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“Your word on that,” Asher said.

“My word.”

I nodded. “When we’re not ass-deep in alligators, and I’ve had a few days to digest the news.”

“Is this news to you, that I want him as my lover?” Asher asked.

I shook my head. “Truthfully, I thought you guys were doing it like bunnies behind my back. You know, the whole don’t ask, don’t tell policy. It never occurred to me that all the touching you did was with me.”

“I thought you would see it as cheating,” Jean-Claude said.

“With another woman, yeah, but I don’t have the same equipment. I mean if guys do it for you, I don’t have those parts. But it wasn’t guys I thought I was sharing you with, it was Asher. He’s not just one of the guys to us.”

“Are you saying that Asher is your exception to the rule?”

“I’m not sure I had a rule, but I won’t share you casually with anyone, any more than I’d expect you to share me. But I assumed that you and Asher were lovers, without me.” There, that was the truth.

“Why did you assume it?”

I motioned at Asher. “Look at him. Look at the way he watches you.”

Asher laughed. “Are you saying I am so adorable, how could anyone turn me down?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I am.”

His face softened, and he came to stand beside me. “Oh, Anita, you make my heart young again.”

I took his hand in mine. “And sometimes you make me feel like such a baby.”

“Pourquoi?”

“That I can take you both to bed, but I assumed you were doing each other behind my back, to save my sensibilities. It was a neat, clean solution, I thought. I didn’t have to decide how I felt about you two being a couple, but we all got what we needed. Instead, Jean-Claude has been a very, very good boy, and you’ve felt neglected.”

“Rejected,” he said, and gave Jean-Claude a dark look.

I touched his face, turned him back to face me. “That was my fault, not his. He’s right, Asher. You know me. I can ignore the elephant in the living room until I’m eyeball-deep in shit, but if you make me look at something before it’s that big, sometimes I take it badly. If I’d walked in on you guys together, I’d have used it as an excuse to run for the hills. Jean-Claude’s right about that.”

“And now?” he asked.

“I’m not sure. That’s the truth. Before I saw Jean-Claude kiss Auggie last night, before we shared him, I would have just said no. Not only no, but hell no.” I looked down, not sure if I was embarrassed, unhappy, or just out of my depth. “But I want everyone that I love to be happy. I know that. I want us all to be happy, and to stop running.” I touched my stomach, so nice and flat with all the exercise. “To stop pretending that we’re something we’re not.” I looked up at him. “No one asked you how you feel about the baby thing. I mean, you have as good a chance at it as Jean-Claude. Being the father, I mean.”

He smiled at me. “I am a selfish clod.” He dropped to his knees, gazing up at me. “I wake power drunk, and forget you have been through so very much in the last few hours. Forgive me.”

I shook my head. “No, I’ve been ignoring your problem for a lot longer.”

“I am in the bed of two people I love, there is no problem. I am luckier, and happier, than I ever dreamed to be again.”

“But…”

He put his fingertips against my mouth. “Hush. You ask how I feel about your pregnancy. How could I be anything but happy about the possibility of a little you, or Jean-Claude, coming into our lives? Julianna regretted that she never gave me a child.” He said her name without aching sadness, for the very first time.

I kissed his fingers and moved his hand so I could say, “You’re happy about the pregnancy.”

“Not happy, or unhappy, but I am very happy with you right now. I am very proud to call you my lover. You truly want us all to be happy, Anita. You have no idea how rare it is for two people in a relationship to truly want the happiness of the other, but you juggle many hearts and seek happiness for all. It is a rare gift, this desire.”

“How could you love someone and not want them to be happy?