“What happened to your face?” she asked, focusing on her brother. He was easier to deal with than Shane. “Or is that classified?”
Trevor inclined his head sideways. “He punched me out.”
“What?” Her gaze darted to Shane, who looked fine, not a speck of blood on him. It didn’t make sense. Trevor was deadly with his fists, and he wasn’t the type to let another guy hit him and get away with it. “Did you two…fight?”
“If you can call it that,” Shane said, his voice cold. He jerked his chin at Trevor. “Tell her.”
Trevor dragged his huge hands through his hair. He breathed out hard—not quite a sigh but not quite a sound of exasperation either—and swallowed a few times.
Ginger’s heart began to race. She’d seen Trevor do that a few times, and inevitably the news was bad—once, when she was in high school, he’d had to tell her somebody had run over their dog. “What is it, Trevor? Did something happen to Mom and Dad?”
He shook his head. “They’re fine.”
She let out a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. If they were okay, whatever Trevor had to say was probably not a big deal. “Just spit it out.”
“The photos you were talking about.”
Every cell in her body stilled. “What about them?”
Trevor broke eye contact and looked down. “I was the one behind them.”
She blinked a few times, then laughed a little tremulously. “What?” He’d always wanted to be a comedian, except none of his jokes were funny. Maybe he’d gotten tired of doing whatever he’d been doing and decided to try his hand at stand-up comedy again.
“The pictures…” He sighed. “I didn’t mean anything bad to happen.”
A giant claw seemed to squeeze her neck and chest. “You didn’t mean—? What did you think would happen when you sent pictures like that?”
“I just thought it was shitty that he”—Trevor gestured at Shane—“didn’t appreciate you. You guys had been together for so long, and…well, he kept dragging his feet about proposing and, you know, doing the right thing. So I thought I’d show him that you had other options. I wanted to let him know if he didn’t act soon, he was going to lose you.”
“That was your plan? Make me look loose so Shane would try to chain me down?” Her voice started to rise. “You wrecked over a year of our lives!”
Trevor shook his head sorrowfully. “I didn’t know the pictures were like that. I had a guy make them and mail them, but I hadn’t seen them until now. They were just supposed to show you having a
good time and men looking at you, checking you out with, you know, admiration and all, to demonstrate you had other options. Not like you hanging all over them.”
“You have no idea what you did. I told you to stay away from our relationship.” Trevor had always been too protective, but this crossed the line. “I thought the man I love didn’t want me anymore—wouldn’t want our baby either.”
“Well, if you had been pregnant, I would never ha—”
“I was pregnant!”
Trevor paled. “What?”
She pointed a trembling finger at him. “I was pregnant, and I lost the baby on my way back from South Africa. That was why I missed my connection in Amsterdam and stayed there for so long.”
“Oh my god, Ginger. I didn’t know…”
“I didn’t tell you—or Mom, or Dad—because what would be the point? By the time I came back, I was finished with my medical treatment, and the doctors said I was fine—physically. But you…you wrecked so much.”
He buried his face in his hands, his shoulders shaking. “I’m so sorry.”
She looked away. She felt…hollow. How could her brother have done this? “Me, too.”
“Ginger—”
“I’d appreciate it if you’d just leave now. Unless you have any more confessions about how you destroyed something that’s important to me.”
Trevor reached out, but she scooted back like his hand was a viper. His face crumpled, now a complete ruin. Debbie took one glance at Ginger, stepped around her and escorted him outside.