I had hope, however foolish, that he would change his beliefs for me. Thought he would secretly be ecstatic, and we could celebrate. Rejoice in a miracle, despite being so unprepared, unsuspecting.
We would love him or her and move into a white-picket fence and live happy ever after…but if I uncoil my hands and look at my hand, it would be bleeding. Pooling with blood from stupid hope and wishing for things that would never happen in a million years.
In a normal situation, he would have freaked out when finding the test. Get angry, upset, numb—anything—but then he would calm down, and we’d sit down and talk about it. If I were really pregnant, we would devise a plan, go through each option thoroughly, and be rational adults.
But Grey is not normal, and I knew this. I am not blaming him or his disorder, but he never should have reacted the way he did. I get it. He doesn’t want to pass down his disorder; he’s afraid he’ll be a shit dad.
But over time, he’d cope with the fact that you can’t reverse a pregnancy by traditional means. The baby is there, and he or she is sticking around for as long as God allows them. What matters is that we figure out what to do about him or her.
Instead, he flipped his shit and downright accused me of getting pregnant on purpose. I thought we knew each other well enough for him to know I would never ever do that. Not only would that be insane, but really fucking stupid and selfish. I was ready to compromise. Ten years. Fifteen. Even twenty before we talk about children.
Why would I just decide to stop taking my pills? And to lock him down? We’re already a couple, a pretty serious one. Why the fuck would I need a baby to keep him when I already have him by my side?
I grunt and punch the wheel. The horn blasts.
I’m just so disappointed and so fucking sad and hurt, I can barely breathe.
“Deep breaths,” I instruct myself, curling my fingers around the wheel.
He did exactly what I thought he would do in my worst nightmare, said what I didn’t ever want to hear. No woman in a relationship wants to hear the man she loves yell at her to get “rid of it,” to “get the fuck out” after he finds a pregnancy test. Women want to be met with shock, but overall happiness. Even a little, just a tiny speck. Not outrage and hatred. And it wasn’t even mine, which is pissing me off even more.
If he’d just let me explain, I wouldn’t be sitting here in my car, in the freezing rain. I crank the heater up more and stare at the hood of the apple-red car. Where am I going? What am I doing? I don’t have any direction, no idea where I am. The fog and onslaught of rain is too much for me to see out of the window.
I turn up the speed of the windshield wipers and glance up at the street sign. Okay, I’m about ten blocks away from the apartment. I can easily turn back around. But why should I do that?
He pushed me to the ground, hurt me. I rub my aching wrists I shot out to help the harsh impact, tearing up. I don’t care if he has Bipolar Disorder. He could have one hundred personalities, and I would never easily forgive him. Bottom line is he hurt me…I just never saw it coming.
The tears come before I feel the pain in my chest. In my lungs. My heart and lungs are pounding against my stomach; it hurts so much. I groan in pain and lean against the seat, cupping my stomach. It’s a good damn thing I’m not really pregnant.
Why would they want such a weak mother and a fucked-up father? I take back the latter. I am weak. There’s no denying that. But Grey is…fuck it. He is fucked up!
My phone begins ringing and, with a stuffy nose and puffy, red eyes, I snatch it off of the dashboard.
It’s Grey calling.
I scream before ripping off the back and taking out the battery and SIM card. I know he tracks me; he admitted it once. I once found it kind of sweet—weird, and creepy—but overall sweet. And over-protective, but protective at the same time. But I do not want him to find me now.
I have my answer, then.
I am not going back to him.
I turn the car on, pull back onto the road. Thankfully, there are barely any drivers on the road. The rain is picking up with vigilance. I’m very thankful for upgrading my tires for the sturdy kinds that can prevail through any harsh weather.
I’ve been driving for approximately for thirty minutes, and I still have no idea where I am going. All I know is that Grey and I need space. Though it feels me moving to the moon still wouldn’t be enough, I have to put some kind of distance between us. I am just too hurt, and he is too up his ass to listen to me, to have common sense.
