Our group has become the most rebellious of all.
We’re the St. Mary’s rebels.
In fact, my guidance counselor, who I always thought was my friend of sorts, requested that they switch me to a different counselor now that I’m pregnant.
I’m not going to lie. That did hurt, but it’s okay.
It’s not anything that I didn’t expect.
So I’ll live. But from the looks of it, he won’t.
“Yes, I’m sure,” I tell him. “Can —”
He looks over my shoulders. “Then what the fuck are they looking at?”
I know what he’s talking about.
Like me and my girls, there were others watching him as well. They’re still watching him and now me.
On his first day here, the whole school watched him pick me up after school. They stood outside the cinder block buildings, gathered in the courtyard and watched me walk up to him. Over the past week, a lot of people have lost interest but a lot of them haven’t.
So they watch him.
They watch me walk up to him and they watch as he takes me away in his Mustang.
By now they know who he is.
There are several rumors about him and me, and of course one of them is that we’re together. That he’s my boyfriend and I’m having his baby.
I am having his baby but he’s not my boyfriend.
He never wanted to be and he never will be.
“You,” I reply.
“What?”
“Girls always look at you, remember?”
“I don’t like it.”
Surprised, I laugh. “Are you serious? You loved it. And you always watched them back. And –”
“I didn’t.”
“What?”
“Watch them.”
“I…”
I forget what I was going to say because with the way he’s watching me, it looks like… he’s trying to say that he didn’t watch them.
He watched me instead and that’s absurd, isn’t it?
He moves his eyes away and goes back to glaring at the girls over my shoulder. “If they want to watch, I’m –"
“Just ignore them. I do.”
“You shouldn’t have to,” he growls.
“I swear it’s okay.”
He narrows his eyes for a second before taking a step toward the gate but I stop him.
Physically.
Well, maybe that gives the wrong impression. I can’t physically stop him from anything. He’s bigger than me, a lot bigger and stronger.
He’s like a towering mountain, a building, and I’m like a bag of feathers to him.
I can’t stop him, but I do.
I put a hand on his hard stomach and he comes to a halt, going all rigid.
He glances down at it, at my small, pale hand on his white shirt, before looking up at me. “Let me go.”
I have to take a moment before answering him. “No.”
He flexes his fingers on my backpack that he’s holding. “Take your hand off, Fae.”
And I swear to God, my heart spins so fast in my chest that I think it will break out. It will burst out of its cage made of bones like I burst out of mine, the cage of cinderblocks and black gates.
The one he sprung me out of.
The guy who’s so much stronger than me but somehow is letting me control him like this.
Letting me make him do things.
Like he could. Make me do things I mean. Back then.
Back when I was in love with him.
Swallowing, I say, “No. You’re not going in there.”
His jaw clenches. “I am.”
“No, you’re not. We’re leaving.”
“Fae.”
My own stomach clenches as I press a hand on his. “No. You’re not going to fight with anyone, Reed. I won’t let you. I told you that it’s okay. They’ll lose interest after a while. If they want to look at something, let them. I don’t care. But you’re not going in there and doing your thing.”
“What’s my thing?”
“Blackmailing people.”
“This is going to be much easier than blackmail.”
“Oh, that makes me feel so much better.”
“That’s the idea.”
I sigh. “No. You’re not going. Besides, aren’t we late for our appointment?”
He stares at me, all belligerent and angry, and I stare back.
I’m not belligerent though, no.
I’m breathless.
My lips are parted and my heart is racing.
Because I don’t know what to do anymore.
I thought I knew.
I thought that all I had to do was remember my mistakes from two years ago so I won’t repeat them. I thought that if I remembered every little thing he did to me and that if I carried every little piece of my heart that he broke, I’d be safe.
I’d be safe from him.
But I don’t think I’m safe anymore.
He backs off then. He obeys me and his muscles go lax under my fingers, like I’ve managed to tame this beast with just my touch.
“This isn’t over.” With that, he throws a last glance over my shoulders and commands, “Let’s go.”
***
The room’s stark white and smells of bleach.
Which is to be expected, because it’s an examination room.
We’re at a private clinic.
For my first doctor’s appointment.
Because in addition to taking a pregnancy test, there’s another thing a girl does when she finds out she’s pregnant. And like everything else so far, Reed has taken care of that too.
Even though the clinic is out of town — not in Bardstown but in the neighboring town of Wuthering Garden — Reed has assured my brothers and me that she’s a good doctor and comes highly recommended.
As soon as we came in, a nurse in pink scrubs gave us a bunch of forms to fill out.
Which again Reed took care of.
He asked me questions when he didn’t know the answers but mostly it was all him.
