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38 Callie
“We need to talk,” I whisper, my heart so full of pain that it hurts with every beat.
“Not right now, Callie. Let’s just try not to go over all the what-if’s tonight. There’s a very real possibility that Chas is lying out of her ass. I’ll meet her at the clinic tomorrow and we will go from there.”
“You really think she’d be so bold as if to announce it in front of everyone if she wasn’t pregnant Reed?” I ask, praying she is that stupid, but in my heart, I know this was the dark cloud I’ve always felt hovering over mine and Reed’s relationship.
I fainted at the laundromat and when I came through, Jake treated me with kid gloves, but refused to talk about anything. I have so many questions running through my head. I want to ask Jake if we’re still a team. If we’ll handle this together, stay together despite the fact another woman is having his baby. It will hurt me. I want to scream at the unfairness of it all, but I don’t. I’m trying to be rational for once.
“I think she’s pregnant,” he says, and I close my eyes because that feels like a verbal blow.
“Then, we need to talk, to plan—”
“No, Bluebird. It’s been what four months? If Chas is pregnant, it’s not mine. She isn’t showing at all. At four months she’d be showing signs of pregnancy. I’ll go with her and demand to look at her records. She said they did blood work. That will have her due date. That will tell us exactly how far along she is.”
“You’re that sure?”
“I fucked her once and I was drunk off my ass and honestly, I’m starting to think she put something in the alcohol.”
“I…you think she drugged you?”
“Something happened. I don’t even remember drinking but a couple of swigs out of that bottle. Hell, everything after that is almost a complete blank. Whenever I try to remember anything, all I see is your face, Callie. Yours. I can’t even deal with looking back at it. Something just isn’t right.”
He pulls me in close and I lay with him on our bed, thinking back to that night. I was so busy staring at Chasity that she was the focus of my attention, but I saw Reed and he didn’t seem normal. Of course, I’d always marked that down to being in the thralls of passion.
But what if I was wrong?
“Are we going to be okay?” I whisper, needing his reassurance.
“I love you, Callie. Nothing is changing that. Let’s do our best not to worry about it tonight, okay? Let’s find out the truth and go from there.”
“Will you make love to me?” I find the courage to ask.
Reed puts a hand on each side of my face lifting my head from his chest so he can stare up at me. His face is sad, I can see that, even with nothing but the light of the moon casting shadows in the room.
“Are you asking me that because you want us to go to the next step in our relationship, Bluebird, or are you asking me that out of fear of losing me?” he asks, and I can’t help but grimace.
“Would you hate me if I say it’s a little of both?”
“I could never hate you. I don’t want our first time to be like this, though, Bluebird. When we make love, I want it to be because there’s just me and you in the room wanting to belong to one another completely—not with the shadow of Chas looming between us.”
“If she really is pregnant, Reed, won’t she always be there?”
“God, I hope not,” he says and that’s far from being reassuring.
I don’t know what to say after that. I’m not sure there’s much I can say. So, instead, I lie there with my head on Reed’s chest, listening to his heartbeat, praying everything will be okay and Chasity isn’t pregnant. I don’t sleep the entire night and I’m not sure Reed does either. I just know that when the sun comes up, we both silently get up together and start our day—praying for the best.
39 Reed
I hear the door open, but I don’t move. I’m sitting in the dark, wondering how life can do such a one-eighty so damn quick. I smell the scent of wildflowers before Callie even enters the room. God, I’m going to miss that.
I’m going to miss her.
I’ve gone around and around it in my head, and I’m praying I’m wrong, but I don’t see her agreeing to stay with me. Why should she?
She comes in and the light clicks on.
“Reed?”
I take another drink, unable to look at her.
“Oh God,” she exclaims.
I look up at her, my eyes burning. After I dropped Chas off, I came home and cried. I’m not ashamed to admit it. I had myself convinced that there was no way Chas was pregnant, but I saw the report myself in black and white. I even spoke to the nurse, and he looked it up on the computer and confirmed the information was accurate with Chas standing right there.