I could stay at Jaimie and Julia’s, but Grey would just go there. It’s the first place I’d go. Jaimie is my utter rock, while Julia likes to slap me with some common sense every once in a while. There is Lily and Matthew, but again, he’d find out their address and storm over. I could go to my childhood home.
I begin to merge onto the freeway when I remember my mother informing me it’s officially up on the market. Meaning I can’t stay there anymore. It isn’t ours anymore. I get honked as I quickly swerve back onto the local.
Where is the one place I can go that Grey wouldn’t think to find me…?
I drive for another ten minutes, wracking my mind. I can’t go to a motel since I left my wallet back at home. Knowing him, he’d pocket it, so I wouldn’t find it if I went back and snuck in if he were out. Which I doubt. If he runs through my short contact list, he’d camp out, waiting for me to come back for my things.
Noticing the needle near the E, I pull into a gas station. I have a bit of cash hidden away in my glove compartment. I put it away for emergencies like this. I enter the gas station, and luckily there is no line. Like there are no cars outside. The rain is picking up even more; the winds are insane. I feared I would be blown away into the strong wind.
After putting money on the pump and filling the tank up, I slide back inside the car, turn the heat up even more, and rub my hands.
If anything, I’ll have to call my mother and have her arrange for her plane to take me to Georgia, where she is. I guess living with her wouldn’t be too bad…I just don’t like the idea of taking off God knows how many days or weeks off of the program and school while I figure out what happens between Grey and me.
Sighing, I open the compartment and begin to slide the remaining cash inside when I spot something. I put the money down, pick it up, and shut the door. I stare at the card and feel my stomach drop.
I have to go here. It’s the only place left. The last person I’d ever think to go to in a time of desperation, no place else to turn to.
With great hesitance, I turn the car on and leave the gas station. I grip the wheel tighter, my blood rushing to my feet, knuckles running cold.
About an hour later, I arrive. I rush out of the car, lock it, and run up to the house. I falter in my steps as I look up at the traditional white colonial house. The front yard is immaculate, and there’s a large circular driveway with a fountain in the middle. I am met with a bright red door and a fancy golden knocker that has a ruby in the center. This household practically bleeds money.
After debating with myself for about five minutes and gaining goosebumps and possible pneumonia, I ring the doorbell. A long sweet tune sounds, and I step back. I count the seconds before the door swings open.
Jenna’s blue eyes are wide, her mouth hung ajar. She looks stunned. Before she can say or ask anything, Garrett appears behind her. He looks shocked too, but then relaxes and smiles at me.
“Well, isn’t this a nice surprise?” he says.
My blood runs cold. And it isn’t because of the rainstorm.
Chapter Thirty-Six
I did not imagine being in a situation like this. Soaking wet and standing on the porch of my father’s long-time mistress, her husband, and my current boss standing behind her. I must look like a wet rat. I’d make a mess in their flawlessly gigantic house.
My body is telling me to turn around and run away, using the little money I have for a motel. But I need more than a day at a shitty, broken-down motel. I need days, possibly a
week. My mind is shifting right now, gearing in preparation for making a huge decision. So I follow my brain and its loading screen, and I stay where I am. Feet planted and words sitting on my tongue.
“Can I come in?” I ask, my voice raspy from my crying and screaming. Can they see the rejection from my boyfriend? Hear him accusing me of something disgusting? Taste the salt from my tears grazing my tongue? I sound so depleted. Hurt. The storm inside of me is no comparison to the one behind me.
“Of course, please. Come in.” Jenna ushers me in with a worried look. It’s the face of a woman who knows her life as she knows it rests in the palm of a—by the looks of it—psychopath nineteen-year-old girl.
And I almost do blurt it out, reveal her big, dirty secret to her husband. But then I really look into her eyes, and I see my dying father. I keep my mouth shut. He’s happy with her, has been for a decade. Why should I reveal something that would wreck her, and thus wreck him? I do not want to be the reason he dies romantically, heart-wise, unhappy.
I vow to keep her nasty secret to myself.
