Of course he notices. “Hey, sweetness. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I reply too fast. “I just don’t like being touched there. My stomach. It’s…” I struggle to come up with a believable excuse.
His face gentles in the dimly lit room, as he comes to the wrong conclusion, assuming I have some insecurities about my body.
“You’re gorgeous, sweetheart. Every damn inch. But I’m not all about your body, I love the way you speak up for what you want, you’re it for me.”
As his hand goes back to my stomach, his words hit me right in the feels. I try to wrangle my emotions back under control while he keeps his hand exactly where it is. Letting me know he loves me, no matter what. His hand is warm and certain, comforting a secret he doesn’t know he’s holding. I have never felt this kind of love and acceptance. I’m so touched that I almost open my mouth and tell him what’s under his palm.
I don’t, because now is not the time. But I really want to. Instead, I pull him down, wrap my legs around his hips and let him give us both the pleasure we so richly deserve after such a miserable day.
When he first plunges inside me, I can feel every inch of him. Now that we’ve been having regular sex, I can take him easily.
I scrape my nails down his back, as he moves inside me. For the first time, I trail my nails down his buttocks and his hips, tracing the lines of his tattoos. His movements become rougher and faster with each new scrape of my nails. He likes being scratched, the way I like a little hair pulling during sex.
When he grabs a handful of my hair and tips my head back to capture my lips without losing his rhythm, I gasp. His tongue tangles with mine in a sensual dance that I can’t get enough of. He murmurs my name, his voice deep and rough. His hand slides back down to my stomach and he uses his thumb to stroke tight circles around my clit until I come screaming his name.
His movement becomes faster as he chases his own orgasm and when he’s ready, he pushes deep, emptying his seed deep inside me. We stay locked together for I don’t know how long before he reluctantly moves off me and tugs me close. We lie on our sides spooning. I feel warm, safe, and sated in his arms. I can’t let my family mess this up for me, or for my child.
I wake up in the wee hours of the morning because I need to use the restroom. That’s when I realize that I’m spotting. There’s not much blood. But the fact that there’s blood where none should be, worries me. That’s when a low, pinching cramp takes hold. It’s different from anything I’ve ever experienced before. I’m smart enough to know that these two things mean I need medical attention.
I’m hiding a pregnancy inside a locked-down compound that might be attacked at any minute. I don’t have a doctor, and I haven’t been honest with anyone about being pregnant, not even the man responsible. I didn’t even admit it to the woman downstairs who already knows and keeps encouraging me todrink ginger ale. My silence isn’t protecting my child anymore. It might even be putting my unborn child in danger.
Chapter 13
Jinx
Iwake at dawn to Nora’s side of the bed empty. For a second, my mind goes right back to the morning following our one-night stand. I’m alone in bed, wondering where she is, only to discover she ran from me. I press my hand into the dent in the pillow where her head used to be, just like I did back then. Only, this time, I snap out of it. Nora wouldn’t leave me. She actually loves me.
I’m about to climb out of bed to look for her, when I hear a phone jingle with a message.
I grab my pants and fish my phone out, only to realize it’s hers. I grab her pants and pull out her phone to find another message from her family.
It’s from her old man this time. He sent a picture of her friend, the one called Lena. The poor girl looks terrified, probably because an older man that looks a lot like the man Nora described as Stripe, has his arm around her. I can’t tell exactly where the picture was taken but it turns my stomach. I hit the image and swipe, in case he sent more than one image. Instead, what I get is a picture of a positive pregnancy test strip. At first, I think they’re saying that Stripe got her friend pregnant. Then I realize the hand holding the test strip is Nora’s. I recognize the ring.
I sit there, staring at the image as all the pieces of the puzzle click into place. The nausea, the not drinking alcohol, the weirdness about me touching her stomach. It all makes sensenow. Nora is pregnant with my child. It’s got to be mine. She was a virgin when she came to my bed and even though she ran, she’s never slept with another man, certainly not Stripe. I swipe back to the image of Stripe with his arm around Nora’s pretty young friend.
I crawl out of bed buck naked and go look in the only place she can be. The bathroom door is open, and I see her sitting on the toilet with her head in her hand and every other thought ceases to fuckin’ exist. I kneel down on the rug and take her hands in mine. They’re icy cold.
“Nora,” I choke out. “What’s wrong? Are you feeling alright?”
When she looks up, I can tell she’s been crying. I grab a towel, wrap her up and carry her back to bed.
“No, wait,” she protests. “I’m…”
“You’re freezing. That’s what you are. And you’re going right back to bed until I’m fuckin’ convinced you’re not turning into a damn popsicle.”
I’ll admit that I’m trying to make her laugh. It doesn’t work though. She just lays her cheek against my bare chest and relaxes against me. Once I have her tucked into bed beside me, with an extra blanket thrown over us for good measure, I tell her, “No matter what you’ve been crying about tonight, we can work it out.”
“Alright, remember you said that,” she warns me. “I have to tell you something. And I want you to let me get all the way through it before you say anything. Can you do that for me?”
“Yeah, but I already know what you’re gonna say.”
“No, you don’t. Not this time.”
She looks down at her hands. “I’m pregnant,” she tells me quietly.
“And how do you feel about that? Is that why you’re crying?”
