by Thorpe, Elle
The first reporter on the red carpet didn’t even bother with pleasantries. “BB, wow! That dress! We were all stunned when you stepped out of the car. Are you pregnant?”
A hush fell over the room, and I stopped breathing, waiting for her answer.
Her eyes went wide, her mouth falling open. “What? No…” She shook her head, and for a split second my heart beat again. She wasn’t pregnant. I’d been wrong. We’d all been wrong.
But then her date, Jerry or whatever, stepped towards the microphone with a laugh. He put his arm around Bianca and pulled her close. Then he rested a hand on her belly.
I wanted to reach through the TV, rip off his arm, and club him over the head with his own severed limb.
“Might as well tell them, babe. There’s no hiding it in that dress.”
My heart stopped.
“I can’t believe she didn’t tell me,” Reese cried.
“Congratulations, you two! Do you know if it’s a boy or a girl?” the reporter asked Jerome.
He smiled into the camera, his white teeth flashing. “No, we decided a surprise was better.”
Bianca’s expression was frozen, her eyes wide and her lips slightly parted, but Jerome had told me all I needed to know. When I looked over at Low, his face filled with pity.
“Not such a fake relationship after all then, huh?” I bit out before going back to the barbecue to rescue the meat that was turning black. Just like my heart.
* * *
I couldn’t sleep. I was so tired my eyes ached, and I’d gotten into bed, but I couldn’t put my phone down. After a strained dinner at Jamison and Elodie’s place, where nobody talked about the elephant in the room, I made an excuse to leave. No one objected. The party had become subdued, with Reese trying to call Bianca over and over, and everyone studying me awkwardly. But home was no better. Being alone in my room just gave me too much time to think. And too much time to obsessively stalk Instagram and Facebook for any scrap of detail. And there was plenty of it. Jerome had plastered his Instagram with photos of him and Bianca. Bianca’s account was silent, but Jerome was announcing to the world that he had a new baby mama, and her fans were all over it. I scowled at all the congratulations messages. Fuck. Would she move to LA permanently now? Or would they move back here? Would I have to see them at every function our friends put on?
I couldn’t do that.
It had been one thing to see her at events when we’d both been single. But I couldn’t go and watch her with another man. I tossed and turned until sometime around dawn I finally slept.
“Dad!” Sadie said, shoving me.
I sat up blearily, blinking in the harsh light flooding into my bedroom. “Are you awake?”
I scrubbed my hands over my face, fumbling around my bed for my phone. “What time is it?”
“Late. You slept all day.”
“What? I did?”
She nodded. “Mum is here to pick me up. I just came to say bye. See you in a week?”
I blinked away the haze. “Right. Yep. I’ll pick you up from your mum’s next weekend.” I ruffled her hair and pulled her close. “I’ll miss you, kiddo. I like this house a whole lot more when you’re here.”
She laughed and shoved me away. “Yeah, yeah, I know. You tell me all the time.”
She was right. I did. But the past few months of her living here had been the only bright spot in my life. She was a great kid. She’d copped some shit when my sex tape scandal had been all over the place, but she’d made me so proud with the way she’d handled it. Completely owning it and never letting anyone get to her. She’d laughed her way through the whole thing, and eventually life had gone back to normal.
She’d been angry with me, understandably, but after much grovelling and a shopping spree, she’d come round. Eliza and her husband had moved, and Sadie had stayed. Just like we’d planned.
“Say hi to your mum for me, okay?”
She nodded. She kissed my cheek then got off the bed. In the doorway, though, she turned back.
“Dad?”
“Mmm?”
“Have you checked your social media in the last hour or two?”
“No, you just woke me up, remember?”
“Your, ah… Your friend. BB? She’s all over the tabloids.”
I sighed. “Yeah, I know. She announced last night she was pregnant. Or rather, her boyfriend did.”
