AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"Mommy, where are you?"
I bolted up in bed, my spine as stiff as a board. Beside me, Lucas was already sitting up, his unblinking eyes trained on the door, his face blank, his expression slack. "Uh, Olive?"
"Fuck." The hiss slipped through my teeth, and I hopped off my mattress, yanking a pair of pajama pants from a pile of dirty clothes. "Get up, get up!"
Lucas was moving way too slow, easing out of bed as he searched for his suit. I untangled his boxers from the sheets and chucked them at him. "You have a kid?"
I yanked a shirt over my head. "Hurry the fuck up."
Lucas's lips pressed together in a thin line, his voice taut. "That's something you could have mentioned."
"Olive?" Adam's voice echoed from the living room.
"One second!"
Lucas was halfway through pulling on his pants when he stumbled sideways, slipping on the slack of his pants and falling backward on the carpet. The thump of his fall resounded. My apartment was too small that there was no way Adam and Claire hadn't heard it.
From the floor, Lucas fumbled to stand back up. "You're married?" Lucas gasped.
I shook my head, my annoyance bubbling out of me. "Are you serious? No, that's Adam."
"Olive?" Adam called out. "What's going on? Are you okay?" He tapped on my bedroom door.
"I'm fine!" I yanked my shirt over my head.
"Olive, I'm coming in."
"N-no, wait!"
It was too late. Adam threw open the bedroom door. "Are you okay? What's going—"
His eyes drifted from me, standing in my pajamas with my shirt on backward, my sex hair tangled and pointing in all directions, to Lucas, half naked, his pants undone.
Adam's eyes widened, and he sucked in his breath. "Lucas?"
Claire popped her head in behind my brother. "Mommy!"
To my relief, Adam caught her before she darted forward. He spun around, closing my bedroom door. "Mommy's having a bad dream right now," Adam said. "Why don't you go play in your room, sweetie?"
Why the fuck did I bring Lucas back here? Sex, obviously...but I hadn't expected him to spend the night. And I definitely didn't think Adam would be back here so early. If Lucas had asked questions about the photos in my apartment, I could have made up any excuse about who Claire was, but that opportunity was long gone now.
Lucas' jaw dropped, and the color drained from his face. His eyes drifted to the picture of Claire and me on the nightstand. "Olive...how old is your daughter?"
The blood in my veins froze. Lie. "Six."
His neck snapped sideways as he glared at me and pointed at the photo. "That kid is not six. I'm not that fucking stupid," he hissed. "Olive."
I locked his gaze. Fuck it. I'd spend the last ten years of my life doing this on my own. Why lie about it anymore? "She's ten."
Lucas stumbled backward, his eyes blinking rapidly, his lips parting but no sound coming out. His eyes scoured the ground. "Where the fuck is my shirt?"
He lunged for a pile of clothes and tripped over one of Claire's toy trains, his face contorting in pain as he grabbed his toe. I spotted his shirt hung over the edge of the bed frame and handed it to him. "Here."
Ripping it from my hand, he yanked it over his head and snatched his tie from the ground, shoving it in his pant pocket. There was so much I wanted to say, but my throat had closed up. Maybe it was better to say nothing. Then he would walk out this door, and I'd never see him again.
He grabbed his shoes and struggled to slide one on while still standing, not pausing to look for his socks. I hadn't moved from the corner of the bed, and even though I didn't want to look at him, I couldn't take my eyes off him. The thoughts that crossed over his face were visible in the press of his wrinkles, the widening of his eyes, the slack of his jaw.
A million emotions visible—emotions I understood because I'd experienced them myself over ten years ago. Lucas suddenly froze in the middle of the room, with only one shoe on, and looked at me, his gaze probing, brows lowering.
