PREGNANT FOR A PRICE: Kings of Chaos MC

by Kathryn Thomas

  We had lain like that for God knows how long, but eventually he moved back and looked at me.

  “You’re shivering,” he remarked, and I glanced down at my body - I had hardly noticed how much I was shaking, but then it was hard to notice much of anything with him next to me.

  “I guess so.” I shrugged.

  “Let’s get inside.” He scooped me up in his arms, letting my dress fall in swathes of fabric around his hands, and carried me back into the house. He was still naked, and I pressed my head against his bare chest and inhaled deeply. God, the smell of him - I’d missed that. It was all mixed up with the scent of the damp grass we’d been lying on, but it was still undeniably him.

  We made our way back to the bedroom I’d claimed as mine, and we lay on the bed. He looked over at me and smiled, and I knew the question that I’d been too afraid to ask needed an answer.

  “Are we safe?” My words were tentative.

  “Yes.” He nodded, and tears pricked my eyes as relief washed over me. “We’re safe.”

  “Are we?”

  “Really.” He turned to me. “Don’t ask me how I know, but I do. I can promise you that everything’s okay.”

  “Oh, Anthony.” I buried my face into his chest. “Thank you.”

  “You don’t need to thank me,” he replied gently. “Those people… they needed getting rid of. You were just a catalyst for that.”

  “So we can go home?” I sighed. “We don’t have to stay here any longer?”

  “Not if you don’t want to.” He cocked his head at me. “But… we don’t have to go home yet. We could travel, and eat, and have adventures…”

  “What about the restaurant?” I reminded him gently. “That needs to be taken care of too, you know.”

  “I know, I know.” He shook his head. “It was just an idea. Maybe Lily could take it over for a bit?”

  “Maybe she could.” I shrugged. Right at that moment, I couldn’t think about anything else but being here with him, and how ridiculously happy that made me. Suddenly, he extracted himself from our embrace and got to his feet.

  “Just wait here a second.” He kissed my forehead, and I gazed up at him, pathetically ecstatic. “I forgot something.”

  He went back outside. I heard the door open and close, and for a moment I was worried that he was leaving me once again. But he soon returned, carrying his clothes in his arms, and I sat up on the bed.

  “Hey, I like you naked,” I teased. “Maybe I should get rid of all your clothes.”

  “The rest aren’t arriving till tomorrow, so I guess I’d have no choice,” he shot back with a smile. He was rummaging in his pocket for something, and I cocked my head as I watched him.

  “What are you doing?” I demanded, flopping back on the bed and staring at the ceiling.

  “There’s something I have to give you,” he murmured. “Aha!”

  He suddenly pulled whatever it was he’d been looking for from his pocket and held it up triumphantly. I pushed myself upright and looked over at him. My heart stopped.

  In his hand was a small velvet box; the kind that people kept engagement rings in. I stared at him, then back at the box, then him again. Was he doing what I thought he was doing?

  “What’s going on?” I managed.

  He got down on the floor, still stark naked, and arranged himself so that he was on one knee. I climbed over to the edge of the bed, unable to take my eyes from him. He popped the box open, revealing a simple gold ring in which was embedded the biggest diamond I’d ever laid eyes upon.

  “Sabrina,” he asked, a small smile playing at the corner of his mouth, “Will you marry me?”

  “Yes.”

  The word was out of my mouth before I had a chance to think about it. It didn’t need thinking about - I was certain, more than I’d ever been, about this man. I wanted to be with him, I wanted to marry him; I wanted to spend my life with him. His face lit up.

  “Are you serious?” he spluttered.

  “Yes!” I leaped off the bed and towards him. “God, fuck, yes!”

  He burst out laughing and wrapped his arms around me.

  “Thank God,” he murmured into my hair. “I was so worried that you were going to turn me down.”

  I pulled back and looked at him: my man, my fiancé, and the person who I’d soon be spending the rest of my life with. It seemed absurd for him to think that I’d have said anything different, especially after everything we’d been through together.

  “You never had to worry.” I caught his face between my hands and looked at him intently. “Never.”

  “Neither do you, now,” he reminded me and darted forward to plant a kiss on my mouth. I grinned, delirious with joy, and wondered if this feeling would ever fade.

  “So, what now?” I asked, raising my eyebrows at him. “Where do we go from here?”

  “Wherever you want,” he replied. “Home, or…?”

  “Or…?” I prompted him.

  “We could go traveling together,” he suggested. “See the world before we go back.”

  “That sounds incredible,” I sighed. Before we could make any more plans, I heard footsteps on the stairs, soon followed by a knock on the door.

  “Sabrina?” I heard Lily’s sleepy voice drift in from outside. “You okay?”

