She stopped then and closed her eyes. Her body was strung so tight that I was afraid to hear what more she had to say. This wasn’t going to be a funny story. It wasn’t something that we were going to laugh about, then go fuck. She was about to change everything. I could feel it. The tension in the room was too thick.
My hands clenched into fists as I waited, terrified of what she was going to say.
“The condom was broken. There was cum between my thighs.” She swallowed hard, and then she looked at me, her eyes now wet with unshed tears. “Nine months later—” she said and then covered her mouth on a sob.
I sat there, numb. What she was telling me sank in. Questions started to add up in my head. But nothing came out. I just sat there. My gaze dropped from her to the wall behind her.
Finally, after several moments—I wasn’t sure how long we’d stayed there, silent—I asked, “Are you sure he’s mine?” I didn’t look at her when I asked it. I wasn’t sure how I felt about this. I wasn’t sure how I felt about her. The lies. Everything I’d believed about her no longer held up. I was questioning it all.
“Yes,” she whispered.
I managed to nod, then ran a hand over my face. I was stunned. I had never been this stunned in my life.
“I’ll need a paternity test done,” I said then.
She let out a shaky breath. “I’m not asking you for anything. I don’t want child support, Dean—”
I stood then, anger slowly building inside of me. I swung my gaze back to her. “This isn’t about you, Brielle. It’s about the fact that you claim I have a son I didn’t know existed. A boy who needed to know his dad. I want a motherfucking paternity test. If he’s mine, he needs to know. I need to know. You took nine years from us.”
Tears were running down her face now. I couldn’t comfort her. Not now. Not after this.
“I’ll set up the test. Have him here tomorrow at noon. We will do it then,” I said to her.
I wanted to ask her if she’d tried to get in touch with me. I wanted to know why she had waited until now to tell me. Had she meant to suck me in with her body and my need for her first? Had that all been a part of her plan?
“You need to leave,” I said instead of asking her anything more.
Right now, she was the last person I wanted near me.
She didn’t say anything as she turned to go. No attempt at explaining. No apologies. She just left silently as I stared out the window, thinking back to every conversation I’d had with her since I’d walked into that office.
If she had been the woman I thought she was, she’d have told me about Cam. She’d have found a way to reach me. She wouldn’t have kept that from me. Kiro had several kids, and all his baby mamas had been able to reach him. To let him know his kid existed. Brielle had done nothing.
Nothing.
thirty-three
brielle
Standing in front of the mirror in my bathroom, I stared at my reflection. My eyes were swollen and puffy from crying myself to sleep last night. I reached up to brush my wet hair. I’d hoped a shower would make me look less of a mess. When Cam returned home, I couldn’t look like this. He would get worried. He’d ask questions. He was going to ask questions anyway when we went up to Dean’s penthouse for a paternity test.
I gripped the brush to my chest, and my eyes welled up with tears again at the thought that Cam could turn away from me too. He wanted a father. I knew that. How would he react when he found out the guy he worshipped was his father and I had kept that from him for nine years? Would he hate me too?
A tear rolled down my face, and I wiped it away. I had to get control of myself. Cam needed me to be strong and levelheaded. I had to protect him. It was my job, although right now, I felt like a complete failure at it.
Dean couldn’t even look at me after I told him. When he got the results back and saw that Cam was his son, then what? He would get him every other weekend, and we would be awkward around each other, barely speaking.
I didn’t want that, but then I hadn’t wanted to fall in love with the father of my child either. As crazy as it sounded, I had known better. I had fought against it. Then, he’d made me love him anyway.
This wasn’t about me anymore. It was about Cam. It was about Dean. I was just the woman that linked them.
I washed my face with a cloth and swore I was done crying. I then dried my hair, brushed my teeth, got myself dressed, and went to the kitchen to find tea bags for my eyes. I needed something to help them look better, and I was running out of time.
By the time Cam walked in the door, I’d used some makeup to cover things up a bit. Cam, however, paused and studied me.
“What’s wrong?” he asked me.
I smiled and shook my head. “Nothing. Tell me about your trip.” I hoped his excitement over the trip would be enough to distract him.