“Linda,” Garrett barks, snapping his fingers, chin lifted in a privileged gesture as a young Asian woman wearing a maid’s outfit ushers over to me with a blanket. He is such an asshole.
“You don’t have to…” I start, guilty and embarrassed, but she spreads the warm blanket around my shoulders.
“I’ll get you a set of clothes,” she informs in a deep German accent. She’s gone before I can politely deny. A set of clothes? A blanket? Does it look like I’m a homeless person?
“So what brings you here, Olivia?” Jenna asks with her pearly white teeth.
Are you going to tell Garrett about my affair with your father? How much is enough to keep you quiet? Take the chandeliers, they cost four separate cars, her eyes plead quietly.
I open my mouth but am cut off by curiosity.
“Honey, how do you know Olivia?” Garrett asks, a frown marring his forehead.
“Oh…her mother and I are close friends—” Ugh. “—and I had the pleasure of meeting her during Thanksgiving. You know. When you were out of town for…business?” The way she said that, and her eyes squinted just the bit, I know she knows he’s cheating on her. I mean, she caught him with Delilah after I stupidly told her. In my defense, I didn’t know she was his wife.
How are they still together? I’m sure he knows, or at least suspects, she’s been cheating on him too. If he doesn’t, then he’s too stupid to hold his job position. She has been having an affair with another man for a little over a decade. Surely, she’s slipped up somehow, maybe told a made-up lie wrong or come home with her lipstick three shades lighter, hair just the tiniest bit out of place. Ten years is a lot of time to slip up at least once or twice.
“Right.” He nods and smiles, as if embracing his cheating habits. “Anyway, Olivia?” He raises his thick brows in expectation. He looks laid back and open and guilt-free, like he expected me to show up on his doorstep.
“I…” I don’t know what to say that won’t make me sound like a pathetic girl, running from her asshole boyfriend. “My apartment is being tented for termites. It will take about a week or two,” is the first thing I can think of. Great. I own bugs in my apartment while acting jittery. I totally don’t look homeless now.
“And you want to stay here?” Garrett asks.
“Without calling ahead to time,” Jenna adds.
They sound richly annoying, as a certain someone would say.
“Yes?” I say more of a question.
Garrett breaks into a shit-eating grin while his wife looks contemplative and scared. “Sounds all right to me.” He loops an arm around her, pulling her close to him. Tightly. Intimidatingly. “What about you, honey-bun?” He nods his chin to his wife, who looks petrified and looks to the ground, swallowing thickly.
“That’s more than fine with me. I’ll have Linda take your bags to the guest room…” Jenna turns to call her, but I quickly stop her.
“Oh no!” I shout, and she and her husband raise their brows. I blush at my accidental screaming. I clear my throat thoroughly before saying in a calm, flat tone. “I didn’t get to bring anything with me. I…the bugs just came out of nowhere. It was recommended I leave everything behind.”
“That’s fine. There’s plenty of clothes in the dresser of the guest room—your room—for however long you need it. My lovely wife here bought too many clothes and stored them in there. Jenna’s sister was supposed to stay with us for a month while she house hunted in Georgia, after being evicted from her place, but she ended up not coming. Sorry, that was too much information,” Garrett says, bowing his head at me and squeezing his wife’s shoulder playfully. She just gives him a tight-lipped smile, then stares at the space over my shoulder.
Is everything okay with her? I know I shouldn’t care about her since she’s the woman my father cheated on my mother with, but there’s something that flashes across her eyes that makes me feel sorry for her. Empathy for one half of a delusional, cheating couple. How morally charged am I? The answer is zero. Zilch.
Linda shows me to my room. I thank her. She seems genuinely surprised when I say it. Like she hasn’t heard those two words or received kindness in a long time. I bet she hasn’t around these people. These horrible, horrible people. I know the only reason Jenna didn’t just turn me around and push me back into the rain was because of my father. The man she has been sleeping with for years on top of years.
Sleeping with.
Ugh. Gross.
A knock on the door stops me as I am peeling off my shirt. I was about to take a quick hot shower, but I guess I have to swear fealty to keep Jenna’s secret.
