was still in the mood. "Hey, eyes on me, babe," she murmured, touching his cheek before reluctantly sitting back down. "I'm right here, we're on a great date, don't look at anybody or anywhere but me."
Kevin's eyes finally focused back on hers and he gave her a crooked half-grin, that special look she liked to think now was reserved just for her. "And here I was worried that I'd messed up so badly the night before I left you wouldn't kiss me like that again and you wouldn't agree to be my girlfriend."
Laura wanted to be Kevin's girlfriend more than she'd wanted anything in a long time. "I think you should go ahead and ask me and find out."
"Laura, will you be my girlfriend?"
She stood up just enough to where she could kiss him again, all at once fervently wishing they were away from the restaurant and at his apartment so she could kiss him like she really wanted to. And to tell him what she had wanted to tell him before she'd gotten interrupted. Or maybe Kevin would rather she show him. "I would love to be your girlfriend," she told him seriously. "And once we finish this lovely dinner and get back to your car, I'll kiss you again."
He held her gaze for a long, long time, his expressive eyes rich with something she couldn't determine. "Laura Spencer, I will most definitely hold you to that." He reluctantly stopped himself from looking at her and went back to his food before it got cold. "Please don't think I'm complaining because I'm not, you can kiss me like that anytime and anywhere you want to, but - what did you do that for?"
Laura watched him carefully with gentle concern and hesitated only slightly before deciding to get it over with. They were already there. "I'm sorry, I couldn't think of anything else. Not that I haven't wanted to kiss you like that for three weeks, but - I know how hard this place is to get reservations to and how much you wanted to take me, and I didn't want you to think you had to change our plans. That was the only way I could think of to distract you so you wouldn't turn around and see that table over there and and be blindsided when you saw Lucy and Scotty just got seated over there."
Kevin was silent for a few uncomfortable seconds, before he finally looked up at Laura and forced a smile. Because she had only been trying to help and none of this was her fault. It was just a stupid coincidence. He appreciated her for looking out for him. "Do you know that in the three years since our divorce plus the six months she was cheating on me I somehow managed to live my life perfectly happily without seeing them on a date together?" He managed a laugh - heavy with long-standing and repressed bitterness, Laura thought - and shot her a rueful smile. "Oh, yes, I had a lot of time to think after I moved out and very quickly I figured it out just how long Lucy had been sleeping with Scotty behind my back." Kevin sighed. "So doesn't it just figure that once I find a woman to be happy with after so long, Lucy and I end up at the same restaurant. On the same night at the same time. And one that's completely on the outskirts of Port Charles, naturally."
"Naturally," Laura murmured in agreement. "I'm sure there's some sort of clinical theory about that. Maybe if you looked in your psychiatry textbooks you could find one."
Kevin finally laughed, a real laugh. "I'm sure if you looked hard enough you could find a clinical description of any theory you could think of." He immediately and smoothly changed the subject away from Lucy and to Christina and what all they had done together for the two weeks he was there to care for her, how all the time spent watching movies and playing games and even just talking made him even more unbelievably difficult for him to come back to New York without his daughter. He told Laura that he'd asked Christina to figure out a time that worked for her to come visit him and to let him know and he'd pay for the tickets. (He laughed when he told Laura that he'd had to specify to Christina that he'd pay for business class but not first class.)
But when Christina did come to visit, he told her quietly, somewhat cautiously, he'd like to invite Christina to come to one of his and Laura's lunch dates so he could introduce her to Laura. In person. If that was okay with both of them.
Kevin had formally met Nikolas and Spencer, for obvious reasons; Laura had on purpose limited his chances of him running into Lulu, for equally obvious reasons, but being introduced officially to Kevin's daughter was something different. She knew simply by the way Kevin talked about her how deeply he adored his daughter and how much he valued her opinions.
It meant a lot to Laura that he thought enough time had passed from their first date and their relationship was in a good enough place for him to introduce her to his daughter, and it also showed her how deeply she and Kevin were becoming involved in each other's lives. That didn't even come close to scaring her like it used to. "I'd like that," she told him softly. "I'd like that a lot. I've been texting her every so often since you gave me her number and she knows who I am. Sometimes she texts me to ask me questions about you, I can't imagine why." She paused, choosing her words carefully. "Did you talk about me to her, when you were in Paris?"
Kevin again stroked her palm with his thumb, because he understood what she was really asking. "I told her you were my girlfriend and that I cared about you very much. Does that work for you?"
