"A bottle of Merlot?" Jason asked at dinner later that evening.
"Sure." Natalie said automatically, continuing to scan the menu.
Joe cleared his throat. "Are you sure that's a great idea with the, uh, headache you had earlier?"
"Oh." Natalie's eyes widened slightly as she looked up; she'd given her usual response, forgetting her condition. "You're right. I'll have a sparkling water instead."
Jason looked at Natalie with suspicion but didn't say anything and ordered a beer for himself. The three chatted idly about their plans for leaving the next day while they waited for their food to arrive.
"I'm glad to see that you're eating something." Jason nodded to the plate of grilled chicken, asparagus, and a baked potato that the waiter set down front of Natalie.
One of the realizations Natalie had in those first few hours of knowing about her pregnancy was that she would have to eat – healthily and consistently.
"Well, I can't go on not eating forever, can I?" Natalie muttered.
"Well, it hasn't really stopped you before." The words were out of Jason's mouth before he could stop them, and the hurt expression on her face made him wish he had. They ate in awkward silence for several minutes.
"Do you want to try my salmon?" Joe asked, holding a forkful of it in front of Natalie.
"Um…" Natalie eyed the pink piece of fish dangling in front of her face. The smell hit her nose and caused a wave of nausea. "No… I'll... I'll be right back."
Jason watched Natalie get up and hurry away from the table and sighed as his suspicions were confirmed. "She's pregnant, isn't she?"
"What?!" Joe asked, bewildered. "Why would you think that?"
"At what other point in time have you ever seen her drink sparkling water?"
"I don't know." Joe struggled to think of an explanation. "She's kind of fancy, so is it really that weird?"
"It's to try to help with the nausea. And, she's actually eating, or at least trying to."
"She's trying to be better about it." Joe shrugged.
Jason pointed his fork with a piece of steak on the end of it at Joe's fish. "But that... That was the kicker."
"Why?" Joe looked confused.
"She can't be around salmon when she's pregnant. The smell makes her sick."
"Ahh, shit. I didn't know that." Joe groaned, starting to eat his fish faster so it'd be gone by the time Natalie got back.
"How would you?" Jason asked, a hint of bitterness in his tone. He stabbed his fork through another piece of meat, hard.
"We only found out today, seriously. She didn't want to tell you because she didn't want to hurt you."
Jason nodded tersely. "Right. Got it."
The two men focused on the food in front of them until Natalie slid back into her seat a few minutes later. "Sorry about that."
"I hear congratulations are in order." Jason said shortly.
Natalie stared wide-eyed at Joe. "You can't be fucking serious. You told him?!"
"He figured it out." Joe sighed. "The fish."
"Oh." Natalie mumbled.
"I hope it turns out better for the two of you than it did for the two of us." Jason managed, finishing off the beer in front of him.
The rest of the meal was hell, with no one wanting to speak. When they got back to the hotel room, Natalie's hands were all over Joe as soon as the door was closed.
"What's gotten into you? Are you turned on by probably devastating your soon-to-be-ex-husband?"
"No. I'm turned on by you." Natalie said, pulling her shirt off over her head.
Pushing Joe back onto the bed, Natalie bent down to draw him into a deep kiss. He kissed her back enthusiastically at first until worry suddenly set into his mind.
"Wait." Joe pulled back from her. "Are you sure this is a good idea?"
"This is always a good idea." Natalie practically purred at him, moving her hands under his shirt.
Joe swallowed hard; she was always difficult to resist. "I mean, you're pregnant, and… What if something hurts the baby?"
Natalie rolled her eyes. "I know you have a big dick, Beer Can, but you know it's still not actually possible for you to fuck me in the uterus, right?"
"I know that, but maybe we should wait until you have an appointment."
Natalie groaned and rolled back over, flinging her head back against the pillows. "Seriously? We've already been having sex for however long I've been pregnant."
