Add the threat of infidelity to the situation and the readers come to life. LOL Seriously though, your reactions were great. It's nice to know you're sucked in deep enough to actually care what happens to them. Thanks for letting me know how you feel!
Jack stood in the lobby of the hospital waiting for Brandi to join him. He saw her exit the elevator and in an almost hyper manner bounce over to where he was standing. She quickly moved in to kiss him and he dodged it and hugged her instead.
"I missed you Brandi and a lot has changed." Jack said and then pulled away from her.
"Yeah, what's different Jack?" She asked happily.
"I'm engaged Brandi and my fiancée is pregnant." Jack admitted.
She looked at him for a moment, shocked by the news, but not the least bit deterred by it. She smiled at him.
"Congratulations Jack. Does this mean we aren't going to have dinner and drinks?" She asked.
"I guess that depends on whether or not just dinner and drinks is okay with you." Jack said.
"So we can't sleep together anymore, oh well, that sucks for me, but not so much I'd want to lose you as a friend. Will this fiancée of yours mind if I still take you out once in awhile to pick your brain?" She asked.
"Probably not." He chuckled and put his arm around her and led her out of the hospital.
Kate sat in the living room of the big empty house watching television, but not really seeing anything, her mind deep in thought. Jack's mother had brought Conner home hours ago and he was sleeping soundly in his bed. It was after midnight and she hadn't heard from Jack again. She was just about to turn the lights off and go to bed, resigned to the idea that Jack was screwing another woman at the moment and wouldn't be home, when she heard the front door opening. She thought about jumping up to greet him, but decided that even though this was her fault she wasn't going to seem that eager. She heard two voices and looked up. Christian was doing his best to steady a very drunk Jack. One of Jack's arms was draped over his shoulder and Christian had his arm wrapped securely around his waist.
"Do you think you could help me out here?" Christian asked.
Kate immediately took her place on the other side of Jack and they began the task of getting him up the stairs and into his bed. Christian sat Jack on the bed and bent down to remove his shoes.
"I guess I let you down again dad." Jack drunkenly mumbled.
"We all need to tie one on once in awhile Jack." Christian replied and pulled Jack's legs onto the bed, forcing him to fall backward, his head landing on the pillows.
"I need to pick Conner up." Jack argued and tried to sit up.
"Conner is home. He's asleep." Christian told him.
"Are you sure?" Jack asked.
"Positive. Go to sleep Jack." Christian ordered and threw a blanket over him.
"Kate. Where's Kate?" Jack asked.
"She's right here watching you drool all over yourself. Goodnight son." Christian said again.
Jack went silent and quickly passed out, as drunk as Kate had ever seen him and Christian wasn't sure, but possibly the worst he'd ever seen him. Christian turned around, gave Kate a look that bordered some place in-between disgust and disapproval and left the room. Kate went after him, following him down the stairs and grabbing his arm from behind to make him stop and talk to her.
"What happened? Are you the friend he was having dinner with?" Kate asked.
"No Kate, that would've been Brandi. She called me to come get him when she realized he was too far gone to make it home on his own." Christian said.
"Where'd you pick him up?" Kate asked.
"What?" Christian replied.
"Did you pick him up at her house?" Kate asked.
Christian flashed Kate another unflattering look and in his typical condescending tone began talking to her.
"You're going to marry my son, yet you don't know the simplest fact about him, which is that he wouldn't cheat, doesn't have it in him to cheat on the woman he loves." He said.
"You just couldn't wait to tell him could you? You promised me you'd let me handle it." Kate accused.
"You promised me you would handle it Kate and I assumed that meant before you married him. I have no idea why you are lying to him, but I can find out if I need to. What I do know Kate is that the last time I saw my son that drunk was when his wife died so that tells me he's in this thing with you for the long haul and whatever faults Jack may have, he doesn't deserve to be feeling the way he's feeling tonight." Christian told her, his tone no longer condescending, but that of a concerned father, of someone that genuinely loves his son and hates seeing him being hurt.
"You really love him don't you?" Kate asked.
"What kind of question is that? He's my son. Do you really love him?" Christian asked.
