Page 130 of Heavy Shot

They were as nice as paparazzi ever are, snapping pictures like their lives depended on it as she strolled down to her empty mailbox, and then hurried back up to her gate as though she’d been caught out unawares and was horrified. As soon as she was back through the wrought iron, the cameras stopped and one guy called, “Thanks, Jill!”

“Anytime.” A no-makeup photo of any actress was worth big bucks. A no-makeup photo of an actress in a short robe that barely covered her ass and showed off her nipples? Someone was putting a kid through at least a semester at college. She was going to have to figure out the short robe equivalent of a baby bump.

Back inside, she started retching as if on cue, and spent the next ten minutes alternating between telling herself that morning sickness was a good sign and wishing she’d never heard the word ‘sex.’ She brushed her teeth and got a ginger ice pop from the freezer and sucked on that until her stomach started to feel right again. Then she blended one of the smoothie mixes the chef had left for her and drank that with her vitamins.

Finally, she stripped to the skin and waded into her swimming pool to lie on her back and float. She was turning into a prune when the intercom buzzed her up and back into her robe to take a delivery of flowers. “I was incredibly rude last night,” the card on the bouquet of white roses read. “Start fresh? Thad.”

In turn, that made her call up a florist and send an apology arrangement to Rhiannon. “Sorry for ambushing you. I’m the worst. Mea culpa. JP.”

Then, chewing her bottom lip, she unblocked both of them on her contact list. No sooner had she finished, but her phone was ringing, showing Thad’s number. She hesitated, but answered. “Hello?”

“I got a delivery notification, and I was hoping you’d read the card?” he said without preamble.

“You were pretty rude.”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’ve been a great arse about this whole thing and when I saw you, I lost my head a little. A lot. It was easier to get mad than to get honest.”

“Well, you were certainly angry.”

“I’m sorry. Jill, I’m sorry. I can make all kinds of excuses about how I was out of my element in Prague, and I was feeling insecure and having all the imposter syndrome, and missing my kids, and drowning in mud, and how it affected my judgment, but the bottom line is that I didn’t give you benefit of the doubt when you’d already told me all the truth about what was going on and what would continue to go on with you and Kline. I fucked up.”

“I was in the Maldives when the story came out. We went on a little holiday with Roland and Shanna. We didn’t even know about it until we got to the airport, so I couldn’t warn you. With everything–when those photos of you and Rhiannon came out, well. I thought you were moving on.”

“No. I mean, I didn’t spend my time alone over there, to be perfectly honest. But I also didn’t spend my time with Rhi outside of the time the whole cast and crew were together, and you saw all those pictures. It was bad timing.”

“I didn’t spend my time alone here either, if we’re talking about that.”

“Kline?”

“Yes.”

“Are you two an actual couple now?” She thought she heard him swallow hard.

“No. In a funny way, it was just good closure. Got him out of my system, so to speak.” She almost laughed at her own words. No one had ever been more completely tied to her system.

“Do you want to have lunch? Start over? My divorce is final and I’m actually single.”

“Thad–”

“If you don’t want to, that’s okay, but I really felt like we had a connection, and I don’t want to lose that because I was so fucking stupid. At least would you give me the chance to run you off with my boring, mundane, never at home because I’m always working life like the rest of them?”

“I don’t think you’re boring or mundane.”

“I am always working.”

“So am I.”

“So, lunch?”

“I like lunch.”

It took a while to find time in their calendars, and honestly, that was fine with Jill. They had made and rescheduled two dates since their call, but he’d sent flowers and chocolates, and called every day, texting her jokes as he thought of them, so she felt like she’d spent a lot of time with him. It was a soft launch back into friendship–that was the most she was letting herself hope for at the moment.

In another attempt to regain ground, August had been over to see her. “I promised you we’d always be friends,” he had said, kissing both her cheeks. “I keep my promises. Are you back on carbs? You look bloated.” He walked through her new home scrutinizing it in a way that made her very glad she hadn’t tried to shoehorn herself into his very clear aesthetic for the rest of her life, and it felt very naughty and good to be sitting across from him with a human baby cooking inside her, and her new puppy scampering around at her feet.

It felt less good and was very difficult to not tell Thad about the baby each time they talked, but she was still afraid that things might fall apart and she didn’t want to have to go through the sympathetic smiles and well-wishes if she lost this pregnancy like she had the others. She could wait a minute more.

When he arrived for a late lunch on a Sunday, she met him at the door with a chaste side-hug and showed him around most of the new place before walking him out to the patio where her part-time chef had laid out a wonderful spread for them. “I saw your Lancôme campaign at the mall,” Thad said, digging into the salad. “It’s stunning.”

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