She looked like an innocent rock ‘n’ roll virgin.
Albeit a pregnant one.
She sat as her mother park the car at the base of the sweeping, wide, stone stairwell that led to the arched, fifteen-foot tall, studded, wooden double doors.
Belle felt a wave of nausea and swallowed it down.
Her grandmother, sitting in the backseat, leaned forward and rested her hand on Belle’s shoulder. “You okay, Bellerina?”
No, she was definitely not okay.
But she didn’t admit that.
“Let’s just get this done,” Belle muttered instead, threw open her door and stepped out.
No sooner had she done this than one of the double doors swung open and Joy, wearing an elegant, blue dress the likes of which one would don to meet The Queen, came flying out.
She was wearing the brooch Belle had given her.
“Belle!” she cried, rushing down the steps, throwing her arms wide and Belle braced just as Joy reached her and gave her a warm, friendly hug. “Oh darling, I’m so pleased to hear your and Jack’s news. So, so, so, so, so, so, so pleased,” she chanted, her arms still tight around Belle and Joy was swinging her side to side with abandoned delight.
Joy moved a bit away but held Belle by the forearms so she could look into Belle’s eyes with a friendly smile.
As if the last time Belle saw her, Belle wasn’t dashing out of her house in humiliation after loudly fighting with both her sons because she’d been dating one and slept with the other.
As if, for a month after that, Belle’s sordid relationship with her sons hadn’t been written about in detail (not all of them correct, but they were correct enough) in every newspaper on three continents (maybe seven, Belle had no friends in South America, Asia, Africa or Antarctica so who knew).
Joy gave Belle’s arms a squeeze and repeated on a whisper, “So pleased.” Then her head jerked around and she shrieked, “My God! You are not Belle’s mother!” And she rushed to Rachel and embraced her too.
“Is James Bennett adopted?” Gram asked, sotto voce, in Belle’s ear and Belle choked back a wave of hysterical laughter.
This was not hard to do. While swallowing her laughter, she saw movement at the door and her mirth and hysteria died.
She looked up and there stood James, arms crossed on his chest, legs set wide. He was wearing jeans and an untucked, tailored, black shirt. He was looking even more beautiful than she remembered him and she thought she’d remembered every single detail of him in glaring clarity but, apparently, she had not.
His eyes were on her and she felt the trill go up her spine as her belly did a flip that had nothing to do with nausea.
Quickly she turned her eyes away and watched Joy introduce herself to Gram with another welcoming hug.
Then Joy disengaged from Gram and linked arms with Belle, leading her up the steps.
“I’ve ordered high tea and we’ve made sure we have plenty for dinner if you all decide to stay which I think would be lovely,” Joy wittered on as she firmly guided Belle up the steps even though Belle tried very hard to drag her feet.
They nearly made it to the top and Belle didn’t look up but she saw James’s thighs, h*ps then stomach and none of them moved out of the way of the door.
She ignored this by turning to Joy and saying, “I’m sorry you went to all that trouble, Joy, but I’m not very hungry.”
The forceful, no-nonsense words uttered in James’s unmistakable, deep voice brought Belle to a stop.
“You’ll eat.”
Her gaze skittered to his still unfairly beautiful eyes and she saw he was staring at her.
“I’m not hungry,” Belle repeated.
“You’re eating for two so you’ll eat,” James returned and Belle felt the heat sting her cheeks at his nearly instant reference to their unborn child.
She also felt like running back down the steps to her car or avoiding it altogether and jumping into the sea and swimming to France.