“True.” He turns to face her, brushing back a strand of her long mahogany hair. “But I don’t see why we need to wait. I have plenty of money. You don’t have to work. Let’s have a baby right away. Let’s start our family now, Mags. With your looks and my brains, our children will be superstars.”
“But I’m not ready to have a baby, Eric. My career is finally beginning to take off. The job I’m interviewing for on Friday could be my big break.”
Eric’s arms fall to his sides. “I don’t want my wife traipsing all over town, chasing after two-bit news stories.”
“I can take care of myself.” She studies her husband’s chiseled facial features for clues as to where this sudden change of heart is coming from. He knows how important her career is to her. Before she agreed to marry him, she’d made him promise he wouldn’t interfere in her professional life.
“I’m not planning to be a reporter forever, Eric. The news anchor is going on maternity leave in May. If I do a good job, I’m hoping they’ll offer me the position.”
“That would only be temporary, until the anchor comes back.”
“If she comes back,” Maggie says. “She might decide to stay at home with her baby.”
“Home with her baby is where she should be.” Eric leaves her in the doorway and moves to the crib. “Aside from the obvious charm, there’s a reason I chose West Avenue. It’s known as Stork Alley, has been since the first houses were built on the street, because of the abundance of young families who live in them.” He stares at the mobile of knitted safari animals. “I was hoping you’d be pleased with the nursery. I thought you’d be excited about the prospect of having a baby. I’m not getting any younger, you know.” He swats at the mobile. “I was an only child of parents who fought all the time. As you know, I don’t like to talk about it. Suffice it to say, my childhood was miserable. I’ve always dreamed of having a big happy family. You’re a wonderful wife, Mags, and you’ll be a loving mother. We’ll be good parents to our children.”
This is the most he’s ever shared about his past, and Maggie can’t help but soften toward him.
What’s so wrong with him wanting to start a family, anyway? Most women would be overjoyed to be in your shoes. Look at this lovely home. He can afford the kind of life you always dreamed of. His desire to be a father isn’t a bad thing. It’s sweet that he wants kids. And he’ll be a great dad.
“Look, Eric.” She goes to stand beside him at the crib. “You’re throwing a lot at me at once. New city. New home. New decor. Give me some time to adjust to the idea of starting a family earlier than we agreed.”
Leaning into him, they walk back down the hall to their bedroom. Inside the doorway, she turns to face him. “Why don’t I cook us a nice dinner to celebrate our first night in our new house. I’ll unpack first and then go to the grocery store. Where’s my car, by the way? I didn’t see it on the street when we came in. Is it parked around the corner?”
“About that . . .,” he begins.
A sickening feeling in her gut warns her of what’s coming. She’d last seen her Chevrolet Malibu as the moving van left Portland, her car in tow.
“The movers ran into some trouble when they were towing your car. We had to sell it in Wyoming.”
Her mind races as she considers the logistics. “What kind of trouble?”
“Let’s see.” He rakes a hand through his thinning dark hair. “First, they blew out a couple of tires on the trailer. Then some other stuff happened. I’m not exactly sure what. I’m a builder, not a mechanic. Towing the car was slowing them down.”
“So, you sold it. Without my permission.” She levels him with a cold stare. “How’d you do that, anyway, without the title?”
“You gave me the title, remember?”
She remembers. For safekeeping. He personally transported their important legal documents to Virginia. “Still! It would’ve been nice if you’d consulted me before you sold my car. How much did you get for it?”
“Pocket change,” he says. “Your 2001 Malibu had more than a hundred thousand miles on it.”
“I loved my Malibu. I paid for it myself with money I earned waitressing in college.”
He tilts his head to the side, grinning down at her. Dressed in jeans and a green plaid flannel shirt, Eric reminds Maggie of her three older brothers, as children, returning home from spending the day in the woods. “We’ll go shopping next weekend. I’ll buy you a new car. Maybe something like a Volvo SUV with a third seat for when you have to drive carpool.”
She lets this latest reference to starting a family slide. “How am I supposed to get to my job interview on Friday?”
“I’ll drop you on my way to work, and you can Uber home.” Taking her face in his hands, he kisses her, his teeth nibbling at her lips. Their sex life isn’t bad. But it isn’t great either. Not like with Daniel.
You need to stop pining for Daniel.
She tolerated the kiss a little longer before pushing him away.
He holds her at arm’s length. “I’m sorry if I’ve upset you, Mags. You’ll see. We’re going to have a beautiful life together. You need to trust me to take care of you.”
Eric’s eyes are so crystal clear and aqua blue most people mistake them for colored contact lenses. When they first met, Maggie found them mesmerizing. Hypnotic. She felt as though he was seeing inside her soul. But now, his penetrating gaze makes her squirm. It’s like he always knows what she’s thinking. And at the moment, she isn’t thinking very kind thoughts.
He plants another peck on her lips before leaving the room. She hears his footfalls on the bare steps followed by the closing of the front door. He returns minutes later with her suitcase, parking it just inside the door. “I’ll be downstairs. When you’re finished unpacking, I’ll drive you to the grocery store.”
Maggie slips off her coat, draping it over the back of a slipper chair, and sets her phone on the bureau. Opening her suitcase on the bed, she removes her favorite sweater, a thigh-length, pale-gray cashmere cardigan, and hangs it in the closet with the rest of her wardrobe, which is still organized according to type—blouses, slacks, skirts, dresses—the way she’d packed them in Oregon.
Gathering up her bras and panties from the suitcase, she opens the top drawer of the bureau and is taken aback at the sight of neatly folded gowns and teddies in slinky fabrics with lace trim. She thinks there’s been a mistake, that the movers mixed up their possessions with another client’s. But then she realizes this is yet another one of Eric’s surprises—seductive lingerie intended to spice up their sex life in order to produce a baby for the crib down the hall, another child to play hopscotch on the sidewalks of Stork Alley.
Most brides would be turned on by the thought of their new husbands buying them sexy lingerie. But all Maggie feels is repulsed. She drops her bras and panties on top of the lingerie and slams the drawer shut.
Staring at her phone on the bureau, she wants desperately to call Valerie. But how childish of a twenty-eight-year-old woman to complain to her mother about her husband. You’re an adult now, Maggie. Suck it up. Your family is expecting your marriage to fail. Prove them wrong. Try harder. You can do this.