Laura's smile was all the answer he needed and he smiled back, squeezing her hand. The next twenty minutes of their meal were remarkably uneventful and she used that time to in the back of her mind plan out how she was going to tell him what she'd been interrupted in trying to say earlier. She considered just letting the evening take them where it may and trusting him to figure it out but after what had happened the last night they were alone together she thought that highly unlikely. Laura was thinking that her best course of action would just be to say it out loud and let the chips fall where they may when something across the room caught her attention and she set her fork down in disgust. "Oh, you have got to be kidding me."
"Hm? What is it, Laura?" He watched his girlfriend's face as her eyes darted nervously from the opposite side of the restaurant to him, and then back to the table where his ex-wife and her boyfriend sat. "Honey, you don't have to spy on Lucy and Scotty for me. I don't care if they are here or not, I'm much more interested in you and what you were saying earlier before we got interrupted. You had decided something while I was away, about us?"
She kept talking. "As sweet as that is, Kevin, and honestly you have no idea what it means to me to hear you say that, I'm pretty sure judging by the commotion over there that Scotty and your - Lucy just got engaged."
Kevin shook his head. Lucy hadn't been his for a very long time, even for some of the time he was still her husband. "Lucy's not my anything anymore except for my child's mother and so if she wants to marry Scott Baldwin that's her business." He shrugged. "I hope he makes her happy because obviously Christina and I couldn't."
"You don't mean that," she murmured. "You can't seriously believe your wife cheating on you with Scott Baldwin was your fault, babe."
He stared at her, not unkindly, but with eyes blazing with emotion and three years worth of deep personal hurt. "What do you want me to say, Laura? When you hear it enough times that your wife wouldn't have cheated if only you were home more or paid attention to her more or made her feel wanted, then yes, it starts to sink in that maybe it was my fault. And I'm not ashamed to admit that seeing her here with him hurts, that it stings how she can be so casual flaunting around her dating the man that she broke up our marriage for without a thought to how confusing it would be for Christina, but at the same time Lucy and Scotty getting engaged is not what I want to be focused on when I'm on a date with you. Especially not when you agreed to be my girlfriend and meet my daughter and promised me a really good kiss when we get out of here, ideally when we're alone." His expression turned tender and he kissed her hand. "I do appreciate you looking out for me, though, Laura, thank you. That means a lot."
He wished it wasn't so automatic of Laura to blush and avert her eyes from his penetrating gaze when he complimented her. One of his first duties as her boyfriend was to work on her self-esteem. "I just know if it was me I'd much rather be told what the situation was and not be blindsided later."
Kevin suspected there was a backstory to her comment and she wasn't only referring to Lucy and Scotty being here tonight but he let it go. "Stop it, Laura," he murmured, following her gaze to the table Lucy and Scotty were at, and sure enough Scotty was still on one knee in front of Lucy. "Give it up, man, the show's over," he muttered. Laura's sudden cough was the only evidence that she had heard him say that. He sighed. "It's okay, hon. I'm okay, really. You don't have to worry about me."
"Lucy's coming over here to talk to you," she whispered in a hurried breath when she saw Lucy stride quickly to their booth. "If you want me to keep quiet I will but I should warn you I don't suffer fools gladly and if she starts in on me I will talk back to her. Quietly. With enough decorum for a public place."
"Noted," he said, the corners of his mouth tugging into a smile. He scooted a few inches to the left and farther away from the edge of the booth only seconds before Lucy appeared but he wasn't happy with what happened next. Lucy materialized next to him and sat down beside him on the booth seat and called him Doc, running her fingers through his hair in a way that was entirely too intimate for their current strained relationship. Kevin glanced at Laura apologetically and saw her looking, to put it mildly, less than thrilled. Her grip on his hand got tighter and she looked down at the table.
Laura looked up, her eyes narrowed at what she immediately noticed as a marking-her-territory and possessive action in a long list of possessive actions, and for the briefest of moments she fantasized about how good it would feel to take one for the team and punch Lucy Coe right in the face. For Kevin's sake mostly but also for Christina's. And hers. But she snuck one look at Kevin, who looked as apologetic and also as embarrassed as she'd ever seen him, and decided against it. She was determined to show Lucy who was the better person here. Her mouth, however, showed no such promise to be restrained despite what she had promised Kevin. "Kevin and I are on our first date in weeks, actually, and we're headed home soon so if you could keep your hands off of him both of us would appreciate that very much. Can we help you with something?"
"Yes. You can stay out of my business when I need to talk to my husband about our daughter. I am perfectly capable of answering Kevin's phone calls and don't need you seeking me out in the hospital to tell me to call Kevin about Christina. If Kevin needs me to know something, he's a big boy. He can get in touch with me himself."