Then that same nurse ushered us into an examination room. She told us that a technician would be with us in a few minutes and that in the meantime I should change into a white gown. She also gave me a cup to pee in along with a thick Sharpie so I could write my initials on it, for the pregnancy test.
When I told her that I’d already done it, she smiled and told me that it was just standard procedure.
And now we’re here.
I’ve peed in a cup and written down my name on it. I’ve changed into the yellow-ish gown and the technician has just entered the room.
Her name is Christina and she’s all energetic and happy as she tells me that today she’ll be doing my first ultrasound. She’ll also do an internal pelvic exam, which is basically to quickly check my uterus, cervix and vagina and make sure that everything is okay. Not to mention, she’ll do a pap smear, check my weight and blood pressure and things.
So basically an overall exam to make sure that me and the baby are healthy.
“All of these procedures are very basic and standard,” she says, snapping on her gloves. “There might be some slight discomfort during the pelvic exam but it’s nothing to worry about. If it becomes too uncomfortable, let me know, okay?”
Swallowing, I jerk out a nod. “Okay.”
Once she’s taken my weight and other vitals, she tells me to lie down on my back, with my butt slightly hanging off the edge of the table. She also tells me to put my legs into these archaic-looking metal contraptions called stirrups and relax.
Because this will be quick.
Nothing about it feels quick though.
Especially when she pulls up a stool where my legs are spread and I’m completely exposed under my gown.
I hadn’t realized that I’d grabbed onto the edge of the exam table and all my breaths were tangled up somewhere down my throat and
my lungs.
Until him.
Until he appears at my side.
So far he was standing on the opposite side of the room, leaning against the wall by the door. He kept his eyes on me during the weight check and everything.
As if keeping guard over me. As if Christina meant me some harm.
I don’t know when he moved though.
But he’s here now, at my side, and his long, graceful fingers wrap around my wrist, making me let go of the table. Making me grab onto him instead. And my fingers, they like that so much, so very, very much, that they latch on.
My fingers latch onto his and my breaths come easier.
The surging nausea in my stomach calms down too because he did what he said he’d do. He stocked up on his fabric softener and she likes that, the tiny bundle of cells in my stomach.
And the discomfort.
That vanishes as well because I’m looking at him. Into his eyes.
His molten gray, intense eyes.
I don’t mind the stretch then, of the speculum that Christina has inserted inside me. I think I only wince once and squeeze his hand for like three seconds until I adjust to the pressure. In my head, I take that as a victory.
Not him though.
His fading bruises ripple and he snaps at Christina to be careful.
And even though I say sorry and tell her to keep going — which she does after looking slightly intimidated by Reed — and stare up at him and shake my head, I can’t stop my ballerina heart from spinning.
I can’t stop myself from going breathless again when his jaw clenches, making me aware that he doesn’t like that. Me asking him to hold back.
A second later though, Christina’s voice breaks our stare when she says, “And there’s the tiny little thing. The baby.”
At this, we both snap our eyes to the monitor so we can see her.
Or at least see something.
Because for the love of God, I can’t.
I cannot see our baby.
And I tell her that and laughing, she points it out for me. The little dot that’s supposed to be her. She also tells me that the due date is in July.
My stomach flutters and I know it’s not her but still. I’m assuming that it is and I’ll keep assuming until she does move inside of me.
But anyway, Reed sees her right away and I’m not going to lie, I hate him a little bit for that. That he could see her while I couldn’t.
Although my ire melts away when he asks Christina to make four copies of it.
Of her.
And he does it while his fingers flex against mine.
Soon though, I have to let go of them, his fingers, because it’s over. And Christina tells us that the doctor is waiting for us in her office.
Dr. May is a friendly woman in her fifties maybe who asks me all kinds of questions. She takes my complete family medical history and prescribes me prenatal vitamins. She hands me pamphlets that I can read and get myself informed about the upcoming changes in my body and tells me to call the office any time I feel the need to.
Then it’s Reed’s turn.
To ask questions.
And he has a lot of them. The very first one is what the fuck can we do about my morning sickness. And why the fuck won’t it go away? And what the fuck we can do to give me a break from it?
All his exact words, not mine.
The doctor is patient, however. She says that we can’t do much about it. Every woman’s body is different and it sucks but I’m going to have to ride through it. And usually it clears up by the second trimester. However, if I really can’t bear it, she can prescribe me some mild anti-emetics.
Honestly though, these things take a natural course and she doesn’t think there’s any cause for worry at this point. So I refuse the anti-emetics — despite Reed being all upset over it — and thank the doctor for all the help.
And then Reed drives me home.
My new home that I’ll be living in for the foreseeable future.
It’s not my old house where I wanted to live with Conrad.
This is another thing I put my foot down about.
Living separately, living on my own.
