One More Time

“You're my date for the night,” he said. “Simple enough. They're used to me bringing random girls over. Don't expect Cynthia to be pleasant though. She hates my guts. It's not personal.”

“Cynthia is –?”

“Malcolm's mother, sorry.”

“Oh,” I said.

My pulse was going crazy and I felt a headache coming on. I briefly considered telling Adam that I'd made a mistake with all of this and would just take a cab home. I knew that if I stepped through those doors, Malcolm might be furious with me. He might decide it was too much drama for him to deal with and send me packing.

But dammit, I was pregnant with his child and he couldn't simply ignore me. That's not who I was, and that's not who I was going to let him be. This was an issue we needed to deal with head on. Since he wasn't returning my calls, I decided that the best option was to bring the issue to him.

“Alright,” Adam said, taking a deep breath of his own. “Let's do this.”

He opened the car door for me, and this time, I wasn't even mad. I was too lost in thought and trying to keep myself from being freaked out to notice or really care all that much. My legs were weak, but he took hold of my arm and helped me walk up the stairs and onto a porch studded with ornate Greek columns. Lights shone from inside the house, the windows glowing a bright orange against the darkness and the evening moonlight.

I stared at the ornate wood door, the name ‘Crane’ carved into it with birds intricately carved alongside it. “I guess it's now or never, right?” I said. “Time to put up or shut up.”

“You'll be okay. You'll do just fine, Casey,” Adam said, opening up the door so we could head inside.

Yeah, just fine. If I could keep myself from throwing up all over the fancy, expensive oriental rug in the foyer, that would be a great start. Adam seemed as cool and confident as ever, any sign of his former self – the poor, neglected child whose father had forgotten about him – was gone. In his place was the arrogant and cocky little shit I took him to be from the moment we met.

The first person we ran into when we stepped into the foyer was an older Hispanic woman. She looked from Adam to me, and then she smiled brightly. Her smile was warm and genuine, and I got a good feeling about her. In some ways, she reminded me a lot of my own abuela.

“Casey, this is Alba,” she said.

“Un placer concrete, Alba,” I said.

The woman looked at Adam, then back at me, a look of mile surprise in her eyes, but the smile growing wider on her face.

“Gracias, mi nina.” Alba said, taking my hands in hers. “I like her already, Adam.”

Well, at least I had one ally in the house. By the looks of things, she was probably their housekeeper. How cliche could you get, really?

Adam laughed. “I have no idea what you've just said to one another, but okay.”

“I just told her it was nice to meet her, and she thanked me,” I said, rolling my eyes. “Did you never take Spanish back in school?”

“I don't recall,” he said. “But, I'll consider that my Spanish lesson for today. I'll be hablo'ing real good in no time flat.”

I rolled my eyes and sighed as he took my hand and led me through the foyer. We walked into a hallway that ended in a grand staircase. I heard voices upstairs, and when I heard one in particular, my heart started to thunder in my chest. I held my breath as we waited at the bottom of the stairs for him to make an appearance. As we stood there, I found myself gripping Adam's hand tighter than I'd intended. I also started contemplating the wisdom of turning a

round and getting the hell out of there, calling an Uber, and going the hell home.

What had I been thinking to come here? To crash their family dinner party like that?

Before I could turn and run, I heard footsteps coming down the staircase, and finally, I caught sight of Malcolm. He was walking alongside a woman I'd seen before. As I looked at her, I realized that I knew who she was. She was the girlfriend from the club. The one Malcolm said he was done with. The woman he said he'd never be with again. Ever.

The two were lost in their conversation, looking entirely cozy with one another, and Malcolm was staring intently at her. When she rounded the corner, I noticed she was holding her stomach, caressing it, and smiling warmly. She was wearing an empire waist dress that flowed out from her stomach, a style someone like her wouldn't wear unless –

“I made a mistake coming here,” I said. “I need to go. I need to get out of here.”

I'd meant to speak low enough that only Adam could hear me, but apparently, I spoke loud enough that it made Malcolm and his girlfriend to stop on the stairs and look down at me.

“Casey? What are –”

The blonde stepped forward. “This is Casey?” she sneered. “What is she doing here?”

Malcolm's blue eyes turned to steel and his jaw clenched as he walked the rest of the way down the stairs. He stood before me, his face a blank mask that bore no emotion whatsoever. He turned that look toward Adam, and when he did, something changed in his expression. His face went from someone trying to hide their emotions to a man who was very clearly angry beyond measure. The air around us was saturated with tension; charged with electricity and the anticipation of violence.