  Anthony and I quickly pulled on our clothes, and I went to the door, opening it wide enough that Lily could see who was inside with me. Her eyes widened, and she blinked a couple of times as if confirming what she was seeing was actually real.

  “You’re back?” she murmured, and Anthony shrugged modestly.

  “And everything’s dealt with,” he promised her.

  “Since you’re out of bed, you want to celebrate?” I grinned at her, catching her by the arm. She looked down, obviously feeling the unfamiliar ring against her skin, and then back up at me.

  “I think we’ve got lots to celebrate,” she agreed. “I’ll crack the wine.”

  “We’ll be there in a second,” I promised and turned to Anthony. “Thank you,” I murmured, wrapping my arms around him. “For everything.”

  “There’s nothing to thank me for,” he replied gently, and I lost myself in his kiss once again. There was no place I’d rather be, no person I’d rather be with. Now, we had the whole world ahead of us to explore together. Life didn’t get much better than this.

  Epilogue

  As soon as I stepped off the plane, I let out a long sigh of relief. Who ever would have thought I’d have been homesick for New York?

  Well, in all fairness, I had never imagined that I would spend so much time away from the city. Lily had flown back to American to manage the restaurant as soon as Anthony returned, but she made me promise to stay and explore the world for her so I could come back with plenty of new stories and fresh dishes for us to try out at the restaurant. I couldn’t say no - God, how could I have turned down the chance to travel the world with the man I loved?

  We went everywhere. I never asked how Anthony got the money, but we always ended up in the finest hotels, the best cafes, and the most expensive spas. We worked our way around Europe - Spain, France, the UK, and then spent a few weeks in South America before finishing up with a fortnight in Thailand. Every place we visited was magical in its own way and the memories that had imprinted themselves on my brain would be hard to shake. I had never really had the chance to travel before then, and I savored every moment. But it was the last day of our trip that quickly became the one that eclipsed all the others.

  We flew back to Milan to clear out the last of my stuff from the villa, and as we drove up to the building, my jaw dropped. It was decorated in great swathes of flowers, trailing down from every surface, and as we pulled up outside the house, I realized what was going on. Anthony turned to me with a nervous smile on his face and helped me out of the car, where we found a priest standing outside, ready to marry us. I was stunned, but he knew how I felt about planning a gigantic wedding. Well, he knew that the thought of it gav
e me the major heebie-jeebies. So he’d taken away that stress for me, and I couldn’t have been happier.

  We exchanged our vows on the lawn where we’d made love upon his return, shooting each other knowing little looks and praying that the priest didn’t notice anything. He held my hands tight and produced two simple weddings bands that we swapped at the end of the ceremony. It was simple, sweet, and touching - everything I’d ever wanted from my wedding day. Even though I was a little jetlagged and wearing flip-flops, I wouldn’t change a thing about how we joined ourselves.

  We spent our wedding night in his private jet, and yes, joined the mile-high club several times over. And even though I was exhausted when we arrived back in New York, the first thing I did was head over to the restaurant to see Lily. Anthony kissed me on the chin and headed back to his apartment to unpack, and on the way down I stopped off at a drugstore to pick up something I had a niggling suspicion I was going to need in the near future.

  As soon as I was through the restaurant door, Lily was barrelling towards me.

  “Sabrina!” she shrieked, loud enough that all the diners in the room turned to look over at us. “You never told me you were coming back!”

  She caught me in a giant hug, one that knocked an “oof” out of me as she made contact. I couldn’t help but notice how busy the place was, and as she pulled back, I looked around with surprise.

  “This place is packed,” I commented, and Lily nodded excitedly as she led me back to the office.

  “Yeah, right?” she agreed. “We got a great review in one of the indie papers, and I guess it just spiraled out from there.”

  “Business is good?”

  “Great,” she replied with a beaming smile. “Though I can’t wait to transfer some of this onto you.”

  “Me neither,” I sighed, glad to be back. “Hey, can I just use the bathroom? There’s something I need to check.”

  She gave me an odd look but gestured for me to go ahead. I went in, clutching the bag from the drugstore, and did what I had to do. When I came back out again, I was feeling a little dazed and knew there was someone I had to talk to.

  “Hey, Lily.” I caught her attention. “I have to… there’s someone I need to see. Can I stop by later and we can catch up on everything?”

  “Sounds good.” She nodded, giving me another hug before I could get away. “I’m so glad you’re back.”

  “Me too,” I smiled at her, and then pulled out my phone to text Anthony. I needed a lift.

  A few minutes later, Anthony’s handsome hire-car was sitting outside the restaurant, and I hurried outside to get in.

  “Everything okay?” he asked, and I nodded.

  “Where are we off to?”

