Raji slipped her arm around Peyton’s waist.
He flinched a little and stiffened in her grasp, but he settled his arm over her shoulders. “That’s right. We’re married.”
Because she could trust Peyton to have her back.
Her mother unleashed a torrent of Tamil, the trailing end of her sari fluttering in her anger, which essentially meant Raji had broken her heart by not inviting her to the wedding, not allowing her uncle to arrange her marriage, not being married in a Hindu temple with the appropriate pujas—
The list kept going.
—not purchasing the appropriate wedding saris, not throwing the proper three-day wedding celebration, not allowing a Brahmin priest to pray over them for three days, not allowing her mother and aunties do the pujas for her first child—
Her mother’s tirade did not stop.
—that the boy was most unsuitable because he did not speak Tamil, that she had been anticipating doing the in-law pujas with Raji’s fiancé before her wedding and now she would be denied that—
Peyton whispered to Raji, “What’s going on?”
Raji shrugged. “She just has to get some stuff out of her system. This is nothing. When I got a B-minus in fifth grade math, she flipped her lid.”
Her mother paced the living room, stomping on the floor.
—that the baby would not have good eyebrows with such a pale father, that it would be born under a bad star, that they had not had the boy’s astrology chart done and had his and Raji’s charts compared for marriage compatibility so who knew what would happen—
Peyton asked, “Do we have an anticipated time that this will finish? I was going to make dinner reservations.”
Raji shook her head. “You can’t rush this. Just go with it.”
Her mother slapped her hand on the kitchen counter as she walked by and glared at both of them.
—and most cruelly letting Aarthi think she was getting a baby when obviously they were married and were completing their own family.
Oops.
Shit.
Raji said to Peyton, “We need to talk.”
She grabbed Peyton’s hand and towed him into the bedroom, kicking the door shut behind them.
As soon as the door shut, Peyton grabbed her and shoved her up against the wall. His mouth crashed down on hers, kissing her deeply.
She grabbed him around his neck, holding on as she felt his lips on her for the first time in far too long. He sucked at her lips and tongue, his mouth driving all thought from her head. He stroked her side, gently exploring the shape of her pregnancy.
“Don’t,” she said, wondering if he would be repelled by it. She wasn’t particularly thrilled with her size, shape, or her explosive farts when the baby sat on her intestines.
“I’m fascinated,” he whispered in her ear as he kissed her neck. “I thought you did the other thing, but I wanted to see our child grow in you.”
“I just couldn’t,” Raji said. “I’m supposed to be a cold-blooded lizard person, and it was supposed to be a clump of cells, but I couldn’t. I kept thinking what it might look like, what it might be like.”
“It?” Peyton asked. “Don’t you know whether it’s a boy or girl?”
“I didn’t want to know,” she said. “I was going to give it to my cousin, Aarthi. She can’t have kids. Or he can’t. Or both. It was never clear to me what the problem was.”
Peyton’s hand flattened on the silk over the swell of her belly. “You were going to give it up?”
“I couldn’t take care of a baby by myself, Peys.”
“I wanted to be with you.”
“No, you didn’t. You never told me what to do. You always asked. It was always a suggestion or a question or a query. That’s not how we do things. When I’m with you, you tell me what to do. I do what you tell me to.”
“Not about this, Raji-lee. That’s a game we play, but this is for the rest of our lives. You have to tell me that you want to be with me, that you want us to be together. We both have to enter with all our hearts, not just as part of a game. For this, I need informed consent.”
“But you don’t want to do this,” she said, watching his blue-green eyes for any hint that he was lying.
“I do. I do want it.” His gaze was steady, not flicking away. “As soon as the shock wore off, which was only a second, I wanted to be with you, both of you, and I wanted us to be a family. I’ve missed you so much these last few months. I regret that I walked away even though you told me to. I should have stayed.”
“Stayed? We were talking on the phone.”
“I was in the hallway, outside your door.”
Raji sucked in air. He’d been so close. He’d been there. “You were?”
“When you said yes, I was going to tell you to open the door, and I was going to be kneeling there with the ring.”
She pointed. “That ring?”
“Yes.”
“And you kept it?”
He bit his lip. “I kept hoping.”
“You did?”
“I know that I don’t say it enough, but I love you. I’ve loved you for so long. It’s a New England thing, and it’s hard for me to say it.”
“Didn’t your parents tell you they loved you when you were growing up?” Raji asked.
“God, no. How gauche.”
She snorted a laugh. “That explains a lot.”
He said, “I’ll sign anything you want in a prenup. We’ll write in a clause that, if we’re married for over a year and we divorce, I will write you a check for five million dollars in addition to any other monies you’re entitled to, and there might be a lot more.”
Five million dollars? She could pay off her student loan debt ten times over. “Why?”
“Because if you live with me for a year, you’ll fall in love with me and never want to leave.”
Peyton’s confidence and humor scattered light over the dark thoughts in her head. “You are so full of yourself, you with the hot tattoos and shredded abs and impossibly sea-green eyes. And I don’t want a damn prenup unless you want to safeguard your family’s money. I understand that. And I’ve already fallen in love with you, so your money doesn’t matter.”
“And I’ve fallen in love with you, there with your funny little lizard brain and your silky hair and your luminous eyes,” His hands roamed her back, stroking her, soothing her, “and you with our child in your body. I shouldn’t have left. I should have battered down your door and made you listen to me.”
