“No, he won’t, but he’ll want to find out who’s responsible and kill them for disrespecting him. The very last thing I can do is tell Gino. And Papa would throw a hissy fit too. I’d be bringing dishonor on his name. Neither of them would rest until they found out who knocked me up, and Leo would end up dead. I can’t tell anyone, Frankie. No one can know.”
She knows I’m right.
“Jesus, fuck.” She rubs a soothing hand up and down my back. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.” I glance at the clock on my nightstand, and I’m running out of time.
“How far along are you?”
“Not long.” I know they calculate your due date from the date of your last period, which would be almost seven weeks.
“Maybe you can convince Gino the baby is his,” she says, thinking out loud.
I’m horrified. “I can’t do that! That would be unfair to Leo, Gino, and the child.”
“At least everyone would be alive,” she murmurs.
“I would have to get the midwife to lie when I delivered early, and how would I do that?” I shake my head. “No, I can’t do that. It would be so much worse if he discovered I had lied and tried to pass another man’s child off as his. We would all end up dead then anyway.”
“Running away isn’t seeming like such a bad idea,” she quietly says. “You could go alone and leave Leo out of it.”
“I’m due at the church in two hours, Frankie. If I abandon him at the altar, he will never stop hunting me down.” I release a shuddering breath. “Besides, I don’t have access to much money and Papa has my passport.”
She hugs me, and I feel her shaking against me. “I’m scared for you, Nat.” She eases back with tears in her eyes. “I think you should tell Ben. I can get him here. He’ll know what to do.”
“Involving him puts him at risk too. I can’t do that.” I know my brother would do everything in his power to find a solution, but there is none. I have thought of nothing else for the past week.
“Are you just going to think about it until you start showing? Then what?”
“I had considered a secret abortion, but I can’t do it. I can’t kill my baby.” My hands cradle my stomach as if I can shield this new life from my heinous words. “I already love him or her.”
“Maybe you will miscarry. A lot of women do with their first.”
“Wishing for that is as bad as considering an abortion.”
“I know.” She places her hand over my stomach. “What other options are there?”
“I think my best option is to lie. Say I was raped in the city and threatened I would be killed if I told anyone. I’ll tell him I was scared. Beg him not to take it out on an innocent child and ask him to send me away to give birth and then I will give my baby up for adoption.” Tears spill down my cheeks as I contemplate giving Leo’s baby away, but it’s the best solution I have come up with.
“He might not buy it.”
“I know, but he might. He has already shown he can compromise, and he kissed me when he knows it’s against the rules.”
“This isn’t as black and white. What if he figures out it was Leo?”
“I don’t think he would. Leo and I have had nothing to do with one another for years. Everyone knows we are no longer friends. No one knows I was with him that night. I think I can sell it to Gino. He might be mad he didn’t get a virgin, but he needs a mother for Caleb and Joshua, and we’ll be married by then. I’ll be his responsibility. You know the traditions forbid divorce, so he will not have much choice.”
“He could still have you killed, Nat!” she chokes out.
“He won’t. He’d have Papa to answer to, and he needs me.”
“But for how long?” She gets up, pacing the room in her gorgeous pink bridesmaid gown.
I get the point she’s making, and it’s a future concern. “I’ll worry about that later.”
“God, Nat.” She kneels before me, taking my hands in hers. “Even if you do get him to agree, how are you going to give up your baby?”
Pain slices through me, like a red-hot blade carving chunks out of my heart. “It will destroy me, Frankie. It will kill me slowly, day by day. But there is no other choice. If it’s my only way of keeping our child alive, then I will have to do it.”
