Page 25 of Can't Get Enough

I’ve got Zere on Zoom,” Skipper calls from the outer office. “Okay to pipe her in?”

“Sure.” I tweak the last sentence in my email to one of the Aspire Fund’s limited partners. “I’m ready.”

The large plasma screen mounted on the wall to my right lights up with Zere’s face. I know her well enough by now that the stunning smile doesn’t completely disguise the new sadness in her eyes.

“Morning, partner,” she says, tucking one long copper strand of hair behind her ear. “Have you recovered from Saturday night?”

“You could say that.” I swing my chair around to face the screen and stretch my back dramatically. “But this forty-year-old booty don’t twerk like it used to. I think I dislocated something popping on that last set.”

She laughs and I’m glad to see it chases away some of the sadness even if only for a moment. “Girl, same.”

“You’re forty?” I ask, lifting my brows.

“My next birthday.” She slides her gaze away. “It’s gonna be a tough one.”

“Forty’s not bad. Actually I’m having the time of my life. My career is on fire. I know myself better than I ever have. In my twenties, I was just running. Always in the streets and for what? In my thirties, I started asking big questions and looking for answers. Now I know exactly who I am and what I want.AndI can finally afford myself.”

We both laugh, but the humor dwindles on her face quickly. “What about kids? A husband? Do you start to worry that maybe you won’t ever have those things?”

“One of them I don’t want,” I reply. “Childless by choice over here.”

“You really don’t want kids?” The shock on her face doesn’t surprise me. I’m used to it. Why is it so hard to believe there are women in the world who don’t want to act as host for a human who may never fully appreciate their sacrifices, drains their hard-earned money, and forces them to make the difficult choices that men, even as fathers, never seem to face?

“I really don’t.” I shrug. “Kids aren’t for everyone. Society tells us that, and there are a lot of abused, neglected, unloved kids in the world because women caved to antiquated gendered expectations. I like my life.”

“And what about companionship? A husband?”

“I have the best friends in the world for companionship and I get dick whenever I want it.”

She sputters a laugh and shakes her head. “I’ve had plenty of dick. I want a baby.”

“Then have one.”

“You make it sound easy.”

I don’t insult her by saying these days it can be, that she could adopt on her own. Surrogacy. All kinds of ways to become a mom. I know what I want and respect her enough to believe she knows what she wants, too.

“Look, my best friends both have kids and wouldn’t trade them for the world.” I swing back and forth in my chair and tip back. “I see why it works for them, but I also see very clearly why it wouldn’t work for me. Besides, I love being the rich auntie who gets to go home to my nice, quiet expensive apartment after spoilingtheirkids.”

“I come from a big family and have been the rich auntie for a long time,” she says with a wry smile. “I thought maybe that would be enough, but the closer I got to forty, the more I realized that for me, a family is essential.”

She glances down at the slim hands folded on her glass desk. “I thought I could have that with Maverick.”

“I was sorry to hear about the breakup,” I say, forcing myself not to look away from the raw pain on her face. No need to pretend I don’t know what the whole world seems to be talking about today on every gossip site and social media post.

“You read the announcement, huh?” She huffs out a bitter breath. “‘Mutual’ my ass. If there’s one man I knew would be the best father to my children and a wonderful husband, it was Maverick Bell. I knew that from the beginning. I would never have given that up, but he left me no choice.”

“Did he…” She’s goingthere, but I’m not sure how personal we should get. How much I should probe. “What happened?”

“He doesn’t want kids.” She rolls her eyes. “Correction. Anymorekids. His daughter, Tamia, just graduated from high school, and he doesn’t want to start over with a new family at his age.”

I don’t reply because it sounds completely reasonable to me, but that’s the last thing Zere wants to hear.

“He did tell me from the beginning,” Zere admits, her eyes unfocused and filling with tears. “I knew, but there was this little voice in the back of my head that said I could change his mind. That he’d love me enough to choose me over…”

Over his own happiness?

I don’t say it aloud and neither does she, but it’s loud in the room. Is that love? Expecting him to become someone else for you? Forgo what that person knows will make them happy to be with you? Is that trade ever even?

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