"Ex-husband," Kevin corrected quickly. "I'm your ex-husband and you don't get to talk to Laura that way in my presence or in anyone's presence. I called you about Christina for two days and you didn't answer my calls. She needed you. She needed her mom."
"I came, didn't I?"
"When it was convenient for you and you only stayed two days after she got released from the hospital and then you ran back home. That hardly counts as being there for our daughter by my definition," he said quietly but firmly. He snuck a second glance at his girlfriend. "And I don't think it's appropriate to have this conversation here or in front of Laura. We do need to talk about Christina and I think it's best that I call you so we can pick a time and place to meet and -"
"And what, Kevin Collins?" Lucy hissed. She wasn't even looking at Laura anymore. "You have turned Christina against me ever since we divorced so guess what? When I got to Paris she always turned to you for comfort and wanted nothing to do with me." Her eyes filled with tears. "Being there in the hospital with her was hard for me, Kevin, you know why!"
"You weren't the only one that had those memories, Lucy," he forced himself to say. Laura held his hand and nudged his foot under the table so he would look up and see that she was still there with him and supporting him. She had a sinking feeling there was something in Kevin and Lucy's past she wasn't privy to, something else bad besides the divorce, and whatever it was Lucy seemed to be bringing it up on purpose for the sole reason of upsetting him. "Don't you dare think you're the only one that remembers. I do, too, I remember it every day, but Christina needed both of us to be there for her."
"You had no right, Kevin! You had no right to appoint yourself -"
"I am her father, Lucy, she has my name! I have every right!" Lucy looked triumphant and Laura gazed at him with gentle concern, so Kevin consciously lowered his voice. "I am her father, Lucy, she has my name, I have every right to do what's best for her." He scooted further away from her. "We will discuss Christina at another time. Why are you here talking to me and do you think you can tell me the truth as to why my girlfriend jumped up and kissed me the moment you and Scotty walked in the door and her reasoning was that she didn't want me to be blindsided?"
Laura smirked and found her voice. "Elizabeth Webber, the nurse you talked to to find out about Kevin's plans tonight and where he was taking me? Elizabeth Webber happens to be my former daughter-in-law and mother to three of my grandchildren. She warned me that you and Scotty would show up here tonight but Kevin worked hard to find reservations at a restaurant outside of Port Charles that he thought I would like and reservations here are hard to come by. I didn't want him to have to cancel when he'd already cancelled once." She leveled her gaze at Lucy Coe. "Don't you dare lie to him and tell him you didn't do that because I know you did. The only thing I can't figure out is if you knew Scotty was going to propose and decided you might as well throw that in Kevin's face too."
Lucy smirked and Laura concentrated very hard on her glass of wine so she wouldn't have to watch up-close how Lucy got even closer to Kevin and practically shoved her left hand into his face. "He did and I thought it was only right and proper that Kevin be the first to know that Scott Baldwin and I are getting married."
"So I heard," Kevin muttered noncommittally.
"The whole restaurant heard," Laura replied when it was obvious that Kevin was done talking to his ex-wife. She felt Kevin nudge her foot under the table and she couldn't help but grin. She couldn't wait to get out of here away from Lucy and be alone with him. Providing the run-in with Lucy hadn't dampened his mood too much. "You didn't have to tell Kevin about this now, did you? I'm sure a phone call would have been more appropriate."
"I don't think you need to be telling me what is or isn't appropriate when it comes to Kevin and I and our daughter."
Kevin drummed his free hand on the table. Not only was Lucy ruining his perfectly fine date with Laura, but their food was getting cold. "You're getting married. To Scott. Good for you, I hope he makes you happy."
Laura lifted her head quickly when the other woman didn't take the hint that the conversation was over and walk away. "I happen to think Kevin is being unreasonably generous towards you given the circumstances. The circumstances where you had an affair behind his back for months with your daughter's legal father, somehow convinced his best friend to lie to him for you and keep your secret, and then both of you proceeded to use the hospital's charity event to humiliate him in front of all of Port Charles?" She gave Lucy an insincere smile. "I bet those circumstances are hard to forget."
"Laura," Kevin warned under his breath, a touch of disapproval in his voice. A hint of a smile tugged at his mouth.
"I - wasn't aware you knew the whole story. Kevin doesn't talk about it."
