Cease Fire (Blackbridge Security 9)

I don’t know if it’s because she doesn’t care or if it breaks some professional boundary, but Jillian doesn’t ask about Kit’s role in this situation.

She instructs me to lift my shirt. “You’ll need to probably unzip those.”

I do as she asks, feeling Kit’s eyes on me when I tug the unzipped sides of my jeans apart. The lace of my black panties peeks out, but Jillian covers it with a towel before squirting warm gel on my abdomen.

I look up at him, but his eyes are locked on the monitor Jillian is now typing things on. Maybe I only imagined him looking at me because right now he seems to have no damn interest in me at all.

“Kit is the baby’s father,” I say out of nowhere. I just need her to understand who he is, and more importantly I need him to hear me tell her as much.

She gives me a soft smile. Maybe she can feel the tension in the room because honestly I’m choking on it.

“With this being your sixteen week scan, we should be able to tell the gender. Do you want to know?”

I look to Kit, but he’s stoic, eyes still locked on the blank screen. He’s either leaving the decision up to me, or he doesn’t care to know. It doesn’t seem fair to assume that. I know Kit wants to be part of this baby’s life. Pissed at me or not, he’s in this for the long haul.

“That would be lovely,” I say, my eyes stinging with unshed tears.

“Let’s get started.” Jillian spends the next fifteen minutes taking measurements and explaining what she’s looking at because I have no frame of reference. It looks like lumps and globs to me.

“Ready?” she asks, giving me a quick smile before darting her eyes to Kit.

He’s stepped a little closer since she began, but he hasn’t reached out to me once. This is nothing like the shows I’ve seen on television where the happy couple holds hands as they see their baby for the first time on the sonogram. It feels cold and distant, a procedure rather than a celebration.

I look over at Kit, watching as he nods at the sonographer, the quick dip of his head the only hint that he wants this final piece of information.

“That,” Jillian says, her finger pointing at the screen. “Is your son’s penis.”

Tears that have been threatening to fall since he walked up to me in the waiting area stream down my cheeks.

“A baby boy,” I whisper, sensing Kit shift beside me.

He still doesn’t reach out for me. He doesn’t say a word with the news he’s just been given.

But when I look up at him, I find him looking down at me for the first time since we walked into this room together.

He’s got a mask of indifference on his handsome face, and I know that has more to do with his hatred for me than anything to do with his son. His eyes start to glimmer, but no tears fall.

“I’ll print out a couple of pictures for the two of you,” Jillian says, pulling Kit’s eyes from mine, and in this moment I hate her a little.

It doesn’t matter that he’s angry, and that he’s practically glaring at me. I had his attention, and for the briefest of moments it wasn’t so hard for me to breathe.

“Thank you so much,” Kit says as Jillian hands him a black-and-white printout.

She hands me one as well, making it clear that she knows we won’t be leaving this office together.

Kit looks at me one last time before walking out of the room without saying a word.

Jillian hands me a paper towel to wipe the gel from my belly.

“Some men are just jerks,” she whispers.

I immediately shake my head. “I made him that way. He was a wonderful man before I hurt him.”

She gives me a weak smile before telling me she’ll give me a few minutes to put myself back together.

I take every second that’s offered trying to stop the tears, but she eventually comes back, looking a little shocked to see me still sitting on the table.

“Ms. Warren, I have another appointment.”

“I’m so sorry.”

I know my face is a mess when I leave the office and keeping my head down doesn’t matter. Everyone in the waiting area can see how upset I am.

I never knew that it would hurt so bad to love a man I’ll never have.

I sit in my car for half an hour staring down at the images I’ve been given.

“I won’t ever regret you,” I whisper, my fingers drifting over the black-and-white face of my little boy. “And your daddy loves you, too.”

This is supposed to be one of the happiest times of my life. I’m supposed to be celebrating. I should be planning a gender reveal party or go shopping now that I know what items to buy.