“Come in,” I call out.
She walks in, careful to not let the door make a sound as she closes it. She faces me and doesn’t say anything for a while. All of her sneaking around and cheating and guilt flashes in her eyes, the way she bites her lip and tears up.
“Yes—?”
“You can’t say anything to Garrett,” she says, more like begs like her life depends on it. I bet he must be completely loaded and she’s afraid to lose that.
“Why?” I ask.
“Because he’s my husband and I love him very much,” she replies.
“No.” I shake my head. “I mean, why my father? How did you two even meet? Don’t you feel guilty for stealing him away from his family who needed him after the worst thing happened? Don’t you feel bad? Don’t you think you’re a bad person?” I know I’m not in the position to lecture and judge her while I’m standing in her home. But I need answers. Now. I deserve them.
Her eyes widen in surprise at my rare brazenness, but she sighs and closes her eyes. “I never meant to hurt anyone. I just wanted to be loved.” She begins tearing up and does a horrible job at wiping them away. “Garrett was a sweet man, but then he turned sour and completely changed. I wanted someone to be there for me, and that was your father.”
“So you used him,” I conclude, feeling rage grow between my veins.
Her head shakes quickly, and she takes an assuring step forward. “No, no, no. I loved your father. I still do. He makes me feel so…” She smiles softly, then realizes I am his daughter, and blushes, embarrassed, taking a step back. “I love your father,” she claims.
“I don’t care. You ruined his relationship with my mother. They could have helped heal each other and in turn heal me too, as a family. But you stuck your nose where it didn’t belong, and you took him away from us. He was so quiet around us. But I bet he was a charming speaker at restaurants getting you the best view, huh?”
She looks to the ground, too ashamed to look me in the eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she mutters.
“Whatever.” I cross my arms.
“Please,” she says.
“Please what?” I question.
“Don’t tell Garrett.” Her voice shakes, and I finally look her in the eyes. Her soul is broken. “I can’t tear our family apart.” How fucking ironic
. She shakes her head again as if just hearing what she said. “I’m sorry but…I can’t change the past. Change what I feel, have felt…”
She looks so sincere my chest hurts. What she and my father did was underhanded and disgusting, but at least they were happy, right? He may have displayed a look of dismay and numbness, but behind closed doors, he was the happiest he could have been. Meanwhile my mother and I were miserable all the time. We needed him, and he wasn’t there. But at least he was happy.
“Fine,” I mutter.
She sniffles loudly. I glance at her small smile and shaking, clasped hands. “Thank you, thank you.”
With a nod, I look to the ground. Taking the cue, she carefully opens the door before slipping out. I kick the mattress, fall onto it. I can’t believe I am keeping this big secret. I really hope God doesn’t hold this over my head on my judgment day.
I take a long shower that may have been an hour. It just felt so good. The hot water, the muscles in my back loosening. In the dresser, I find simple t-shirts, shorts, and pants. Even underwear that appear untouched.
I get dressed in a plain white V-neck shirt, pink plaid pajama shorts, and a pair of socks. I pinch my cheeks for a soft red and pull my hair up in a ponytail. I use the hair dryer in the bathroom to dry my hair. Half an hour later, I am more than ready to hit the giant California king bed.
But a knock on the door stops me from even touching the silk duvet.
Slowly, confused, I walk over to the door and unlock it. I open it a crack, uncomfortable with being other people’s—who I barely know—house, especially these people’s house.
No one’s outside of the room, though. I frown in confusion as I look around. Down the hall, both ways. No one. Convinced I’m hearing things, I close the door and retreat to the bed. This time I have one knee on the bed when there’s another persistent knock.
I jump and look around. Am I being pranked? Who in this house would prank me? Linda? Garrett?
I walk over to the door again and swing it open quickly, hoping to catch the person playing games with me. I take a single step out and yelp in pain as my foot collides on something sharp and hard. I look down and frown.
Grey: Everlasting (Spectrum Series Book 6) Page 26