Laura couldn't stop herself from smirking. The three of them - four, if they decided to include Scott - really were too old to play this jealousy and one-upmanship game but she wouldn't deny the satisfaction it gave her to get one over on Lucy Coe after everything the woman had done to hurt Kevin. And apparently that wasn't the only big thing she had done to hurt him. "He told me. Your betrayal and your blatant disregard for the vows you took and the promises you made each other hurt him extremely badly, but he told me. One night in his apartment." She took special satisfaction at how Lucy's eyes narrowed at the thought of Laura in Kevin's apartment at night. Laura waited patiently for when Lucy looked up again and she looked straight back at the other woman, unflinching. "When you said earlier that it wasn't my business? I'm his girlfriend, Lucy. We've been together for almost three months and I care about him very much. Kevin's happiness is my business. So when you organize an ambush on our date and come to our booth to make him atone for whatever sins you think he's caused, when your presence here is making him unhappy? That's when I make it my business to tell you to leave our table." Laura held up her hand slightly and made sure Lucy watched her slip her hand into Kevin's protectively. "If Kevin has business he needs to discuss with you regarding your daughter he will call you at his convenience and set a place to meet. I'm not going to stand in your way about that. But otherwise, I highly suggest you leave Kevin alone. I happen to know Scott pretty well myself and he's not going to like it that on your engagement night you've spent all this time talking to Kevin."
Lucy opened her mouth to say something else and Kevin beat her to it. "Forgive me, sweetheart," he whispered, squeezing Laura's hand. Laura's eyes sparkled with laughter when she saw the look on Lucy's face and knew exactly why Kevin had chosen to use that term of endearment right in front of his ex-wife, one he hadn't used before outside the four walls of his apartment.
Kevin turned slightly away from Laura and angled his body towards Lucy and for the next minute and a half the only thing Laura heard was hushed, extremely angry French. Lucy soon left the table and made a noise that was halfway between an indignant huff and an embarrassed choking sound, glaring at Laura all the while. But not before leaning in close to Kevin once more and murmuring loud enough for Laura to hear that she'd call him soon.
Laura's eyes narrowed at Lucy's retreating form. "Does she have to get so close to you like that?"
Kevin looked embarrassed. Subtle wasn't a word that was in his ex-wife's vocabulary and now that he thought about it that more than likely explained her Nurse's Ball spectacle with Scotty. "She likes to get attention," he sighed. "I don't know that I can apologize enough that it came at your expense. She clearly was looking to get a reaction out of you and though you were very well-intentioned you gave her one. So did I. I am fairly sure I know her motivation in coming here tonight and saying all the things she said to you and I don't want you to think for one minute that you're not important to me or anything you have to say about my daughter or anything at all isn't valid and important. Do you understand?" He stroked her wrist with his fingers. "Laura?" he asked, his voice soft. "You understand me?"
Tears pooled in her eyes and he quickly released her hand and reached up to cup her cheek and wipe them away with his thumb. "I get you," she murmured. "I'm - I'm sorry if I talked when I shouldn't have, you're right, I shouldn't have given her the reaction she wanted, but she was here and she was purposefully antagonizing you and I couldn't just let her do that to you. When she put her hands in your hair and called you Doc I swear to God I wanted to punch her in the throat. But I don't want to talk about her anymore. I told her she wasn't going to ruin our date and I'd really like that to be true."
He nodded almost immediately and she suspected he was grateful for her no-more-talk-about-Lucy ground rules. They could talk about it another day if she wanted to. "That sounds like a fantastic idea. I'd rather not waste any more time thinking about her when I could be thinking about my future with you. Immediate-speaking, as in, where would you like to go on our next date?"
It was now or never. He had given her the perfect opening. "If it's alright with you we can plan our next date later. What I want right now is for me to finish telling you what I was telling you earlier, about how I hoped that offer you made me the last night we were at your apartment is still good. Because I want to stay the night with you."
Kevin had to pull his hand back at the last minute so the inside of his shirt cuff didn't fall in the cocktail sauce. He really hoped he was understanding her correctly. He wasn't about to assume anything, look where that had gotten him last time. Her nodding or even her soft little smile wouldn't work, he needed verbal confirmation and consent. "At my apartment."
She gave his foot a little nudge under the table and resisted the urge to laugh. She certainly hoped he was more perceptive once they got to his apartment. "At your apartment. I don't want to go back to Wyndemere tonight, Kevin. I want to go to your home, to your apartment, with you."
Kevin reached across the table and took her hand in between both of his because he knew now what she was really saying. He was so grateful he hadn't messed things up between them three weeks ago. "Will you stay through the weekend?"
Laura murmured a coy we'll see and reached for the end of his tie to absently move the fabric through her fingers. "Take me home and make love to me."
Kevin didn't care anymore that their food was cold. He flagged down their waiter and asked for the check.