Knees feeling like they were made of jelly, I crossed to the sink and picked it up.Two pink lines.
My heart lifted into my throat, the world going dark around the edges as I held that piece of plastic.
Fear and love flooded my veins.
Vega was pregnant.
Our little star was having our baby.
And she wasn’t fucking here.
Kane appeared beside me, taking the test from my nerveless fingers, holding it like it was priceless.His chest was heaving, and his throat bobbed a few times as he tried to swallow.
“She left us.”My voice didn’t sound like my own.Pure, agonizing pain sliced through me.Vega had left us.She’d fucking left!There were no signs of a struggle.Her neighbor would have alerted me if something had happened.Which meant she’d gone on her own.
Without an explanation.Without a goddamn goodbye.Without one last “I love you.”
Just a positive pregnancy test left for us to find when we arrived.
Pain turned quickly to fury, something I had rarely felt toward my little star.
Why did she leave us?Vega might have been a runner when she was a foster kid, but that stopped when she got to the group home with me.Her running had been because people were hurting her.No one would believe her.The social workers would take the foster parents’ side and had labeled her as overdramatic.
That wasn’t my girl.She didn’t do random shit for attention.
This, the way she’d been no-contact for days, only to vanish on us, leaving that test for us to find instead—it was a statement.
“She knows,” Kane croaked out, his fingers clenching around the little piece of plastic.Hearing it crack, he pressed it to his chest, his lips moving in a silent prayer before slipping the test into the pocket of his black slacks.Jaw clenched, face gray, he looked destroyed.“There’s no other reason for her to leave us, Ryder.Vega found out.She must have.”
“No.She doesn’t know anything.She can’t,” I denied, shaking my head and walking away.Out of the bathroom, past the memories that haunted me of making love to Vega in that bed, into the living room.
Vega lived a minimalist lifestyle.Only necessary and practical items allowed.Couch, TV, coffee table, her beloved coffeepot on the kitchenette counter.
Which was also missing.
Vega couldn’t know anything.Not yet, not when we were so close to having everything in place to get out of this life.I’d never wanted her to know a single detail.Kane was the one who thought we should tell her.After, though.Not before, sure as fuck not during.Ask—beg—forgiveness, then start over fresh in a warmer climate.
She’d promised to never do a name search on either Kane or me.It was a very thin tightrope we’d walked, with only her vow not to go looking for information.Ninety-eight percent of what was online about us was fake news that we’d fed the masses anyway, to make it look real to our fathers and Aurelio Bianchi.
But even though none of it was true, Vega wouldn’t know that.She couldn’t know.Kane was always a little nervous about it, saying we should find a way to lock Vega’s access to anything linked to us.But I hadn’t been worried.If she said she wouldn’t do something, I trusted her not to break her promise.
That was how close we were, how deep our bond was.
Even though Kane and I were the ones holding on to secrets and she shouldn’t have trusted us, I’d expectedherto keep her promises.Double standard, definitely, but it was only to ensure her safety, damn it.
“She can’t fucking leave us!”I roared to the silent apartment.
Grabbing hold of the edge of the counter, I sucked in a harsh breath, my legs going weak.Tears blurring my vision, I called her for the twenty-seventh time that day, the six hundredth time since I’d last seen her.
It didn’t ring this time, didn’t click straight to voice mail.Instead, I heard an automated voice say, “The number you have reached is no longer in service.”
Gone.My star had left.
“Find her.We have—Christ,ahfuck.”Knees buckling, I dropped to the floor, a sob ripped from me.“We have to find her, Kane.”
Kane
Hands stuffed in my pockets,I stood in front of the fireplace, absently stroking my thumb over the tiny pregnancy test in my pocket.
