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Oh God, this was going to be a disaster. It already was. I’d fucked everything up.
Which was when I felt that tell-tale sick tingle underneath my tongue, and then the nauseous feeling sweeping through my stomach.
Oh shit.
I fled for the bathroom, slamming and locking the door shut behind me, then barely made it to the toilet in time before losing the meager contents of the lunch I’d pecked at and all the water I’d drunk to stay hydrated.
Almost immediately, there was a banging at the door. “Abilene. Abby! Open up. Let me in!”
I grabbed the toilet bowl and retched again, spitting up bile.
I felt hot and sweaty all over and my eyes teared up as I reached for some toilet paper to wipe my face and mouth.
“Abilene! I’m serious, open this door right now!”
I flopped onto the cool tile floor by the toilet and sank back against the wall. I let my head drop back until I was staring sightlessly at the ceiling.
“Abilene!” Bang bang bang bang.
I put my weak hands to my head, then shouted at the door. “Go away! This parasite you put inside me makes me barf three times a fucking day! You can wait your goddamned turn for the toilet!”
Then I groaned and rubbed my belly. “I’m sorry, baby. I don’t really think you’re a parasite. You’re amazing, I know it already. Your daddy is just an asshole who needs a beat-down from Mommy. But Mommy’s too tired for the beat-down right now.”
I let my head sink back against the wall.
But Beau wasn’t letting up and was all but banging the door off the wall. When he threatened to do just that, I finally yelled, “Fine!” and struggled to drag my weak and shaky ass off the floor.
I half-hobbled, half-crawled over to the door, unlocked it and flung it open. But the movement had been too much, too soon, and then I was crawling back to the toilet, hugging the lid, and retching even more. Barely anything came out, but each time it was an entire body spasm. By the time my body was done trying to expel what was no longer in it to be expelled anyway, I was a sweaty, teary mess.
Which was when I realized there was a body behind me. And strong hands holding back my hair. Beau was rubbing my back and holding my hair while I—
If I was a teary mess before, it was nothing to the tears that exploded at this unexpected, gentle action.
Beau as a cold ice-man asshole, I could handle. Not this, not this—
“Shhhh,” he said, turning me and pulling me into his arms. “Shhhh.”
And then, as I lay limp and exhausted and completely spent by the evening and its spectacular culmination, suddenly I was floating.
Beau had lifted me up. He cradled me in his arms. And then before I’d quite comprehended what was happening or how absolutely heavenly it felt to be held so secure in his arms like that, he was laying me gently on the bed.
I blinked my eyes open, and his face was soft and distressed with concern. And then I felt his hands around my body again. Was he— Was he really… tucking me in?
But yes. Yes, Beau Radcliffe had just been compassionate and gentle, putting me in bed and tucking me in when I’d been sick.
“Shhh. You need to get some rest. We’ll talk more when you wake up. You don’t have to worry about a thing anymore. If this child is really mine, they will never want for anything. Ever.”
So I fell asleep, feeling that no matter how much else I’d screwed up along the way, it seemed like I may have accomplished at least one thing.
My child would be a Radcliffe.
12
Beau
I walked over to the window to try to keep my eyes off Abilene—something I struggled to do as every hour in the Oleander ticked by at an agonizingly slow pace. I knew the only way I was going to get through these days was to stay focused on the endgame. No distractions. Chicks fucked things up for me in my life, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to allow this one to mess up what was the most important test ever… at least that had been the plan.
But her news just threw me for a loop. I couldn’t process her words, I couldn’t picture the future. I couldn’t plan my next step. Complete chaos.
The goal of the Order was to break the belle.
Not save the belle.
Not fall for the belle.
Not live happily ever after with the belle.
But now there was a baby to think of. The rules of the game just drastically changed.
We hadn’t been in the manor long, and I’d already found myself struggling, which wasn’t a good sign. I had come in so confident I could handle this secret society shit, that it would be just another box to check in my confident march toward the future I’d always seen for myself. But now this pregnancy…