Sadie shook her head. “You dodged a bullet there, Dad. What a train wreck. That Jerome guy was caught kissing some brunette at the afterparty. The photos are everywhere. I know you liked her, but she’s always in the media for something. And it’s never anything good.”
“What?”
She shrugged.
“He was kissing someone else?”
She pointed at my phone sitting on my bedside table. “It’s trending on Twitter. You can’t miss it. See you next week.”
She waved, then a few seconds later the front door closed.
I snatched my phone up and stabbed at the Twitter icon. My heart sank as I scrolled through the feed. Sadie was right. Candid photos of Jerome all over some brunette in the corner of a club were everywhere, with hashtags like #wheresBB and #babydaddydrama along with photos of Bianca and Jerome on the red carpet.
My blood boiled. That stupid prick. I wanted to fly across the world and punch him in his cheating, too handsome face. Didn’t he know what he had? Obviously not, if he couldn’t even keep it in his pants on the day they’d announced they were having a child together. I got up and paced around my bedroom, anger coiling my muscles too tight. Fuck! She didn’t deserve this. She’d already had to get through one scandal in the last year. She’d only just had time to put that behind her, and now this? I shook my head and tried to relieve some of the tension in my shoulders, but no amount of pacing was calming my fists balling at my sides.
I grabbed my phone again and brought up her number. My finger hovered over the call button, but what the hell was I going to say? Congrats on your pregnancy, sorry your baby daddy can’t keep it in his pants?
“Argh!” I yelled, throwing my phone onto my bed. I couldn’t call her. It wasn’t my place. She’d made her position perfectly clear when she’d up and left the country to get away from me.
I sucked in deep lungfuls of air and groaned. Who was I kidding? Even if it made me the dumbest, lovestruck fool in history, I couldn’t just sit back and do nothing. Not when she was on the other side of the world, hurting.
I picked up the phone again, and this time, there was no hesitation. I knew what I needed to do.
32
Bianca
Tangie and Marco, Jerome’s manager, screamed at each other across my hotel room, while I sank deep into the plush lounge, wishing I was anywhere but here.
“This is a PR disaster,” Tangie screeched, her face red as she stood toe to toe with Marco. “Jerome has royally fucked this up for everyone. How the hell are we going to spin this?”
Marco was just as angry, his entire body so tense he was practically vibrating. “Well, maybe if you’d told me your client was knocked up and going to wear a skin-tight dress so the whole bloody world knew it, we could have gone in with a game plan!”
Jerome sat beside me on the lounge, the two of us watching the back and forth between our managers like it was a tennis match.
He leaned over. “I really am sorry, Bianca,” he said to me quietly.
I wanted to be angry with him. He’d outed my pregnancy, falsely claimed to be the father, and then gone and made out with some woman he’d been seeing, naïvely unaware of how much attention would be on him after the shitshow he’d created. I wanted to be angry, but the whole situation was just ridiculous. And in the scheme of things, so unimportant.
I had a tiny baby growing inside me.
And compared to that, everything seemed insignificant. Just the thought of a baby was both overwhelming and terrifying. Tangie had made me stay in LA for the weekend to attend this crisis meeting, but then I was on the nex
t plane back to Sydney. I had no reason to be in LA. And every reason in the world to go back home.
Back home and straight to Riley’s door to tell him he was going to be a father again.
I was done with LA. For good.
I rested my hand on my little baby bump, still shocked over the fact it wasn’t just bloating from overeating. Tangie and Marco droned on and on, but I tuned out. A band of panic tightened around my chest at the thought of being a mother. I’d never even really considered having kids of my own. After what had happened with my sister, and with my job, I’d always been adamant that I didn’t want to bring an innocent child into the storm. A child was something the press could use to hurt me. Just like they’d hurt my mother. They’d destroyed her life the night they’d taken things too far.
