Forbidden

by R. R. Banks

  I had thought that traveling would be good for me, giving me something to distract me from my thoughts, but in the last week I knew that it was time for that to come to an end. I couldn't run away from my life forever and now that there was less than a month until my due date, I needed to be close to home. I needed to start preparing the house for the baby and to be able to visit Nikki each week rather than every two weeks as I had been doing. I had thought that coming back here would feel comfortable, but after two days I was still trying to get used to moving through the space again. It almost felt as though I was visiting, like I had stepped into another life temporarily.

  I stood in the kitchen, rubbing away a tightness in my belly and being rewarded with a few presses of the baby's feet. She didn't have enough room in there anymore to do full kicks and I was starting to worry that she was going to run out of space before her due date came. It already felt like it was getting cramped and I hoped that she wasn't getting too big. I was still measuring slightly larger than my due date would have warranted, but Nikki had been monitoring me carefully and said that I was still healthy, so I hadn't gone for any further tests, including avoiding another ultrasound. As much as I would have loved to see her little face, I couldn't imagine facing those memories again. She had warned me that in the last few weeks of the pregnancy I would start feeling Braxton-Hicks contractions and that I shouldn't panic if I felt them. They were just my body's way of starting to get ready for labor.

  That's what I reminded myself of as I let the last of the tension ease away from my belly, and then straightened from where I leaned against the counter. I reached for a cup to make myself tea, hoping it would relax me, and gasped when I heard a loud knock on the front door. I knew that it wasn't Skylar. She would never knock like that and she would call me before just showing up at the apartment. I heard another, slightly different, knock and walked cautiously toward the door.

  "Gabrielle, open the door."

  Talon's voice coming through the door made me stop. I felt my chest contract and my breath catch in my throat.

  "Gabrielle, come on," Jackson called. "We know that you're there."

  "We saw your car in the lot," Lucas added.

  "Come on, Gabrielle, open the door," Aiden said, rounding out the beseeching from the four brothers.

  I hesitated, not wanting to open the door and yet wanting nothing more than to see them. Finally I stepped up to the door, knowing that there was nothing that I could do to make them go away. If I ignored them, they would just keep standing there, pounding on my door and calling in to me. The last thing that I needed at this moment would be Frank and Marie from next door coming out with popcorn to watch all of this unfolding. I opened the door enough to look out at them, but kept my body behind it.

  "What are you doing here?" I asked.

  "We want to talk to you," Jackson said.

  "I don't have anything to say to you," I said, hoping that they couldn't hear the trembling in my voice.

  "That's the problem," Talon said. "You seem to not have anything to say to us, but we have a lot to say to you."

  My heart was pounding in my chest and I could already feel the tears starting to form in my eyes. Seeing them was so much harder than I had expected it to be. I knew that it would be difficult to see them, to be close to them, but I hadn't expected that it would take my breath away. All I wanted was to throw myself into their arms, but that was exactly what I couldn't do. Not anymore. Not now.

  "Fine," I said. "But you can only stay for a few minutes. I don't have much time."

  The fact that I was standing there in my pajamas probably told them that I was lying, but they had the decency to not say anything about it. I opened the door a little further and they streamed into the living room. I noticed them all focused on my belly and my hands went to it protectively. Jackson stepped forward.

  "Wow," he murmured.

  He reached forward and rested one hand on my belly. I lifted my eyes to him and felt the familiar melting feeling inside me.

  "Why did you leave?"

  I looked over Jackson's shoulder at Aiden, who was looking at me intently. "Why did you just disappear?"

  "I didn't disappear," I said. "I left you a note."

  "Yeah, you left a note saying that you had changed your mind. How could that be? Everything was fine the day before."

  I looked down at the floor, not wanting to look at them anymore. This wasn't the way that this was supposed to be. This wasn't how this was supposed to happen.

  "I didn't think that you would care," I said.

  Talon looked at me, his eyes wide.

  "You didn't think that we would care?" he repeated. "How could you think that we wouldn't care when you and our child just left and we couldn't find you?"

  I drew in a breath, trying to stay as calm as I could. I needed to stay strong. I needed to keep myself as under control as possible and just get through this. When the baby was born, they would understand. I would explain it all to them then.

  "I told you that I would let you know when the baby was born. This is just something I can't do anymore."

  "I don't understand," Lucas said. "What changed? How can you suddenly say that this is something you can't do?"

  I knew that we had reached a point of no return. The fact that they were standing here in my living room changed everything. I couldn't hide from them anymore. I couldn't keep trying to pretend that I didn't feel what I was feeling, or that I would be able to just put all of them behind me and move forward. That wasn't going to happen. The love that I held in my heart for them was something that I would always live with, and that meant that I had to tell them the truth. I had to be honest with them so that they could understand why I had to pull myself away from them before I was hurt any more.

