I blink away thoughts of the other day with Abby. How we got off together. I’m such a fucking idiot.
“Uh, no.” I grimace when she frowns. “Sorry, but, uh, I’m working on making it epic.”
Her smile is back but it doesn’t reach her eyes. “I suppose I did this to myself by getting involved and asking questions about the ring.”
Said ring is still rolling around in the floorboard of the backseat of my car. I really should put it somewhere safe, or at the very least, carry it in the house.
I haven’t been able to bring myself to touch it, though.
“Oh,” Angela says, digging her nails into my forearm. “I forgot to tell you. You know Ellie Crenshaw? She saw Abby.” A laugh tumbles out of her. “She said she got fat.”
Before I can answer, the waitress at the country club restaurant brings us our steaks. My stomach clenches with worry. Where did Abby go that she was seen? Do I actually expect her to stay hidden away forever?
“Where did she see her?”
“Shopping with two other ladies. Apparently, they seemed normal.” Angela snorts. “I told her it couldn’t have been my sister. She’s probably coked out and spreading her legs for a biker gang or something. I mean, she was dabbling in drugs there for a little while. Fat and happy and normal just aren’t her thing.”
“Why do you say that shit?” I ask, voice dripping with irritation. “You know it’s not true. Why do you hate your sister so badly?”
Angela blinks her long, false lashes at me and her eyebrows pinch together. “She’s embarrassing, Rhett. I swear she was switched at birth or something. My real sister is out there somewhere.”
While she giggles at her own joke, I don’t twitch a facial muscle and wait for her to give me a legitimate answer.
After a heavy, annoyed sigh, she says, “She always wanted whatever I had. Like you.”
“Me?” My muscles tighten and sweat trickles down my back. “That’s bullshit.”
She got me, though. In the pantry that night we made a baby. And the other day. When came together on her couch.
“I tried to tell her good men like you don’t go for whores but?—”
I cut her off by the scraping of my chair as I rise to my feet. From across the dining room, I see him. Beau Masterson. Sick, fucking rapist.
Angela says something behind me, but I’m already storming over to the douchebag. As soon as he sees me, and recognizes me as Owen’s son, he sneers my way. He doesn’t know that I know he’s a twisted monster.
“This is for Abby,” I say in warning before rearing back my fist. It swings fast and hard, slamming into his jaw. Beaustumbles back, lands on a table behind him, and everything crashes to the floor.
I flex my fingers and try to shake out the pain in my hand. There’s a chance I might have fractured something on this loser’s face. If he were still conscious, I’d give him another knock to the head, but I laid him out with one hit.
A few men grab hold of me and usher me out of the restaurant. Chaos ensues inside, but I’m grateful to get away from it. When they deposit me outside, I storm off to my car. Angela can catch a ride with her parents whom I’m sure saw everything from the bar.
Fuck these people.
It’s late when I sneak into Abby’s townhouse. I lock up after me and tiptoe up the stairs. After shucking off my clothes until I’m only in boxers, I climb into bed with her.
“Rhett?”
“Needed to see my baby,” I murmur, reaching for her stomach in the dark. “Go back to sleep, honey.”
She curls up on her side, and I spoon her from behind. I love rubbing her swollen stomach while inhaling her hair. It’s soothing. The pain still throbbing in my hand is ignored as I lose myself in the mother of my baby.
Our legs are both bare and only underwear stands between us. Her T-shirt is big and loose, so I’m easily able to explore her body beneath. I stick to her stomach, but I ache to touch her breasts that keep swelling with each day that passes.
“You’re upset about something.”
I brush my fingers over the underside of her belly, skimming them along the hem of her panties. “Not anymore. Now I’m happy.”
“Happy here with me?”
