Chapter Four: Within Reach

After they pulled apart, they both looked around to see if anyone had been watching but the streets and sidewalks were as empty as before.

Zane gently rested his hand on her very swollen belly and rubbed soothingly back and forth as he pressed his mouth to hers again. Their laugh broke the kiss as the baby kicked at him and moved around to his hand running against her.

Jo took the hand that had been holding her face and kissed it before placing it along side his other one on her stomach. "I think he's annoyed at me too," she said smiling. "Not a word, Donovan," she added when he opened his mouth to respond. "This is so much harder than with Scooter. I'm so uncomfortable all the time and my hormones are raging, and not in a good way."

Zane was not content to let that understatement of the year go unnoticed. "Really, 'cause I hadn't picked up on that. Owwww!"

Jo pinched him on the thigh and then wiped the remaining tears from her eyes. "Watch it. You're not the one creating life as we speak."

"Hey, for about an hour, I helped out plenty!"

Jo moved his hands off of her and adjusted her sweater. "An hour? Aren't we being optimistic in hindsight," she replied smirking at his hurt look. "I know it's three more weeks and I know you guys are being really great and patient with me. But, Zane, I can't even pick up or cuddle with my own son I'm so huge. And I'm going insane on bed rest! I don't know what I'd do if Zoe weren't around to help out." She hung her head in shame just thinking about her good friend. "Ugh! I really need to make this up to her. She has been so great and I'm a total hormonal bitch all the time."

Zane took her hands and helped her to her feet so that that they could go back in. "I think she understands JoJo. This isn't her first time at the Josefina Lupo pregnancy rodeo." They walked slowly towards the entrance with Zane stopping right before going in. "But seriously, you're driving me nuts, Jo. You've got to take it down a couple of notches. I and everyone else are on edge and it doesn't have to be that way." He could see that she felt bad and was convinced for the moment that the message had been received. "Just remember, three more weeks and you'll be on your way back to your girlish figure and we'll have two little boys to keep us busy for the next twenty years."

She smiled at the thought and squeezed his hand. "I love you," Jo said sweetly, which was a turn of mood that he wouldn't complain about presently.

"You better to put me through this," he responded kissing her quickly and opening the door for her.

Jo strolled back to the table feeling sheepish and embarrassed at her latest breakdown. "Sorry for the drama guys. I'm blaming the munchkin," she said pointing at her big stomach. "And Zane, of course," she added, flashing a wicked smile over her shoulder at him. Scooter looked up and seeing his mommy and daddy together, reached out again to be held. This time, Zane grabbed him and placed him in his lap so that Jo sitting next to him could tickle and play with him.

On her way to sit down, Jo leaned over to give Zoe a squeeze as an additional apology. "Zoe, you're the best. I owe you six months of spa days at this point. I'm so sorry for being such a cliche, crazy pregnant woman. Seeing you and everyone else holding Scooter when I can't sometimes gets to me."

Zoe waved away Jo's concern and grabbed some food now that Zane had taken Scooter. "Oh, I know exactly how you get. I just don't want you to worry or hide anything if something is wrong. I'd be crazy too if I had an 18 month Zane-clone with one more in the oven. And since I'm calling Zane like a million times a day about you, I'd say he owes me a few months spa time too." She waved her fork around as she lectured her friends and family gathered around the table. I tried to tell them that it was just nature running it's course. You and Zane have always been about the fireworks even when you weren't hopelessly jumping each other." She ignored her friends' and her father's incredulous looks while Kevin chuckled around his forkfuls of food and Jenna continued to ignore the adult conversation in favor of her meal. "It's no wonder that your children wreak havoc even from the womb."

"Exactly," responded Jo. "But I'm still choosing to blame Zane for that. I'm not the one who spent my twenties as a felon," she offered playfully. It was a running joke between the two of them.