"I'd feel better about it if we waited."
"Fine." Natalie relented.
"That doesn't mean we can't do anything, though…" Joe said with a grin, moving to straddle her legs.
"Oh?" Natalie bit her lip. "What did you have in mind?"
"Something you enjoy very, very much…" Joe smirked as he unbuttoned Natalie's pants, quickly ridding her of them and her panties. He lowered his head between her legs to a moan of approval.
After they traded pleasure with each other, Joe fell asleep comfortably in the bed, but Natalie was alert and thinking about how things had gone with Jason. Quietly, she put her clothes back on and headed downstairs to the hotel lounge. She spotted Jason at the bar, as she'd expected to.
"Hi." Natalie slid onto the bar stool beside of him.
"Hey." Jason didn't look up from the glass in his hand.
"Are you okay?" Natalie asked quietly.
Jason had been sitting at the bar, thinking, since they'd returned to the hotel from dinner. He was turning his thoughts and feelings about Natalie being pregnant with another man's baby over in his head and washing them down with whiskey.
Jason had figured out that he wasn't angry with Natalie and Joe. The sinking feeling that he had in his stomach felt more like something else.
Regret.
It was crazy, he knew, especially since he had left her, but there was part of him that felt that it should have been their baby – his baby.
"I was a jackass at dinner, Nati. I'm sorry."
Natalie recognized by the nickname (that she'd only ever let him call her – she would deck anyone else who tried to) and his slight slur that he was a little drunk. "It's not like I expected you to take it cheerfully, given… Everything."
"I fucked up your life, and you should get to be happy now. You've always wanted a baby, and I hope this one that Joe gave you is okay since I couldn't ever give you a healthy baby."
Natalie closed her eyes. "Jason…"
"It could be me, you know. Maybe I have bad sperm." Jason took a long drink of his whiskey. "You've blamed yourself, but it could just as easily have been me. If there were chromosomal abnormalities, I mean, it could've just—."
Natalie reached over and took his hand. "Stop. Please."
Jason stared back into his drink. "I'm sorry that you found out about Gavin and me by seeing us kiss, too."
Natalie furrowed her brow. "How did you know about that?"
"Joe."
Natalie inhaled sharply and dropped Jason's hand, though she wasn't really surprised by that point that Jason and Joe had shared yet another of her secrets. "Damn it, Joe. Are you fucking him behind my back, too? You aren't going to bring him to the gay side of the Force, are you?"
Jason flinched at her biting words. "Ouch."
Natalie sighed. "Sorry. I didn't mean that, I just…"
"He adores you, you know." Jason interrupted.
"I know. I think he's a glutton for punishment."
Jason raised a brow as he took a sip of his drink. "You still don't believe you're worthy of anyone loving you."
Natalie scoffed. "Not to point out the obvious, but you didn't exactly help with that, you know."
"Touché."
"Can I ask you something?" Natalie asked suddenly.
Since they were getting everything out in the open, there was something that she needed to know; something that had been torturing her for months.
"Shoot."
"When we were young and in love, and then when we got married… Did you ever think there'd be a time when we wouldn't be?"
Jason shook his head and answered without hesitating. "Not once."
"So, does that mean that you didn't know that you were gay, or bisexual, or whatever it is that you identify as when we got married?"
"No. I didn't."
"I've just wondered how long you've been living this lie... If there were other men. If I'm just totally fucking blind because I didn't realize it."
"Just Gavin. I can't explain it. There was an attraction and flirtation. One day we were kissing in my office, then we just…"
"Okay then." Natalie held her hand up. "You can spare me the gory details. I just wanted to know if I'd always been your beard and if the last fifteen years of my life had all been a lie."
"No." Jason sighed. "Nati, I was very much in love with you. I'll always care about you."
"I'll always care about you, too." Natalie whispered.
"Let yourself be happy with Joe." Jason advised. "Let him love you."
"I'm trying."