  "I thought that I could handle this," I said. "I really did. I really thought that I would be able to just go ahead with the type of life that we talked about and be able to raise this baby with the four of you and stay the way that we were, but I thought about it, and I realize now that I don't have that in me. I can't pretend that I am OK with just raising a child with the four of you. That's not me, and the closer that I've gotten to delivering, the more that I've realized that. I need more. I need something that I said I didn't, and that's not fair to any of you. I'm sorry that this isn't what you expected, but I'm sure that we can find a way to work it out that will be right for all of us."

  That was the truth, as much as I could tell them now. There was another half that I wasn't saying yet, but they would find out soon enough. Then it would be easier for them to walk away without feeling like they were doing something wrong. It was the least that I could do for them after all that they had done for me and how much they had changed my life.

  "Gabrielle, you don't understand," Talon said, taking a step toward me. "And that's our fault. We told you at the beginning of this that this was just about the baby, that we just wanted to make sure that we had a child to carry on our legacy, but that's not the truth anymore."

  "It's not?"

  My heart fluttered.

  "No," he said. "It's not. You said that you need something more than what we agreed to, but that's not a reason for you to leave."

  "Of course it is. I've known from the beginning what you wanted from me. You wanted a child and someone to help you raise it. There was never anything else…"

  "There is now." I looked at Aiden. He came toward me. "Gabrielle, you are more to us than you could ever know. But that's why we're here. You leaving shattered us. It's been hard just to get through each day and the only thing that has kept me going has been the thought that one day I would be able to make it right."

  "We've been absolute idiots," Lucas said. "We admit that. We never told you how important you are to us. We want to be a family. A real family. We don't just want you to help us raise the baby, and we definitely don't want you to raise the baby yourself and have us just visit occasionally. This is what w
e want."

  Jackson reached out for both of my hands and I rested mine in them. He lifted both of them and touched a kiss to each.

  "I love you," he said softly. "I want to spend my life with you."

  I listened, barely able to breathe, as the other three men repeated the sentiment, coming closer to me until I could feel them all around me. The world around me seemed to be closing in, buzzing and swirling. I felt suddenly dizzy and as though I couldn't form any words. The words that they had said felt incredible as they settled into my heart, but I felt like I couldn't accept them yet. I hadn't been honest with them yet. I drew in a breath to force myself to focus and started to speak, but a sudden pain stopped me.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Gabrielle

  I felt a sharp pain through my lower back and I pressed my hands against it.

  "What's wrong?" Jackson asked.

  "Nothing," I said, shaking my head.

  As soon as I said it, though, I felt the muscles of my belly clamp down and a hard pain course through me. I gasped, leaning forward to try to catch my breath as another pain washed over me.

  "What is it?" Lucas asked.

  I felt one of the brothers touch my back, but I arched against it, not wanting anybody to touch me. I was trying to catch my breath, trying to bring enough air into me that I could speak, but another pain pressed in around me and I felt my legs weaken. I started to lower myself to the floor and suddenly there were hands catching me, taking on my weight and assisting me until I was on the carpet. Though I hadn't wanted them to touch me, I felt grateful that they were there and needing their comfort. It was a strange and confusing feeling, at once needing them as close to me as I could possibly have them, and not wanting to be touched, almost wanting to be left completely alone. That primal feeling told me that this was exactly what I had feared that it was.

  "Are you in labor?" Aiden asked.

  I nodded, pressing my hands on either side of my belly to try to ease the pain. The contraction was finally waning and I felt like my lungs were filling with air again. I looked up at the brothers and drew in a shuddering breath.

  "I've been having contractions all day," I admitted. "I thought that they were false labor."

  "You're not due for a few more weeks," Talon said.

  I nodded, trying to change my position so that I was more comfortable sitting on the floor.

  "That's why I didn't think that they could possibly be real contractions. The midwife said that it was really common to have Braxton Hicks contractions leading up to the due date, you can even have them for a couple of months before the baby is born, so I thought that that was what they were. But this is too strong."

  I gasped as another pain hit me. Letting instinct to take over, I rolled over onto my hands and knees. I remembered the techniques that the midwife talked to me about in my birthing class and tried to concentrate on releasing the tension in my muscles and allowing gravity to hold the baby. I swayed my hips, feeling them begin to relax and release. I breathed my way through the pain that seemed to tighten every muscle in my body. It was more intense than the one before and I could feel it focusing in harder on the center of my body. My mind went to the image that I had seen on the screen and the ultrasound office. I could imagine the muscle that had been home to my baby for so long squeezing down on her as it tried to encourage her to emerge into the world. I tried to let that image help me through the most intense moments of the pain, but I felt my legs and my arms shaking. Suddenly I realized that it wasn't just the impact of the pain of the contractions that were making me feel this way. The pressure of the reality of the men being there with me was weighing down on me and I knew that I couldn't push them away any longer. This was real and soon enough they would know what had caused me to leave them.

