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My father stammered. “Who the hell do you think you are barging in here like this? You’ve done enough.”
Duke’s dark eyes pinned my father in place. “I’m the only one here who gives a shit about your daughter. That’s what I’m doing here.” Tension filled the air as Duke clenched and unclenched his fists. “Now, I would hate to disrespect a man in his family home, but that’s the mother of my child you’re speaking to. If you can’t speak to her with respect, then you speak to me.”
My father’s head reared back, aghast that anyone, let alone a Sullivan, would dare speak to him that way. My eyes widened.No onespoke to Russell King that way. Duke stepped up next to me, his hand landing gently at my lower back. My father’s eyes flicked down to his arm, then back up to me.
“Get out.”
I stepped forward to argue with him, to plead with him, maybe defuse the situation. When I realized he was speaking to me, my open mouth clamped shut.
As I sucked in a deep, shaky breath through my nose, Duke’s voice lowered to a grumbly whisper. “Come on, let’s go.”
I squared my shoulders and swallowed back the vomit that threatened to come up.
I turned, stubbornness and hurt driving my feet forward when my father’s words stopped me. “I always knew you were just like her.”
A whore. A black mark on the King name.
He didn’t have to say those words aloud, because I had heard him speak about my mother enough times to know exactly how he felt about her and how he had always, apparently, felt about me.
I turned to look at my father’s cold, hard face, ice running through my veins. “Maybe I am like her, but there’s a common denominator in these situations. The only person we are running from is you.”
I made it all the way down the porch steps, across the lawn, and to Duke’s truck before bursting into tears.
Once inside, Duke threw the truck in reverse and peeled out of the driveway. I had no idea where he was headed. All I knew was that the life I had always known was made of tinder, and in a single moment, I flipped a match and ignited it before my eyes.
Duke’s truckwas pointed toward a quiet, dune-lined cliff. In the distance, waves pounded against the shoreline as tall beach grasses swayed in the October breeze. My tears had dried, andapart from mild nausea, I was numb. I wrapped my arms to hug my middle.
“What do you want to do?”
I was stunned and only managed a blink as I sneaked a glance in Duke’s direction. I scoffed and patted my sticky cheeks. “No one’s ever asked me that.”
“Well, I’m asking you.” The hard grit in his voice was undeniably sexy.
I swallowed hard. “I’m moving. To Savannah. Well, Iwasmoving. I had plans to move. I have to get out of here.”
Duke stilled except for his hands as they clenched the truck’s steering wheel. “When?”
“The plan was spring, but...” I gestured to my belly. “Plans kind of changed.”
“Does it have to be Georgia?”
My brows pulled down in the center. “Um... no. I—I don’t think so.”
His lips pressed into a thin line, and his head jerked. “Will you stay? Once the baby comes, we can figure the rest out, but you heard the doctor. Additional stress isn’t good for either one of you, and it sounds like nothing but stress in that house. If you stay with me—even for a few months after you give birth—I can have some time with the baby before you leave.”
The tortured look on his face was unbearable. The plan hadalwaysbeen to leave. To get out.Finallybe free.
But now leaving would mean taking Duke’s child from him. Could I do that? Even if staying meant losing a part of myself?
He studied my face as I struggled to find the right words. “Look. I know what it’s like to want to leave and can’t. All I’m asking for is time—to help you while you figure it out. I’m not asking for forever.”
I’m not asking for forever.
His words shouldn’t have stung. It wasn’t like either of us ever planned to get pregnant and a baby bound us together forever. Plus, it was undeniable that it would be nice to have his help once the baby arrived if the minimal sleep that the baby books proclaimed was actually true. Savannah would always be there.
I inhaled and set my shoulders. “Okay, but maybe there should be some rules.”
He nodded. “Like?”