But when I thought back to those moments on the beach, being in Riley’s arms and making love, rather than just fucking…this baby was the product of that. Maybe we hadn’t said the words, but I’d loved Riley for most of my adult life. I’d been willing to walk away when walking away only affected me. But now I had someone else to consider. Maybe he wouldn’t take me back. I’d somehow become the story of the year, what with a sex tape, then a baby daddy scandal. I knew my coming back into his life would just be one more drama in a long list of them. But he had to know. He had to have the choice. I would never deny him the chance to be involved with this baby, the way Eliza had denied him with Sadie all those years ago.
I’d picked up the phone to call him a hundred times over the last two days. But every time, I’d cancelled the call before it had connected. It wasn’t something I could do on the phone, from across the other side of the world. It had to be in person. I had to see his face when I told him this baby was his. The way he reacted would tell me exactly how he felt. And from there, I’d be able to make some sort of decision on what the rest of my life would be.
Tangie and Marco were still screaming at each other, but I was done listening.
“Enough!” I yelled over the top of them.
They both stopped and stared at me.
“Jerome and I aren’t together. He did nothing wrong.” I glanced over at him. “Nothing wrong by hooking up with someone else anyway. Telling everyone the baby is his even though we’ve never even slept together is another story altogether.”
He held his hands up in mock surrender. “I told you, I’m sorry about that. I just got caught up in the moment and thought it would be good publicity. I didn’t think it through.”
I rolled my eyes. He was young and green and obviously self-centred. I just couldn’t bring myself to care. Let the whole world think Jerome was this baby’s father and that I was the poor pathetic sap being cheated on. Riley would know the truth. And so would the people we cared about. Sadie. Our friends. Our families. It didn’t matter what the rest of the world thought they knew.
I pushed to my feet. “I’m done with this. My flight leaves in five hours, and I need to finish packing. So if you don’t mind…” I glanced in the direction of the door.
“But—”
Tangie started up again but I held up a hand in a stop motion. “No, Tangie. Spin this however the hell you want. I don’t care. I’m going home.”
She gave me a disappointed look, then threw a murderous one at Jerome and Marco before snatching her purse from the kitchen bench. “Fine. I’ll see you back in Sydney then.”
I nodded as the three of them filed out of my room, leaving me blissfully alone. I padded to my bedroom where an open suitcase lay on the bed, my clothes and shoes strewn about. I picked up a shirt from the bed and folded it neatly, placing it inside the suitcase when knocking on the door started up. I groaned.
The knocking turned into banging, and my blood pressure rose. “All right, Tangie! I’m coming!” I yelled, crossing the room and pulling open the door.
“Not Tangie,” Riley said gruffly on the other side.
My mouth dropped open and I stared at the man I hadn’t been able to get out of my mind since the minute I’d walked away from him. I fought to speak, to voice the confusion slamming through me, but nothing happened. The whole world slowed down, and I suddenly felt like I was moving through a fog.
Riley’s gaze dropped to my belly then lifted to meet mine. Determination shone bright and strong in his eyes. “Can I come in?”
I nodded dumbly and stepped aside. He shouldered a backpack and walked by me.
“Is that all you brought with you?” I asked, snapping out of my trance.
“Yes. I don’t plan on staying long.”
“Oh.” I couldn’t help the way my chest deflated. My fingers itched to reach out and touch him. To run over his two-day stubble and into his plane-tousled hair. To press my lips against his and to feel his arms come around me. To hear him say everything would be okay. That he still wanted me, even after I’d run away. Even though I was pregnant and about to turn his life upside down.
He dumped his backpack on the living room floor and turned back to face me.
“I saw what happened the other night. With Jerome and the baby and that other woman. And I just…shit.” He ran his hands through his hair but didn’t make a move to say anything else.
“You just what?” I prompted. My brain raced a million miles an hour, but I couldn’t come up with a single reason as to why or how he was standing in my LA hotel room. None of this made any sense, and I was wholly unprepared to see him so soon. I’d thought I would have the entire plane ride back to Sydney to think about what I’d say when I saw him.
