AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“My belly’s all queasy.”
“Then take a nibble. They said the tea would help and that you need some food to make the nausea better. Eat what sounds good.”
Okay, so those croissants are calling my name, and Iamconcerned that I need some food.
I take the tiniest bite of a croissant.
“Good girl.”
I can handle his anger, but I’m not sure I can handle his approval. I take a quick sip of tea to quell my nerves.
“Now that I know you’re pregnant, I want to know. Did you know you were pregnant before you were approached at Le Luxe? And if so, did that have anything to do with why you betrayed us?”
I don’t want to give him all the answers. I can’t. He’s already made wild assumptions about my thoughts and motives, and if he truly knew everything, I’m afraid he’d jump to conclusions that assume the worst about me.
I draw in a breath and take another sip of tea before I answer. I have to reluctantly admit, it’s helping.
“Yes.”
I place the mug down on the tray and sit up a little more in bed. It’s hard to remain dignified when the person you’re with just saw you praying to the porcelain gods and you’re completely at their mercy, but I do my best.
“I didn’t want to tell you I was pregnant, because I know that the baby is yours. I was afraid that if I told you, you’d think I was trying to manipulate you. You were right. I was on birth control. But we’re both smart enough to know that birth control isn’t completely effective, and it appears the Gerard family has excellent reproductive genes.”
Is that a hint of a smile at the corners of his mouth?
I draw in a breath and release it slowly.
“And somehow, they also knew.”
The Chabert family, rival mafia, were after Thayer’s Savannah because of what she’d seen. Hidden deep within the walls of Le Luxe, Savannah was safe with Thayer, but thanks to me, not for long.
I look away. I don’t want to tell him this part.
He’s already on his feet, pacing, his phone in a death-like grip as if he’s going to order a nuclear bomb attack if anything I tell him now gives him reason.
Oh, Lyam. Don’t you know not everything can be solved with a well-placed bullet or three?
“I told you that I was loyal to your family. You know that. And you all believed I betrayed you, because obviously, I did. I hate what I did. I don’t know how I’ll ever look Savannah in the eyes again knowing I lied to her.” My throat tightens and I can’t continue for a moment.
Still glaring, he pauses his pacing. “Are you ready to tell me why, then?”
I nod. There’s no point in hiding this from him now and if I’m honest, I want this part at least off my chest. My voice trembles when I tell him the nauseating, horrifying truth I wish I could forget. “They knew I was pregnant. Mindy and I shared a locker at Le Luxe. You know we worked together on the same shift.”
Mindy, submissive to her master at Le Luxe, was friendly to me. None of us knew her master was on the Chabert family payroll, or that he’d infiltrated the privacy and security of Le Luxe.
Lyam nods. And he knows it was Mindy who worked with her master to manipulate me, that the only way to get to Savannah would have to be an inside job. They knew that.
“She must’ve seen the pregnancy test. She definitely saw me vomiting and crying, and even though she asked questions, women sometimes know. They were planning on using me and looking for a threat that would make me cave, and that positive pregnancy test was the ticket.”
He stares in front of me, a look I’m all too familiar with in his eyes. Almost inhuman in intensity, that dangerous, foreboding look warns me he’s on the cusp of going to the dark recesses of his mind that knows no fear. This is the part of him I’m irrevocably drawn to and simultaneously fear.
In a low, deadly voice, he asks, “Did they threaten you and the baby?”
The knowledge that there’s a baby growing inside me as we speak, cells reproducing at enormously fast rates, creating an actual human who will eventually be fully dependent onme,stirs something primal and protective deep within me. I swallow and nod.
I feel nauseous again at the memory of the terrible threat against me. Horrific, vivid, and something one doesn’t get over very easily.
“They told me that if I didn’t cooperate, they would end my pregnancy. And they told me in vivid detail how they would do it.”