"Yes." Kate answered.
"Then stop lying to him. He's not like me Kate. He's a good man that doesn't judge. If you two weren't jumping into a marriage so quickly you'd know that about him." Christian said.
"I do know that about him. He's the most decent person I've ever known. I'm afraid of screwing that up. I couldn't handle seeing shame in his eyes and that shame being for me." Kate said.
"I'm guessing since I've never seen a look like that from him for me, you're safe Kate. Like I said, he's a good man. Oh, and here's that life insurance policy. You're pal Eddie signed it. You just need to sign it and do whatever you think you should do with the money. He won't be bothering you anymore." Christian said.
"What did you do? How did you.." Kate asked.
"I spoke the only language a guy like that understands." Christian explained.
"Thank you." She said.
"I didn't do it for you, I did it for Jack." Christian said and turned to leave.
"Thank you for bringing him home." Kate said.
Christian didn't answer. He let himself out and Kate resumed her position on the couch, deciding she'd sleep there and prepare to come clean with Jack in the morning.
Jack came down the stairs slowly around 8 AM. Kate and Conner were sitting together under a blanket watching cartoons. He stopped and placed his hand on Conner's forehead and face. He was still warm, but no longer cooking.
"Hey buddy, you feeling better?" Jack asked softly, his head obviously pounding and him doing his best to avoid any extreme noise.
"My head still hurts daddy." Conner said.
"Yeah, mine too." Jack mumbled and walked toward the kitchen.
Kate stayed with Conner while Jack stayed in the kitchen, drinking coffee, reading the paper and stewing. He came back through the living room about an hour later and looked at Kate.
"I need to take a shower and go to work for awhile. Are you okay with him or do I need to take him to my mother?" Jack asked.
"No daddy, not again." Conner whined.
"It's okay Conner, you're staying with me." Kate said.
Jack headed up the stairs and Kate was growing weary of the silent treatment he was giving her.
"Conner I'm going to go upstairs and talk to your daddy for a few minutes." Kate told him and followed Jack up the stairs.
Kate entered the bedroom just as he was entering the bathroom. He stopped and looked at her.
"What?" He asked.
"Nothing, I was just wondering if you're ever going to talk to me again." Kate said.
"I can't do this right now Kate. I drank too much last night, I'm sick and my head hurts." He said.
"Whose fault is that?" She asked.
"Mine, but it doesn't change the fact that I don't have the patience for this right now. Can we talk later? We'll get a babysitter and go out for dinner." Jack offered.
"Yeah, okay." She said and walked away.
"Kate." He said.
"Yeah." She replied.
"I love you." He said.
"I love you too." She said and smiled at him.
Jack went to work, but returned home two hours later, too sick and hung-over to do his job effectively. He ate soup with Conner and then they took a nap together. After three hours passed and neither the boy nor the man had come back downstairs Kate went upstairs to check on them. She found them in the master bedroom, Jack on his back and Conner snuggled up next to him, holding onto a handful of his shirt. Both were still sleeping very hard so she left the room and decided she could use a nap herself. She made herself comfortable in the guest bedroom and the lack of sleep the night before finally took its toll on her. She barely remembered lying down, much less drifting off to sleep, the next memory the grip on her arms and her name being called forcing her into consciousness. She opened her eyes and Jack was hovering over her, looking concerned and holding firmly to her arms.
"There you are; I was beginning to wonder if I was going to be able to bring you around. You okay?" He asked genuinely concerned.
"What's going on?" She asked.
"You were having a bad dream. I've been trying to wake you up for about five minutes." Jack said.
"I don't remember. I guess I let myself get too tired." She said.
"That's my fault. I was too hard on you Kate, I over-reacted." He admitted.
"No, you weren't. You've been so good to me and deserved at the very least some honesty. I'm sorry Jack." She said
"Do you still feel like going out?" He asked.
"Sure, I just need to grab a shower." She told him.
They enjoyed a quiet dinner and managed to talk about everything from her having her first morning with no morning sickness to how many times he threw up that day before he finally gave it up and came home. They avoided the subject that was still a source of contention between them and while they walked down the sidewalk, enjoying the pleasant night, he stopped, leaned against the building and pulled her into his chest, wrapping his arms around her and kissing her gently.