  “Raleigh Cemetery,” I replied softly. I hadn’t said those words for a while - hadn’t thought about visiting in a long time, with everything that had happened. But I needed to tell her. Though, I supposed, he deserved to know first.

  “Anthony,” I managed after a few moments of silence.

  “Yeah?” He glanced over at me, and I felt a swell of love in my heart. Here was this man, this wonderful, decent man, a man who had chosen me, and I got to break this news to him. I was blessed in ways I couldn’t even imagine, and he was about to join me in feeling that way. Or, you know, he might just freak out and crash the car in a panic. One or the other. That would probably be it. Either way, I knew he needed to know.

  “There’s something I need to tell you.” I sucked in a big breath, and then let it out again. He gave me a worried look.

  “What? What is it?”

  I guessed after everything we’d been through, the last thing he wanted right then was news. For us, news had been bad, destructive, and difficult. But this time, it was actually something good - or at least, I hoped he would think so too.

  “I’m pregnant,” I replied, my voice sounding odd even to my own ears. I suppose it felt weird saying those words out loud for the first time considering that I had often wondered if I would ever say them at all.

  “What?!” he exclaimed, not taking his eyes off the road. “When did you find out?”

  “At the restaurant,” I replied. “I was late for my period, so I picked up a pregnancy test on the way over.”

  “Do you know how far gone you are?” he asked. His tone was cool and unreadable, throwing me off a little.

  “No,” I admitted. “I’ll need to get to a doctors office for that.”

  There was a moment of silence between us before I got the nerve to speak again.

  “What do you… what do you think about it?”

  “I think it’s amazing,” he replied at once. “I’m just… surprised, that’s all.”

  “Good thing we got married in Italy,” I joked. “My mom would have killed me if I was a pregnant bride.”

  “Mine too.” Anthony flashed me a smile, and I could see him relaxing slightly.

  We sat in silence for a moment, letting what had just happened wash over us. After all, our entire lives had just changed completely. It was natural for us to want to take a few seconds to let it sink in. I snuck a look at him out of the corner of my eye - my husband, soon to be the father of my first child. How did we end up here? After everything that had happened, I still couldn’t quite believe it. But as I saw that smile playing at the corner of his mouth, I knew that he was as excited as I was, and just as taken aback too.

  We drove the rest of the way to the cemetery in silence, and I stared out of the car window as the city turned into the country outside. I felt a little guilty that it had been so long since I last visited, but then, if I told her everything that had happened, she would understand. Hell, she’d probably tell me to turn the whole thing into a novel so she could just read it and get caught up. I smiled at the thought. Most of the memories I had of my sister were so wrapped up in what had happened to her that they were tainted by my grief, but when I remembered the way she would jump in and excitedly try to guess the end of my stories, it filled my heart with joy. Well, there’s no way she’d guess how this one had ended - I certainly didn’t think I’d be sitting in a car a few months after a masked man had saved my life, married to him and carrying his child.

  We arrived at the cemetery after about half an hour, and Anthony helped me out of the car.

  “I’m not that pregnant yet, I can still walk, you know,” I grumbled playfully at him, and he held his hands up.

  “Hey, just trying to help,” he teased me. “You want me to stay here, or…?”

  “No, come in with me.” I took his hand, grasping it tight for comfort. He squeezed it back, and we headed down towards my sister’s grave.

  It was a clear day, but cold - the kind of afternoon that late spring offers, where the sun shines but it doesn’t burn away the chill that takes over the ground. I made my way down to Lia’s grave, a familiar path that I’d taken so many times before. It felt oddly peaceful, even though I wished I’d had the foresight to pick up some flowers on the way down.

  When I got to her grave, Anthony backed off and let me approach by himself. I was glad as I needed a little time with my sister, just the two of us. I knelt down at the edge of her grave, placing a hand on the slightly weathered stone, and smiled at the sight of her name. I felt a pinch in my throat where tears were threatening, but I ignored it and carried on.

  “Hey, Lia,” I began. “Sorry I haven’t been down in so long.”

  I could almost hear her side of the conversation, filling in where she couldn’t anymore. That’s okay, but you have to tell me what the hell’s been keeping you for so long!

  “I… fuck, I don’t know where to start.” I shook my head. “Well, okay, I’ll start at the beginning. I met this guy…”

  I trailed off, as I remembered all the times the women around me had been fucked over by the men in their lives. Me, with those men in the street; Lily, with the boyfriend who hurt her; and, of course, Lia, and everything that had happened to her. Part of me felt crass, bringing up Anthony around her
, but I knew she would have loved him. I knew she would have known that he was different, as I did.

  “I know that we haven’t exactly always had the best luck with men.” I tightened my grip on the stone beneath my fingers, a sudden chill moving across my body. “But… this one’s different, Lia. He’s amazing.”