  "It's a girl," I somehow managed to say.

  "What?" Jackson asked.

  My muscles eased as the contraction made its way down from its peak and I took a breath, breathing out the rest of the tension and pain from my body. When it was over, I looked up at the men who were crouched around me. They were all looking at me with such concern and a wave of guilt came over me. This wasn't the moment that I had planned. This wasn't the moment that I wanted to have with them. Even from before I had gotten pregnant, I had imagined the day that I would bring our child into the world. I knew that it would be a day of incredible joy and excitement, but now I felt as though it was going to be one of disappointment and anger.

  "The baby," I said. "It's a girl."

  "A girl?" Lucas asked.

  "Yes," I said. "That's why I left."

  "What do you mean?" Aiden asked.

  I was starting to answer him, but another contraction hit me, this one so hard I couldn't hold myself up. I dropped down onto my elbows, resting my head onto the carpet in front of me.

  "These contractions are coming really fast," Talon said. "We need to get her to the hospital."

  I shook my head.

  "No," I said. "Not yet. I want to stay here for as long as I can."

  "That's not happening," Talon said. "You're obviously in pain and you're supposed to go to the hospital when the contractions are 4 to 5 minutes apart. These are closer than that."

  "How do you know that?" I asked.

  "We've been doing our research," he said.

  Before I could protest anymore, he reached down and scooped me up into his arms. He carried me out of the house and tucked me into the backseat of the car. Lucas got behind the wheel and the other three brothers got into the back seat with me. Jackson had grabbed the hospital bag that I had packed and put beside the door when I returned to my apartment. When I packed it I felt like I was preparing far too early, but now I was glad that I had.

  I let my head drop back against the seat and squeezed my eyes closed as I fought to slow my breathing. I was starting to feel as though I was more in control and was working my way through each contraction, letting images of my baby guide me through. I was very aware of each of the men there with me. Jackson and Aiden sat on either side of me and Talon leaned around from the second row of seats ahead of me. I felt his hand touch my leg and I instinctively reached for it. His grip was comforting and strong and all thoughts of not wanting to be touched disappeared. I needed their energy. I needed to know that they were there with me. Seeming to sense this need, the other two slid closer until they pressed up against my sides. This pressure helped to release some of the tension and pain in my hips and I felt more of the fear that I had been experiencing start to slip away.

  It wasn't until we were in the birthing center wing of the hospital that they spoke to me again.

  "How do you know that the baby is a girl?" Jackson asked.

  "I went to get an ultrasound in November," I admitted. "The midwife told me that if I wanted to find out what the baby was, I was far enough along to schedule an ultrasound. I thought that it would be a fun gift for you, so I went into a 3D Ultrasound studio. I wanted to get a printout of a picture of the baby and give it to the four of you for Christmas. That's when I found out that I'm having a girl."

  "November?" Lucas asked. "That's when you left."

  I nodded.

  "I know," I said. "That's why I left." I repeated.

  I knew now that it wasn't entirely true. I had told myself that I left because I found out that the baby was a girl, but the longer that I was away from the men, the more that I had to admit to myself that that wasn't the only reason. But they knew that now. They had finally given me what I had needed. I had their love, now I needed to know that our daughter did, too.

  "What do you mean?" Jackson asked.

  "You've always talked about our son," I said. "Even before I found out I was pregnant all you ever talked about was our son. You talked about what he would look like and that he would carry on the family name. When you said that he would be big and strong and that you would teach him to swim and play football. It meant so much to you to have a little boy t
hat when I found out that I was pregnant with a little girl I knew that you would be upset. You wouldn't want her the way that you want a son. I didn't want you to have to deal with that, so I left. I love her so much and I didn't want her raised in a home where she would always deal with people being disappointed that she was who she was. Even worse, I didn't want you to say that you didn't want anything to do with her, and then for her to grow up knowing that she had been pushed away. I would rather have just raised her on my own."

  Even as I said it, I knew that I had made a mistake. I thought that what I was doing was the right thing, but now I realized that that couldn't be farther from the truth.

  "You would have kept our daughter from us?" Lucas asked.

  He sounded so angry it shocked me.

  "I would have told you when she was born," I said. "I would have let you know."

  "That's not enough," Aiden said.

  "You wanted a son," I argued. "You wanted a little boy and I wasn't giving that to you."

  Just then the nurse came into the room.

  "How are you feeling?" she asked.

  "I'm alright," I said.

  "The contractions are coming close together?" she asked.

  As if my body felt like it needed to prove itself to her, another hit me and I grasped the sides of the bed. I fought my way through the contraction and then opened my eyes again, gasping for breath. I nodded.

  "Every few minutes," I said." Sometimes I feel like they're one right on top of the other."

  The nurse nodded.

  "Well, you are still a few weeks from your due date, so you might be dealing with false labor."