"Talk to me Kate. Please, I need to know what's so awful that you felt like you couldn't tell me." He said in a soft, non-threatening tone.
"Jack, TJ wasn't my biological son, but it didn't mean that I loved him any less. All of that was real and I'd give anything to have one more day with him." Kate said as a tear escaped down her cheek.
"I've doubted us the last couple of days Kate, but I've never doubted that the grief you're suffering is real. I just don't understand why you felt like you needed to keep that a secret. Do you not trust me Kate?" He asked.
"I don't trust me Jack. I've done things I'm not proud of, things that might make you think twice about wanting to marry me." Kate said.
"Why don't you let me be the judge of what I'd consider so bad I wouldn't want to marry you." Jack suggested.
"Eddie wasn't TJ's father. I have no idea who TJ's father was. TJ's mother was a 15 year old girl that found herself pregnant and alone. Teenage girls in trouble were part of my job and part of my other job was bringing these girls in, giving them a place to stay and when their babies were born handing them over to their new parents, parents that would pay a lot of money for a healthy, newborn baby." Kate told him and watched his face take on a look of shock, disbelief and even some concern, but she never saw the shame in his eyes that she feared she would.
"So, you were working with baby brokers?" Jack asked.
"Nobody was getting hurt Jack. These babies never stood a chance with their unmarried teenage mothers and the people I worked for gave them a chance, gave them to parents that wanted nothing else more in life than a child or so I thought." Kate defended her actions.
"How'd you convince the girls to give up their babies?" Jack asked.
"We lied to them. The moment she delivered the girl was given a drug to knock her out. When she woke up we told her the baby died. Most of the girls expressed a desire to give their babies up, that was just Cray's way of assuring they couldn't change their mind." Kate admitted completely ashamed of the part she'd played in this.
"Kate, that's…..I don't understand……I'm trying……so how'd you end up with TJ?" Jack finally managed to complete a sentence
"The people that bought TJ brought him back when he got sick. They just wanted to exchange him like a defective appliance or something." Kate said.
"So TJ was diagnosed early in infancy?" Jack asked.
"No, not a diagnosis, but he'd been sick constantly and doctors had given them a list of possible illnesses and all the tests they wanted to perform so they just brought this adorable five month old baby back and wanted their money back. It wasn't until that day that I realized that I couldn't be a part of what they were doing any longer." Kate told him.
"So instead of getting him medical treatment you just decided to keep him and hope he'd get better?" Jack asked.
"No! It wasn't like that Jack. Cray asked me take TJ home and take care of him until they could find another family for him so I did and I got attached and when they weren't having any luck finding a home for him I agreed to take him. He would've ended up abandoned and in foster care Jack. I couldn't stand the thought of that happening to him. So they made me a phony birth certificate and the rest is history." Kate said.
"The insurance policy, what's that all about?" Jack asked as he tried to remain calm and process what she was telling him.
"Cray and Andrew are attorneys and they use insurance as part of their front, part of their legitimate business dealings. The new parents get life insurance policies on the baby. It's relatively cheap for them to keep the premiums up. They must've kept the policy on TJ and put me and Eddie as the beneficiaries." Kate said.
"So you've been in touch with them all this time?" Jack asked.
"No Jack I swear I haven't. I have no idea how they found out about TJ or how they found me. I promise Jack as soon as I got to California I took him to the doctor. They diagnosed him two months later. I loved that little boy more than anything and I did everything I could to fight his cancer." Kate told him a steady stream of tears rolling down her cheeks.
"The story about Eddie and the emotion you told it with. That was all a lie? And the stuff about my father was a lie too?" Jack asked.
"Your dad did come to me. Some how he found out I wasn't TJ's biological mother and he made me promise I would tell you or he would." Kate admitted.
"Kate, you let me blame my father for something he didn't do? You played on my emotions by making up some story about your son's father trying to sell him for drug money? You lied to me about experiencing child birth? Why would you do that?" He asked, clearly confused and hurt by her actions.
