And Back Again

Chapter 7

That evening Zara kept her work attire on, rather than changing into something much more casual, while she made dinner. Purposely she sped home hoping to beat Angel, which she did, but now she was nervous for his arrival. There was no rumble of a Harley to announce his presence, only his heavy footfalls on the porch.

"Hey babe," she said cheerfully from the back of the house. "I'm in the kitchen."

He smiled warmly seeing her at the stove, tapping her foot as she watched impatiently for her water to boil. Angel slipped up close behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist, and nuzzling his face in her neck.

"How was your day?" He said, his words muffled.

"It was, typical, I guess," she said with annoyance. "Yours?"

"Fine," he muttered.

"And the meet?" She followed up his nonanswer quickly and smiled as his body tensed for a second, taken aback by the question.

"You wanna know?" He asked, only relaxing when she nodded. "Oh, uh, it was fine," Angel said half-heartedly. "He was smug and his guys were cocky but we got half the money and all the information."

Zara paused, reluctant as ever to continue, but signaled quite blatantly that she wanted to know more. "How does it look?"

"Detailed," he groaned. "Full bio on everybody, it's fucking crazy."

"Really?" Her interest was piqued. "Can I see?"

"You wanna see?" Angel asked with surprise.

"I'm a nosy bitch," she laughed. "I want to see these girls. Do you know how much they charge?" She asked, intrigued by the much different lifestyle

"I don't know their rates," he laughed. "Why? You want a book one for a date? Little threeway?"

Zara elbowed him playfully in the stomach. "No," she said dramatically. "I don't share."

"After dinner, we can read em' and guess which ones got boob jobs," he suggested, stepping away and grabbing himself a drink.

Looking back at him, Zara rolled her eyes. "You would say that shit."

"Hey," he looked at her with a serious expression as he slammed the fridge shut. "You good with this?"

No. No, she wasn't. Not a bit.

"Of course," she said with a bright smile. "I do want to talk about something unrelated though, and I don't want it to wait."

"That doesn't sound good," his happiness was dashed.

Zara sighed, turning the burner off with a swift flick of her wrist, and moved from the stove to lean on the kitchen island.

"Have you always wanted to have kids?" She asked pointedly.

The dumbfounded, confused puppy expression he wore almost made her laugh. Angel shrugged a little while he thought it over.

"The idea of a family was always kind of nice," he started, "But uh, with the club and my fucking life, it uhh," Angel didn't want to say it, he didn't want to hurt her, "It didn't seem like a good idea."

"So, no? The idea is nice but thinking practically it wasn't a plan you had for yourself." Zara asked forcefully.

"I guess," he huffed, slightly annoyed. "When you got pregnant though, I was all for it, Z. When you showed me that fuckin' picture," he felt himself growing a bit emotional. "I want a baby now. I do. I want one with you."

"Okay," she nodded.

"Why?"

"Nothing."

"Zara."