Even though I’m trying to keep our conversation neutral, I can’t harness the concern in my voice. She was sick like this last month, and if it's the same bug, she needs to see a doctor—urgently.
Jenni’s eyes cloud with confusion as she stares at me. “You don’t know.” Her words are more for her ears than mine.
“Know what?” I use the washcloth to remove a chunk of vomit from her chin while trying to gauge what she thought I knew. I know she’s been sick for over a month, but other than that, I’m in the dark. . .
My inner monologue trails off as reality dawns.
Oh my God. Oh. My. Fucking. God.
I stumble backward until I crash into the bathroom sink. “You're pregnant?” The mad beat of my heart is heard in my words.
Jenni nods, forcing the moisture in her eyes to drip down her cheeks.
“Is it mine?”
Her eyes narrow as her lips thin. When she jumps up off the floor, she's overcome with dizziness, but it doesn’t slow her down. She stumbles out of the bathroom, murmuring under her breath. I let out a groan before taking off after her. I find her in a room at the back of the cabin, stuffing clothes into a small overnight bag.
“Is it mine?” My voice is more vicious than I expected.
She stops packing to turn around and face me. Hurt and anger is marked all over her face. “Who else would it belong to?”
“Christian.”
I dart my head to the side, dodging the shoe Jenni pegged at my head. When the first one misses its mark, she throws another one. It smacks me in the shoulder. Out of shoes, she throws word grenades instead. “You’re an asshole!”
“I saw you kissing him, yet I’m the asshole.”
Ignoring me, she moves throughout the room, grabbing her belongings and shoving them into her bag. I don’t know what hurts more, the fact she kissed Christian, or that I may never see her again after she leaves this room.
Realizing it's the latter, I grab ahold of her wrist, halting her hasty movements. The pain in my chest turns lethal when her tear-stained face lifts to me.
“There wasn’t supposed to be anyone else. It was supposed to be just you and me.” My voice is an angry whisper.
“I know that,” she declares shakily, “and I’m sorry. I never meant for any of this to happen.”
Her beautifully tormented eyes stare into mine. They draw me back in by forcing my heart to overrule my head. Even after everything she did, I still love her.
I can’t give her up.
She's my addiction—my rule breaker.
She's my everything.
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Jenni
Istare at Nick, begging him to see the remorse in my eyes. I’m sorry I wasn’t enough for him to stay faithful. I’m sorry for kissing Christian because I wanted him to take away my pain, where all it did was make me feel worthless. I’m sorry for all the rules he broke for me. But more than anything, I’m sorry for everything I do from here on out.
I’ve used every delay tactic I could to stop my mom fixing my “indiscretion,” but I no longer have a choice. The decision is out of my hands. . . . . .
The two weeks after Nick caught me kissing Christian was spent with my head in the toilet. I couldn’t hold anything down. I wasn’t just brokenhearted, I was incredibly unwell.
I’ve just finished showering after a two-hour long toilet-hugging session when I leave the bathroom to find Christian standing in my living room.
“How did you get into my house?” My question isn’t asked nicely.
He knocked on my door every day the two weeks following our kiss. Not once have I let him in. I’m living the life of a hermit. Excluding the occasional text messages to Emily, Slater, and Nicole, I’ve kept to myself.