"Lying about being TJ's mother became such a habit over the years that it stopped feeling like lies and just became a truth of sorts. I was his mother Jack. I loved him so much and I would trade places with him right now if I could." Kate insisted.
"Kate I don't doubt you loved that child, but the rest of it is hard for me to comprehend. I know my dad and I don't get along that well, but did it really not bother you to add more fuel to the fire?" Jack asked.
"Of course it did! I hated seeing you hurt. This is just who I am Jack. I was afraid of losing the first man that I ever truly loved and when I get scared I resort to old habits." Kate screamed.
He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her, trying to calm her down, not wanting this to turn into a scream fest with both of them saying horrible things they could never take back.
"What old habits Kate?" Jack asked.
"Survival habits Jack. My father died when I was 10. My step dad tried to get in my pants when I was 16 so my mom kicked me out of the house. I managed to finish school and support myself without resorting to prostitution or drugs, but a lot of times it took sneaking and lying and tricking people to get by. I put myself through college, but I was in so much debt I had to find a way to make extra money. I met Cray and we dated for awhile and he offered me a job. In hindsight I guess he probably sought me out and just dated me to charm me into working for him since I had access to the pregnant girls he wanted." Kate explained.
Jack continued to hold her, absorbing all of it, feeling betrayed and angry, but also protective of her and sympathetic to how she managed to get involved in something and probably didn't know how to get out of it.
"So where does this Eddie guy figure in to all of this?" Jack asked.
"Eddie worked for Cray, ran errands, put together the insurance polices, help take care of the girls. I guess when it was time to change TJ's information he just added himself to the policy. I'm not really sure what happened there since I never bothered with the policy." Kate said.
"I wish you would've told me all of this a few days ago." Jack sighed.
"I was afraid if you found out I was involved in something not only illegal, but with questionable moral issues it would ruin what he had." Kate said.
"So this is it? Everything? No more surprises?" He asked.
"Well, I did get caught stealing a yo-yo when I was eleven." Kate told him making him chuckle.
"Why'd you steal a yo-yo?" Jack asked rubbing his hands over her back and kissing her forehead.
"Because it was one of those cool new ones that glowed in the dark and it came in hot pink and all the other kids had one and my mom said we couldn't afford it. I was just being a bratty kid." Kate said.
He placed his fingers under her chin and tilted her head up to look at him. She was afraid to look into his eyes, afraid of what she would see so when she saw nothing but love and acceptance there she smiled and fought the tears that were threatening. He kissed her softly and wiped away the tear that escaped.
"I love you and there isn't anything you can't tell me. No more tears Kate, let's be happy, both of us, all three, soon to be four of us." Jack said.
"Jack, how can you just accept everything I've told you? Don't you care?" Kate asked.
"I care and I'm a little shocked, but it doesn't change how I feel about you. We'll get past it. I guess we should start by getting rid of Eddie." Jack said.
"Your father already did." Kate said.
"What?" Jack asked.
"When he brought you home last night he gave me the insurance policy and said he took care of Eddie, that he wouldn't be bothering us anymore. I'm guessing he paid him to go away." Kate said.
"My father scares me sometimes. He seems to have a very long reach." Jack said.
"He just loves you Jack." Kate said.
"So, are you ready to go home?" Jack said.
"Do we still have a home? Are we okay again? Is this Brandi person going to be someone I need to beat up?" Kate asked making him smile.
"No, I mean yes we are okay, we're better than okay and no you don't need to worry about Brandi, I told her about you, about us and she's happy for me. She only likes me for my brain anyway, well what she can suck out of my brain. She'll probably be my boss within the next 5 years." Jack chuckled.
"Bullshit. No woman in her right mind just likes you for your brain. I know she's smarter than me, is she prettier?" Kate asked.
"Do they make a woman prettier than you? I think not. Kate, she's a doctor, a very ambitious doctor and we're friends. I have no desire to sleep with her again. You're going to have to trust me." He told her and kissed the tip of her nose.
"I do trust you Jack and I'm really sorry I lied to you, not because I got caught, but because I don't ever want to see that look in your eyes again. You deserved better than what I gave you and I won't hurt you like that again." She promised and kissed him.
