The first thing they’d do is tell me to get rid of it, but I couldn’t do that. This was a part of Jayden I carried inside me, and I’d no more get rid of it than I would cut off my own leg.
But I was fearful of what extremes this news might push them to.
Would they hurt me to cause a miscarriage? They’d never laid a finger on me before, but I knew this news would push them to the edge. Or maybe they’d poison me to try to rid me of the baby.
Or I could just not tell them.
Eventually, they were going to notice the changes in my body, but that wouldn’t happen for months. It wasn’t as though they were focused on me anyway. They were both still grief-stricken. My father had thrown himself into work, and my brother was out drinking every night. The drinking frightened me more than the work. What if he came across Jay one night while he was out and they’d both been on the booze? They’d promised not to kill Jay because I’d begged them not to, but also because he was in cahoots with the Cornells now, and killing Jayden Wynter would mean the end of our family, too. But if my brother had had a skinful and came across Jay, he might not be thinking straight. In fact, I knew he wouldn’t be.
I could only hope that by the time my pregnancy got too obvious to hide, months would have passed and Bruno’s loss might not be so raw.
Though I tried to relax in the seat, my entire body was wound into a knot of tension. I clasped my hands together, my shoulders tense. I had no idea how Jayden was going to react to my news.
He took a seat in the chair beside me and then twisted it to face me. “How have you been?”
“Terrible,” I said. “You?”
“Terrible,” he echoed.
I almost wanted to smile. I was glad he’d been having a hard time of things. He looked awful—not only because of the swelling and bruises across his face—but because of a sadness that seemed to exude from his pores. It didn’t make me love him any the less, however. How could it? He’d killed my brother, but I still fucking loved him.
“What happened to your face?”
He touched the bridge of his nose and winced. “Oh, bar fight.”
“You’re still going to bars then?” His words stung. Was he going out to try to pick up women? I hadn’t even thought about being with another man. I wasn’t sure it was something I’deverthink about.
“Only so I can get into fights.”
My voice came out as a croak. “I wanted you to fight for me. You walked away too easily.”
He lifted his bruised eyes to mine. “I was trying to fight for you, Ivy. That’s what I was doing when...it happened.”
I tried to blink away my tears. “You were fighting for me?”
His face was crumpled in pain. “He told me I wasn’t ever allowed to contact you again. I told him I’d die first, so he said then that’s what would have to happen.”
“He said he would kill you if you didn’t stay away from me?” I wanted to make sure I understood right.
He nodded. “And I had no intention of ever saying that I would stay away from you. I could no more have done that than cut off my own head.”
“You have stayed away from me,” I pointed out. “For a month now.”
“Only because I knew you wouldn’t have wanted me anywhere near you. I wasn’t going to let your family tell me to stay away from you, but you saying it is a whole different thing.”
Ihadtold him to stay away from me. I told him I never wanted to see him again. I’d meant it at the time, too, of course I had. At least a part of me had. How could I possibly reconcile my feelings of grief and hatred with love? But now it wasn’t just about me and my feelings. There were more important things to consider.
As so often happened recently, without me even thinking about it, my hand slipped to my stomach, protectively cupping the barely visible bump hidden beneath my shirt.
Jayden’s gaze slipped down to my belly, and his eyes widened.
“Ivy?”
I realised he’d seen. There was no point in trying to hide anything. It was the reason I was here talking to him.
My voice was a breathless whisper, and the tears were back. “Yes. I’m pregnant.”
“Oh my God. Ivy.”