Because after everything that happened and what Conrad told me about him taking care of us while growing up, I wasn’t going to burden him more. He’s already taken care of me and my brothers, he deserves a break now. Especially now that he’s got a new job. He doesn’t deserve a pregnant sister living in his house.
So I told them I’d live in an apartment close to school and once I’m out of St. Mary’s and have a job, I’ll pay them back for everything.
But Reed refused.
He already had a plan for that too.
So I’m going to live in this house.
It’s a house made of all glass, or mostly glass with tall windows taking up all the wall space, and it sits on top of a cliff in the town of Wuthering Garden.
It’s the same house that Reed brought me to that night. When he found me on the street outside of the Blue Madonna. His vacation home, or a vacation home that’s his for now.
I haven’t been able to really crack who it belongs to other than the fact that it belongs to a friend of his and is located close enough to the clinic and my school.
It’s gorgeous though.
Just like the guy who’s driven me over from the clinic in his Mustang.
As soon as he comes to a stop, he climbs out and walks around the car to open the door for me. The first day I got out by myself and it pissed him off. So now I wait for him to do his thing.
It’s not something he used to do two years ago though.
He’d get the door for me once when I was climbing in. I was free to climb out on my own after that.
Now he likes to help me with that as well. Just as he likes to help me with my backpack, which he’s still carrying as he walks me to the front door.
He only gives it back to me when I’m at the door, exactly on the threshold, with the door unlocked, ready to go in.
I know what he’s going to do now.
“You’ve got your phone with you?” he asks like he always does.
“Yes.”
Last week he bought me a new cell phone. Cell phones and personal technology are prohibited at St. Mary’s so I had to leave my old one, the one I had at Bardstown High, at home. I told him that I could still use the old one but he shot me an irritated look and bought me my current phone.
My brothers wanted to pay for half of it.
Reed gave them an irritated look as well but they glared at him back, so my brothers split the cost.
“And groceries and things are stocked?”
“They are.”
I have groceries for days actually.
Because again, Reed bought me everything over the weekend and then my brothers showed up with groceries too. So I have two sets of every food item. After a lot of discussion, they have now come up with a rotating schedule as to who will bring me groceries what week. This was a much more heated discussion than the cell phone one because they’d found out that Reed had already hired a cook and a housekeeper to come every day.
“Good. I’ll come by tomorrow to pick you up. Same time,” he instructs. “Lock the door after me.”
As usual.
He picks me up and he drops me off. He gives me instructions and then he leaves. Only to do it all over again the next day.
Because he doesn’t live here with me.
He lives in a hotel. One of the most luxurious hotels in Wuthering Garden, only fifteen minutes away from me. He made that very clear when my brothers asked him about it.
When he told them he already had a house for me, Con’s first question was where would Reed live. And he said that he’d be staying in a different place but close enough to get to me in record time if something happened.
As much as my brothers hate that I’m living alone now, they agree with this. They don’t wa
nt Reed anywhere near me even though I’m having his baby and he’s taking care of everything.
Before he can leave though, I ask, “Are you going back to the office?”
He’s taken aback by my question, I guess because I usually let him go without comment. But not today.
Today I have to say something to him.
His eyes flicker with suspicion as he answers. “Yeah. Why?”
“Just curious.” I shift on my feet. “So I was thinking something.”
His suspicion only grows. “And what might that be?”
“What do you… do for fun?”
“What?”
Ugh.
Seriously? What am I asking him?
But now that I’ve said it, I forge ahead, “I-I mean, all I’ve seen you do this last week is go to the office and take care of me and… What do you do after this? Like hobbies and stuff. Do you work on cars, I mean… there must be something you do to relax.”
It’s been bothering me for days now.
The fact that this job is killing him and that he has to do it because of me. He should be doing what makes him happy.
Like cars maybe and…
“I don’t have time to relax.”
“But –”
“Just lock the door after I leave.”
“Does he… know?” I ask him then with wide eyes.
“Does who know what?”
“That I’m pregnant. Your dad.” I pause to swallow down my racing heartbeats. “Does he know that you’re doing all this for me?”
The man who wanted to punish me for stealing his son’s car. And rightfully so.
The man who forced Reed to give up soccer in exchange for my freedom.
I wonder if he knows and if he does, what must he be thinking about it. About the fact that I’m pregnant with his son’s baby.
The flutters inside my stomach make an appearance and I can’t help but put my hand on my belly. And when I do, his eyes inevitably focus on it.
There’s a purple bruise on his right cheekbone that ripples at my question. It thrums just like the look in his gaze, all angry and determined. “You don’t have to worry about my father. I’ve got it under control.”
“But Reed —”
“I can handle my dad, all right? It’s fine.”
That’s exactly it, isn’t it?
That he keeps saying everything is fine. That he’s taking care of everything.
A Gorgeous Villain Page 38