Page 44 of Derecho

“I’m going to have Beau take Juniper home, and I’m going to stay.” Birdie smiled as she walked up next to Lainey. “I want to get a read on your blood pressure, and I think it’s a good idea for you to just rest for today.”

Lainey sighed. “No one needs to fuss over me. I’m fine. I just…I’m going to go lie down for a few minutes.”

“I’m not fussing. Just supporting.” Birdie looked like she was a second away from crying, and I knew my brother wouldn’t like that.

“Don’t argue with your sister,” I said to Lainey. “You guys head upstairs if you want. Are you hungry? Do you need something to drink?”

“I’m okay,” she answered, still not looking at me.

“Okay. I’m going to call Colt and see what the hell they’re going to do about this.”

“It doesn’t matter. The protective order didn’t go through.”

That stopped me in my tracks. “What do you mean?”

Finally, she turned to me. “Greg has an uncle who is a judge here. I’m guessing the protective order went in front of him. It wasn’t issued. But he was furious at me for filing.”

“That asshole. No. This is not the end of it.”

Lainey shook her head, walking away from me and Birdie.

“Is she going to be okay?” I asked.

“Yeah. She didn’t tell me about the protective order…Let me just see if I can get her settled. I think you should still call Colt.”

My phone was out before Birdie even started to walk away.

Lainey

Birdie finally left a few hours ago. My blood pressure took a while to even out, but it eventually got to the same point it had been at my doctor’s appointment. She thought I was just upset about seeing him again. She didn’t know the truth. No one could ever know the truth.

Lachlan hovered outside the bedroom while Birdie fussed over me, but I kept the tears at bay long enough to convince her she could go home. She’d made me recite the symptoms to look for with my blood pressure about a hundred times before finally hearing my plea to just be left alone.

All this time, in the back of my mind, I’d wondered if Greg was sneaking off to be with someone else. The way we never went around his family together. All those times he stayed in Dallas because he was too tired to come home from work…

Never once did I ever think I was the other woman. He went on that hunting trip with his dad two years ago, and was just unreachable for three weeks. Things had been so good between us then that I hadn’t thought anything of it. Was that when they got married? Was he really on his honeymoon?

I picked at the lunch Lachlan had brought upstairs, but pretended to be sleeping when he came to tell me dinner was ready. It was ridiculous to lie in bed and let my emotions get the best of me, but I could not get my body to do anything other than just curl up around the pillows and become one with the comforter.

Lachlan had finally gone into his room, and I listened for a long time to see if he’d try to check on me. I just wanted to fall apart in peace. Pity party for one. Actually, for two I was reminded as the alien rolled in my belly.

She was pregnant, too. And I hadn’t told her. That the babies in our bellies were half-siblings. That he was the worst kind of man and she should run—as fast as she could—away from him. Why didn’t I just tell her the truth?

My hand drifted to my extended belly. All this time, I thought that maybe there was just a shred of love left in this world for me. How the hell had I gotten it so messed up? How had I let myself get in a situation where I had to show another human—an innocent, tiny creature who would be completely dependent on me—unconditional love? My sister was made to be a mom. All the hurt and neglect from our own mother had shown her exactly how to love in the most beautiful way.

But my brain didn’t work like that. Lach’s nickname for me was right on the money. I was trouble. All I’d ever invite into my life was trouble.

“You’d be better off with a different mama, and I’m so sorry about that.” Tears slid off the end of my nose until I buried my face in the pillow, trying my hardest to muffle the sobs that had finally found their way to the surface.

I don’t know how long I was lying there, crying about something I’d allowed to happen to myself in the most pathetic display of self-pity in the history of the world, when I heard a knock at my door.

I didn’t respond. I couldn’t. The tears and my ragged breaths were rushing out of me in a downpour I couldn’t stop. And even though I heard the door open and the soft taps of his cane growing louder as he moved toward me, surprise still flooded my body as I felt the bed dip beside me.

I don’t know what I was thinking, but I rolled as best I could, landing easily against his stomach. My own belly rested against his leg, but he didn’t complain. No. He wrapped his arms around me and moved his hand up and down my back.

“It’s gonna be okay. You’re gonna be just fine.”

“It’s n-not,” I whispered back once I could feel the peak of my emotions passing. Numbness was coming for me, and I welcomed it with open arms. “It’s never g-going to be o-okay.”