They stood against the building, wrapped up tightly, the kiss deepening and intensifying. That they missed one another and the closeness they shared evident in how desperately they seemed to be trying to close the temporary gap and return to normal. He finally broke the kiss, his breathing a bit labored and smiled at her.
"We should find the car before this gets out of hand." He suggested and pushed himself off the wall, wrapping his arm around her, pulling her close and slowly walking her to where the car was parked.
The parking lot where they had parked was beginning to empty, patrons finding their way home for the evening. He held her door open for her and once she was inside, closed the door and walked around to let himself in the car. He put the keys in the ignition and leaned over to kiss her again. Her mouth opened and he moved his tongue inside, both attempting to swallow one another and then slowing it back down to a sensual, wet, hungry kiss. He felt her hands unbuckling his belt and considered stopping her for a second, but he'd missed her, missed her touch, missed the smell of her, missed being intimate with her even though it had only been a couple of days. She unzipped his pants and pulled him out through the opening, moving her warm, soft hand up and down his quickly hardening length.
"We should stop now or move this to the back seat." He mumbled in-between kisses.
She smiled at him and then reached over him, hitting the seat adjustment switch and moving the seat backwards. She then unbuttoned his pants and pushed the opening away from him, drawing him out completely and kissing him one last time before lowering her head. He felt her hot, wet mouth close over his now throbbing head and hissed, both hands clutching the steering wheel as she licked, sucked, squeezed and even bit a few times.
What she was doing to him felt so good he felt his mind going completely blank and closed his eyes, allowing his head to relax back onto the headrest and absorb it all. Every nibble, every tease with the tip of her tongue, every deep plunge into the back of her throat, his release steadily building and a sneak preview seeping out onto her tongue, her response of "Mmmm" vibrating over his pulsating head causing him to jerk and groan.
She could feel his hand drop down to head, holding onto her hair the way he always did when he was ready to come, his signal to her, but she wasn't interested in being warned this time, she wanted him to fill her mouth, wanted to taste him, wanted to reclaim him as hers after coming so close to driving him into the arms of another woman. She moved her mouth up to kiss him once more.
"I want you Jack, let it go, all of it." She coaxed as she stroked him with her hand and gave his balls a gentle squeeze before taking him into her mouth again.
She took him deep a few more times, hearing his breathing turn into quick pants, his cute, tight ass squirming in the seat and his hands reaching for anything they could hold onto to. She felt his thighs tense up and then she heard him pant "oh fuck Kate" just before she felt the first spurt of him hit the back of her throat. He jerked slightly and let go of another load, followed by two more quick releases and then he relaxed, his head highly sensitive and flinching away from her tongue at first.
"Sorry, just soft touches I promise." She said as she gently kissed and licked his swollen cock until it began to soften and relax.
Jack continued to rest his head on the headrest, his eyes still closed, his mind numb and not functioning yet. He could feel her tucking him back inside his pants and closing everything back up. He'd just been satisfied in a way that only Kate could satisfy him, leaving him feeling like a pile of helpless mush, his dick feeling like it could happily relax right where it was for the rest of the night even though it was certain he'd be satisfying her before the night would end. He finally came to his senses and lifted his head. He looked over at her, her long curls draped over her tanned shoulders, the street lamp catching her green eyes perfectly and causing a sparkle, her sweet face, complimented with a lazy smile, genuinely happy that she'd been able to do what she'd just done for him.
"You may have rendered me useless for the rest of the night Kate." He teased.
"I bet I can get you to rise to the occasion again." She teased back.
"No doubt, want to go home and engage in some hot, passionate make up sex?" He asked.
She leaned over and kissed him again, slowly moving her tongue in and out of his mouth, holding his face in her hands in a manner that suggested she wished she never had to let go. She finally pulled back and fastened her seat belt.
"I'll take that as a yes." Jack said and started the car.
Do you want to experience the make-up sex? Perhaps you're growing tired of the descriptive bedroom fare? The next chapter will be lighter and happier for Jack and Kate and definitely Conner who is going to be healthy and happy for awhile.