Secret Pet

Considering my nausea, I’m pretty sure the test is right. But I don’t want to argue. “Okay,” I whisper, whipping at my eyes again. Maybe it will be best if I let my two friends take care of me.

As if Eileen can sense my thoughts, she continues laying out a plan. “I will call Sloane and tell her we will both be out. I’ll give her a good excuse like we got food poisoning at the same restaurant. Then Reese and I will pick you up first thing in the morning. Ray has a doctor friend; I think I can get him to see us right away. Just try to relax.”

I pull one of the hand towels down and snuffle into it, rubbing the ugly pink fabric onto my cheeks. “Thanks, Le Le. You’re a good friend.”

“Get some rest,” she repeats and then hangs up.

I take a deep breath just in time for a knock at the door. “Mandy, I have your tea, doll. Do you need help getting off the toilet?”

For some reason, a smile reaches the corners of my mouth. I must be slightly hysterical. “No Bubby, I’ll be right out. Just set it on my bedside table and stay away. I don’t want you to catch this.”

Bubby makes a small snort, obviously not quite believing I’m sick. I give her a few minutes to leave and then open the door. Pacing down the hallway as quickly as I can, I get to the guestroom and pull Pumpkin inside the door before I lock it. I practically fall onto the bed.

The tea is sitting on my table, steaming and making the whole room smell minty. I find no need to touch it though, my stomach is too upset to eat or drink anything. All I want is to close my eyes and fall asleep immediately. Maybe when I wake up this, all will be a dream, and I will never have to face Christian while carrying his child. I don’t know how I will keep this whole thing secret. But I have to, he can never know that this baby is his. I don’t think he would want that.

I think of his face as I close my eyes. I remember how his lips pulled in a sneer when he said that he just took from women and that feelings are a waste of time. I want to erase that look from my mind. I want that moment to have never happened, but I can’t get rid of it.

Soon his face, in my imagination, is replaced by another. Along with another moment, I am desperate to forget. Jered, his half-smirk smile fading, as I told him that I was pregnant with his child. There was no joy in his cold brown eyes. They were hard, hateful. “It’s not mine,” he had argued. “You slut, you opened your legs for someone else.”

I had promised him that he had been my only lover for years. It was his child. It had to be.

Jered didn’t take that well. His rage was like a storm destroying everything he could get his hands on in my apartment. My dishes hit the wall as he called me a slut over and over. Knickknacks hit the fireplace as he yelled that I was too poor to be his wife. He had never really wanted me. I was just a distraction until he found the real thing. He threw the remote through my TV as I stood frozen in shock. My joy turned into a nightmare. A hole through the wall was his last gift to me.

No words came after. Not even when we saw each other at work. I was too afraid to call or start up a conversation. And he didn’t say or ask anything. He didn’t ask if it was a boy or a girl. He didn’t ask how I was feeling when I started getting pale. He didn’t ask why I was in the hospital or out of work for weeks. He didn’t ask where the roundness of my belly went — all too soon.

He didn’t know or care that his baby was gone.

I turn over in bed so that I can sob into a pillow while Pumpkin purrs at my back. There is no way I’m going through that with another man. Christian will never know that I’m carrying his child. I can’t risk it.

Chapter Eighteen

Mandy

My mornings at work have drastically changed in the last two weeks, especially now that I know I really am pregnant. What used to be a leisurely start of my day — then some private sexy time — has turned into anxiety city. Every move I make all day is strategic to ensure that I do not run into Christian. Plus, every time Sloane or Kane or Ashton asks to see me, I start to hyperventilate fearing that this is the time that Christian is going to release the tape of me, or this is the day that I’m going to get fired. And now that I’m pregnant, I really don’t want to get fired.