Zane rolled his eyes. "You see that? I'm the only one she gets all grudgey with. And for the record, I'm off parole so those days are behind me, thank you very much. Besides, you're 50 percent of the gene pool Ms. I-Have-a-Firing-Range-in-My-Basement." His self-satisfied smirk usually had a negative affect in times like these. But with their son sporting a matching grin, all Jo could do was laugh before leaning over and planting a dramatic kiss on her son and then her husband. Scooter broke out in little baby giggles over what was surely a common exchange between his parents.

"Nevertheless," Jo said, "I apologize for disrupting our lovely afternoon meal. Me and the munchkin will try to 'take it down a notch' over the next few weeks," she promised, glancing meaningfully at Zane who nodded encouragingly and rubbed her shoulder briefly before retuning to the active little boy in his lap.

"Don't worry, we've all been there," Carter offered enthusiastically trying to neutralize the mood. But Jo, Allison and Zoe simultaneously stared at him in annoyance. "I mean, not actually there," he said mimicking Jo's stomach. "Well, some of us were there," he said looking at Allison. "And some of us better not be there for a loooong time," he added, glaring at Zoe.

Her response was to meet his stern expression with a saucy smile and twinkle in her eye. "Whatever Dad. I'm happy to stay out of your little parenting clique."

"I think what Jack meant," Kevin, the peacekeeper, interjected "is that some of us at this table have seen it all before," and looked pointedly at his mother when he said that.

Zoe laughed. "Yeah, that's why she and Dad are like Jo's personal bodyguards or something. Such enablers." Zane enthusiastically agreed, and shot a glance towards Allison that screamed, 'see, it's not just me that thinks so!' Still, it was probably better received coming from Zoe and not him. Carter looked amused since he wasn't going to deny it but Allison was shooting daggers around the table.

"Don't give me that look, Mom. I remember how you were right before you had Jenna."

Upon hearing her name the little girl looked up from her plate and said, "I didn't do it." That was enough to have the entire table break out in laughter with only the little girl in the dark as to what was so funny.

"Yeah, Jo, remember when you were seven months pregnant with Scooter and you pulled your gun on Larry while he was in the bathroom." Zoe said chuckling. Jo shot the girl a mock glare even as a grin pulled at her lips over the memory.

"Whatever, he deserved it," Zane said. "He should have known better than to piss her off. It's like twice a year he has to push his luck. What he was doing hiding in that lab storage unit with your breast-pump, I'm still unclear about."

"It's classified," Jo said quickly glancing over at Carter who was doing a poor job of hiding his amusement. "Trust me, you don't want to know," Jo said and proceeded to laugh uncontrollably.

So for the rest of their meal, they shared funny memories and poked more fun at Jo and her hormones now that they weren't tip-toeing around it anymore. They had a good time poking fun at Zane too, especially Zoe as usual. And then Kevin got them both with reminders about their strange love triangle with Zoe crushing on Zane who was crushing on Jo who was confused about the whole situation. Zoe and Zane had always downplayed it as something that lasted for five minutes but to Jo, it had seemed much longer.

Carter, Allison and Jo shared a serious look as they thought back to that time but didn't let on that anything was amiss in front of Zoe, Kevin or Jenna. Zane chose to ignore them when they got like that. He focused on keeping his free arm around Jo and kissing her chastely every so often to remind her that she was loved and appreciated for having another kid with him. He enjoyed sneaking glances at their son who was particularly fond of rubbing his mom's full stomach.

Jo looked around the table and chided herself for her silly emotional displays. Sure she couldn't pick up or hold her son like she wanted to right now. But she also couldn't see her feet or go two hours without peeing so, like Allison said, she just had to make do. And she realized that there would come a day when Scooter would be too old to be held or would think it uncool and she'd have to deal with that too.

She grinned at Zane's engaging their son and making him laugh as they got his little brother to wiggle around for him in his mommy's tummy. The important thing was that she had everything she needed right within her reach.

THE END

AN: So, this was about as far as I could go with my Zane/Zoe relationship prompt (meaning that I couldn't go there at all, LOL).

I'm sure I'll revisit this story to tinker with it at some point. I was going stagger my posting on this but the odds of me editing it further in the near future are not so high. Why not just throw the whole thing up! I hope I didn't confuse you too much but thanks again for reading.