As planned, Alec and I ‘escaped’ to a secluded lunch spot, which was actually a picnic in Central Park that was already set out for us, with security flanking the trees. Alec and I had smiled so much, both of our mouths were sore. I was hungry, having skipped breakfast, and I was feeling the return of my first-trimester nausea, so I dug right into the food.
“Is it always this way for you?” he asked, seeing my calm demeanor.
He looked a bit frazzled.
“It can be. There are days that are this bad. Don’t we have something else tonight?” I had completely forgotten about the Broadway musical.
“Yes.” He rolled his eyes and lay down on the grass. “Your life sucks. When I’m on the news it is a press conference, maybe lunch … but this is madness.”
“Yeah, my life is madness.” I continued to eat, feeling weird.
“And you like all of this?” he turned to me to ask.
“No. But it’s what happens, sometimes.”
“Would you step away from it?” He was suddenly very serious.
“I’m going to have to when I get too big. At least for a little while, then there’s getting my body back, which might never happen so …” I hated to think that far in the future as it was a little scary.
“What would you do if you didn’t model?”
“Focus on my non-profit like giving out awards I actually know about and raise little Jr. Hang out with people. Help Avery with her fashion brand. Live in a big lake house away from the world.” I winked at him and smiled.
There was that damn camera again. He was so relatively normal but for his weird photography habit.
“No more pictures, Alec. You’ve taken enough,” I pleaded.
“So,” he started while reading his phone. “‘Has Kylie finally found Mr. Right after a million Mr. Wrongs?’ That’s the headline. ‘Consummate playgirl Kylie Morgan is seen in Toronto wearing a two-hundred-thousand-dollar Tiffany necklace.’ Wow, I must have gotten a deal.” He winked at me. “‘How did Kylie fit Blair in between Dane Wynters and Poet XRX? She’s always had a full dance card, but not this full. Pictures from Lake Ontario show she’s remarkably flexible, and we should hope to be hearing wedding bells beside the pitter-patter of tiny feet as her baby bump is clearly starting to show. Will this fairytale romance sweep them off their feet or under the carpet? Who knows? So … that’s just the one that posted two minutes ago. There are hundreds.” He put his phone down.
“I usually don’t read any of that stuff. You shouldn’t either, it’s toxic.” I didn’t want to admit it, but those rumors and lies did hurt, but I was the one to blame for them. I crafted the whole thing.
“Do you ever just want to run away from this?”
“Every day,” I sighed, and suddenly I wasn’t hungry.
“Pretty soon this is all I’ll have of you. These blasts in the paper, maybe a private dinner between your engagements. I want real pictures of you so that when I read these things and see them, I’m not tempted to hate you.”
“What about me? What do I get? You’ll be back to dating everyone because you know what you read about me is a lie. But for you, Alec? It isn’t lies, is it? It’s you. What do I have to recall? A child and a beautiful necklace and those dinners and play dates, but what do I get to remember? How your skin feels on mine or your soft snoring next to me?”
“Or my amazing cock?” he teased which was good; we weren’t heading to a nice place.
“That, I probably won’t forget.” I saddled up to him and lay in his lap as he scooted himself up against a tree.
“I guess we’ll have to get there when we get there, but for now, I just want to have a memory of you.” He laid his head on mine, and we stayed that way in the middle of Central Park not even bothering to notice that people had gathered. By the time the throng had become too dense, it was time to go.
Instead of meeting everyone at his penthouse, which had made him go ballistic, he gave the address to his apartment downtown. A driver met us at the park, and we were taken to yet another of his amazing dwellings. This was a massive apartment taking up the entire third floor. I didn’t have much time to look through it as there were makeup artists and Vera Wang’s fitting people, and of course, Maralis was there to help me get ready for the show.
As soon as I entered, someone whisked Alec away, and I was brought over to my own dressing room to be fitted into a maternity evening gown. While I was showing a little, and certainly my body had changed, I wasn’t showing enough, so they strapped a baby bump onto me.