“I told you that I wouldn’t marry you,” she said, leaning her forehead against his strong shoulder. “I didn’t know what else to do. It seemed the right thing to do at the time. God, I’ve missed you so much.”
Peyton stopped breathing, and his hand flexed on her stomach. “I felt something.”
She chuckled. “Yeah, it kicks, a lot.”
He knelt in front of her, his hands gently roving over her belly. When he sat back on his heels, his head only came up to her chest, which was so weird.
He asked, “Will it happen again?”
“Yeah.” She took his hand and pressed next to her hip. “There’s the head, which means the feet are up here, and that’s why my ribs are bruised.”
Peyton inhaled sharply. “I felt it again.”
She smiled at him.
When he looked up at her, his sea-green eyes were shining. From where Peyton was on his knees in front of her, he held out the open ring box again. “Marry me, right now. Please, Raji, for the love of my God and all of yours, be my wife for all our lives, and give this baby the family that they were always meant to have. Stay with me. Be with me. Let me be with you.”
Fear crept up in her—fear that he would walk out one day and she would be left as alone and bereft as her mother had been, like Raji had been when her father had walked out on them both when she had been only ten years old—except that Peyton had her back.
Her mother had begged her father not to go, not to leave them.
When Raji had told Peyton to go, he had listened, and he had respected her enough to believe her.
The ring threw brilliant sparkles over the whole room, magic shards of light.
Maybe, just maybe, she should believe him.
Raji drew as deep a breath as she could. “Yes.”
Hope lit his eyes. “Really?”
“Yes. Let’s get married. I’ll marry you.”
Peyton fit the ring onto her finger. It was just a little roomy, which was perfect. He stood, drawing her against him. “Now?”
“Yeah, sure. My mother thinks we already are married.”
“Evidently. Why did you tell her that?”
“Because otherwise, she would have hated you for abandoning me while I was pregnant, probably forever. Now, she hates me for denying her a big Indian wedding, but she’ll get over that.”
“I’m surprised she believed it so readily.”
“Well, you showed her the wedding ring and said it was mine.”
Peyton’s eyebrows rose. “When?”
“This ring.” She waggled her finger at him. “It’s probably good that I’m wearing it. Fewer questions. Amma is big on questions. And ranting.”
He blinked several times. “But, I haven’t given you a wedding ring.”
Raji held up her hand again. The ring reflected glitter over the walls and ceiling of her bedroom. “Isn’t this a wedding ring?”
Peyton smiled. “No. It’s an engagement ring.”
“Jeez, Louise. So the wedding ring is going to be even bigger than that honkin’ rock?” She would never be able to get even exam gloves over even this one.
“Beg your pardon?” Peyton asked.
“I thought the engagement ring was a little gold band, and the wedding ring is bigger and has diamonds and everything on it.”
Peyton laughed. “That’s backward. The engagement ring is the one with diamonds on it. The wedding ring is usually a gold band that slips underneath it or has smaller diamonds.”
Raji threw her hands in the air. “How does that make any sense at all? The wedding is the big thing, the legal and religious thing, yet it gets the smaller ring?
He laughed again. “Maybe it symbolizes that men make big promises with the good ring and then under-deliver once the women are locked down for the rest of their lives.”
Raji’s jaw dropped. “That’s awful! You are so bad!”
“Hey, I didn’t start the tradition. Isn’t that how it works in Indian weddings?”
“No. First of all, it’s a necklace, not a ring. The bride’s family gives all the wedding jewelry because the bride symbolizes the goddess Lakshmi, the goddess of beauty, prosperity, and good fortune.”
Peyton bonked himself on the forehead. “Then you should have given me a necklace? The Cabots didn’t keep their wealth by giving away jewelry when it’s not expected.”
“Don’t get all excited, Peyton Cabot of the Connecticut Old Money Cabots. First of all, boys don’t get necklaces. More importantly, I’m a cardiothoracic surgeon. I am the gold and jewels.”
He wrapped his arms around her. “I think you must be the goddess of good fortune because I am the luckiest man in the world.”
A slice of pain lanced across her stomach. “Ow.”
“Are you all right? Is everything all right?”
“Baby kicked my liver or something.” More pain, longer, harder. “Ow!”
“Raji?” Peyton was holding her and scanning her face. “Are you all right?”
“Braxton-Hicks contractions, probably, from stress. Or dehydration. Or something.”
“You’re the doctor. You should know.” He hadn’t stopped watching her, though.
She lay down on the bed on her left side, panting, while Peyton held her hand.
Nothing for twenty minutes. The baby kangaroo she was growing in there stopped kicking the shit out of her.
Raji eased herself up. “Okay, I’m better now.”
“Let’s get a marriage license.”
She held her hand over her aching stomach. “Now?”
“It’s almost noon. We just have to go down to a county clerk’s office and pick it up. Let’s go, right now. We can find someone to marry us today.” His hand spread over her stomach. “I know it’s old-fashioned. I know it’s probably chauvinistic or not progressive or indicative of my privilege, but I want you to be my wife when this baby is born.”
“We can’t tell my mother where we’re going,” Raji said. “She thinks we’re already married.”
Peyton kissed her, a slow, gentle kiss. “Whatever it takes.”
“Are we really doing this?” she asked.
“Getting married and having a baby?” He stroked her stomach. “I would say it looks like we’re doing that sooner rather than later.”
“Yeah,” Raji said. She had daydreamed about making a life with Peyton and this little half-lizard baby so often that it felt like she had stepped out of a nightmare and back into real life. “First, I have a phone call to make and an airplane flight to cancel.”