There was so much to explain, and I needed a moment to recover.
“Riley, why are you here?”
He lifted his head, and his eyes blazed with an intensity I’d never seen from him before.
“Because that guy isn’t good enough for you. If he’s cheating on you now, the day you announce your pregnancy, then he’s always going to cheat. You deserve better.” He turned away and paced the room. “I couldn’t stand the thought of you dealing with all this alone. Again. And before I knew what I was doing, I was booking a flight and driving to the airport.”
My heart thumped hard. “You flew across the world just to check on me?”
He stopped pacing and stared at me as if I’d just said the stupidest thing he’d ever heard. Then he strode across the room, stopping just centimetres in front of me so I had to look up to meet his gaze.
“No,” he said fiercely. “I came to tell you I love you. And that I don’t care if you’re having someone else’s baby. I love you and I want you to come home with me.”
Then he dropped to one knee.
“Marry me.”
If I hadn’t felt the thick carpet beneath my feet, or the breeze from the air-conditioning vent, I would have thought I was dreaming. Because only in a fantasy land could this wonderful, amazing man be telling me he loved me after everything I’d put him through. It was impossible that he’d want to take on a baby that wasn’t his. Except that it was his. He just didn’t know it yet. I couldn’t even process the proposal. That was entirely too much to comprehend. I knelt to the floor in front of him, my legs unwilling to hold me any longer.
He ran the backs of his fingers down the side of my face, then to the base of my neck. I closed my eyes as I leaned into him, too shocked and amazed to say a word, and he dipped his head, his lips hovering just over mine.
“Please, B. Give me another chance. Come home with me. Marry me. He can be involved with the baby. As much as he wants, but I want you. You belong with me. You always have.”
Something inside me broke. Five months of thinking about him, missing him, regretting every lost moment over the last ten years. The walls I’d built that held all of those things together snapped, and I reached up to cup his face, pulling back just enough that I could look into his eyes, finally finding my words. “I love you, too. I always have. I’m not with Jerome. And I—”
He blinked, surprise flooding his features, as if he’d expected to have to beg. But then his grip on
the back of my neck tightened, and his mouth crashed down on mine, swallowing the words I still needed to say.
All thought disintegrated as his mouth moved with mine, desperate and wanting, his lips opening and his tongue seeking entrance. I clutched him to me, afraid I’d heard wrong, afraid none of this was real. His muscled shoulders bunched and tensed under my hands. The warmth of his chest pressed against mine. Very real feelings stirred low in my belly.
“Are you really here?” I whispered when his lips trailed off my mouth.
He chuckled before he kissed his way down my neck, swirling his tongue over my skin. I moaned at the sensation.
“Do you think I’m a mirage? Pretty sure a mirage couldn’t kiss you like this.”
His mouth found mine again, and he kissed me so deeply my head spun. His kisses sent sparks of pleasure straight from my lips to my core, and I wrapped myself around him, unable to get enough. My brain was foggy with lust, and the overwhelming need to be with him consumed me. But he had to know first. I couldn’t process any of this, especially not the proposal, until he knew. I pushed to my feet, pulling him up with me, but then took a step back, putting some space between us. I knew it was the only way I’d get the words out without succumbing to the need pulsing through me.
For two days now, I’d thought of this moment. Thought of nothing else really, except telling him he was the father. I’d spent the whole time nervously worrying about what he’d say. Things weren’t good between us, and it had been five months since we’d been together. What if he’d moved on? What if he thought I’d done it on purpose? But now, all those fears evaporated. He was here. Straight off a twenty-plus-hour flight, telling me in the flesh that he loved me and wanted me. Nothing could have made this moment more special. And now I felt nothing but excitement.
“I need to tell you something,” I said coyly, watching his face.
“You do. You still haven’t told me whether you’ll marry me or not. But tell me quick, because after five months of not seeing you, talking is not what I want to be doing.”