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Why hadn’t Amara packed some potpourri or at least some kind of air freshener? She dismissed the idea, and wondered at herself for thinking of something so silly and inconsequential at such a time as this.
Amara’s mother, Raneesha, sat forward in her chair and laid her hand lightly over Amara’s. “Baby, do you want me to close those curtains? Terrible, terrible out there.”
When there was no response, Raneesha stood, turned toward the window and reached for the curtain pull.
Amara stopped her. “No, Momma. That’s all right. I like the rain.”
She spoke halfheartedly, crossing her hands over her stomach, trying her best to keep her composure. Her emotions were as tumultuous and turbulent as the stormy weather, whipped in too many directions at once.
At least she was happy with the birthing. It had gone well, and she’d delivered a healthy baby boy without complications.
Well, unless having to give that baby boy away wasn’t considered a complication.
She stared at a dark, roiling cloud and told herself to stop thinking about losing her child. She should be thinking about how it was all over now, that all the deception and sneaking around would be at an end.
Quint would come to take his baby. Amara would continue to get her funding. And that would be that.
There’d be no more lying to her mother and others, even if some of them were only lies of omission, failures to explain. She’d told her mother and Kari that not long after her breakup with Frederik, Amara had a brief fling. She said she didn’t know the father well, that he wasn’t interested in pursuing anything with her and vice versa. She planned to give the baby up for adoption to a family she thoroughly vetted. Beyond that, she’d said little.
She hadn’t told a living soul that she’d made a bargain with Quint Forbes. In fact, she hadn’t answered any questions her colleagues and casual friends had dared to ask. She’d simply let them believe what they wanted to believe.
And what they wanted to believe was that Amara hadn’t let any grass grow under her feet after her breakup with Frederik. Amara could see the questions in their eyes: who was the father of her child, did they know him, did Frederik know him, was it an affair that was going on before Amara and Frederik broke up, was that why they broke up?
No one actually had the nerve to ask any of these questions, though. It was a good thing, since Amara didn’t know how she might have answered.
Best of all, everyone disapproved of how Frederik was handling the situation. With Quint’s support and backing, Amara’s research had been verified, and she’d been vindicated of all Frederik’s assertions against her scientific integrity. Within three months, her colleagues saw Frederik’s claims for what they truly were: lies told in vengeance against a former lover.
As for Amara, she couldn’t help herself from telling a few carefully-chosen department gossip hounds that Frederik had wanted her to sell her sequencing technology for personal profit, and that was why he tried to sabotage her work. It was all over the department within an hour.
So this gave her peers a choice. They could either assume Frederik attacked her out of jealousy because she chose another man over him. Or they could assume Frederik attacked her as revenge because she denied him a payday he hadn’t earned.
Either way, it worked for Amara. It gave her no small amount of satisfaction to see Frederik stalking the halls of their offices, growling at people, claiming he’d done most of the work on the project and acting like he was the injured party.
Amara was out to get him, he claimed. She was a bitch, a lying bitch, a conniving bitch … always some kind of bitch. Sometimes a puta, too.
The more he ranted, the more prestige he lost. These days, people mostly ignored him, as did Amara. She considered him defeated, a vanquished general who didn’t ha
ve a single soldier left on the field.
Thanks to her verified data, previous sponsors had returned to her, wanting to reinvest. But it was too late. They’d missed their chance; Amara didn’t want to do business with people who had believed the unsubstantiated claims of a former lover. And anyway, she didn’t need them. Quint gave her everything she needed and more.
Quint had more than lived up to his side of the bargain. He’d invested millions already and committed to millions more. Trials were rocketing along, and Amara had been able to hire full-time assistants, not just depend on the few graduate students the university supplied her.
Quint had given her so much help that Amara’s pregnancy hadn’t slowed down her work much at all. He’d been in touch with her constantly, and handled all the details relating to her pregnancy so she wouldn’t have to do it herself.
He had her checked up on and monitored every step of the way. True to his word, she had the best care money could buy, and she did everything right on her own, as well.
Raneesha shifted in her chair, drawing Amara’s attention back to the present. Her mother looked tired, and well she should. She’d been by Amara’s side throughout her labor and after. The poor woman hadn’t slept in how long? Well over a day.
Mostly, Raneesha looked sad, aged by the last thirty-odd hours of Amara’s labor. And Amara knew why.
“You should go home and get some sleep,” Amara said.
“I’m fine, baby girl,” Raneesha said with a gentle smile. “Don’t you worry about me.”
“At least stretch out on the couch over there. Take a nap while we’re waiting for … them.”
An unconscious frown pulled at the corners of Raneesha’s lips. Her look was one of confusion, sadness, and resignation. “They ought to be coming in soon, right? You said you called them yesterday. I’m sure they’re on their way. Soon, baby. Real soon, don’t worry.”
