Christ! Is she fishing?

“Well that depends.” I take a risk and flirt. You only live once, right? “Do I have a girl to come back to?”

“Elijah ….”

Fuck! Not fishing. Not fucking fishing!

Even though I’ve more than likely just fucked everything up, I can’t help sinking myself further in. “Yes or no, baby girl?”

“Honestly? I don’t know. It sucks, but that’s all I can give you right now. You’ll have a job when you come back, and I’ll always be here as a friend.”

“You wanna be my goddamn friend, Ana?”

“Elijah—”

“Do you still love me?” There’s a pause, and just when I think she isn’t going to answer the beep that signals the last thirty seconds of our call sounds in my ears. “Do you still love me?”

“I—”

“Yes or no, Ana?”

Frustration seeps from every pore in my body as I wait for the answer that never comes. The phone cuts out and I slam the receiver down and fight against the urge to go postal on the useless piece of shit. If I destroy prison property it’ll go on record. If the parole board see that shit in my file this close to my assessment they’ll knock me back, for sure. The only way I’m getting an answer to that question is if I see it coming from her lips when she’s standing right in front of me, and I’ll be fucked if I’m going to wait another six months to see her and hear those words.

Chapter Thirty Two

Holly

(Yep, Holly)


I heave up the last of the dry crackers I’d shoved down my throat this morning and curse men for all of eternity. When this kid finally claws his way out of me I’m going to celebrate my vagina by purchasing stocks in We-Vibe and drinking myself into a stupor. Then I’m going find every battery-operated boyfriend I can get my mitts on and screw myself into an orgasm coma. I’ll more than likely die alone, crushed by the mountain of falling dildos, but at least I’ll never have to look at a real penis again.

Falling back against the cold tiled wall, I contemplate jumping off a bridge for the thousandth time since I found out I’m growing a person inside me—which is just wrong, on so many levels, if you really think about it—and then decide my fat arse would probably never make it over the railing. I’d likely get stuck halfway and have to wait for emergency services to come and hoist me down from an embarrassing, half-arsed attempt at offing myself. Plus, once Ana found out she’d likely kill me, and then I would have wasted all the emergency service’s time.

“This is bullshit! I’m taking her arse to the doctor,” I hear Jackson yelling in the hall and panic. He doesn’t know I’m pregnant. I don’t know how he hasn’t figured it out yet. I don’t know why I so badly want to keep this dirty little secret from spilling out. All I know is that I feel alone and confused on an almost hourly basis, but when Jackson’s in the room all that goes away and I can breathe easier and think clearer and forget I’ve got a person inside me, sucking all the joy from my bones.

Sharing a house with him these past three weeks without the buffer of Bob, Sammy and the evil bitch stepmum has been torture of the very best—and worst—kind. It turns out the man is terrible at fixing up cars, so he’s been jobless since Bob locked him out of the garage, meaning he’s been spending an awful lot of time here in this big old farmhouse by himself. Most of the time, I’m torn between wanting to tear off his clothes and pulverise his face with our new magic bullet, but I have to admit that there’s some sort of inner peace I find in watching Friends reruns on the couch with him. Until he opens his great big mouth, that is.

“You don’t need to take her to the doctor,” Ana says, “she’s fine.”

“She needs help, Ana.”

I quickly climb to my feet and brush my teeth. I spray a bit of perfume, which of course makes me dry retch again, and I stand over the sink fighting back the urge to vomit.

Jackson bangs on the bathroom door and I wince. “Holly, get your arse out here. I’m taking you to see someone.”

I pull back the door and a gust of fresh air swirls around me, carrying the acrid scent of vomit and toothpaste toward my nose. For a heartbeat I just stand there, trying not to throw up again, and then I close the door behind me and glare up at him like I’m more annoyed with his overall Jackson-ness than usual.

To look at me, you would never know I was pregnant. There’s no baby bump to speak of, and though I should already be showing, I’ve actually lost weight from the morning sickness. My boobs are definitely bigger, but do guys ever really notice anything past “Oh look, boobs”?

My moods have been kinda crazy, in fact I’ve probably seen days where I’ve looked like less of an escaped mental patient, but outwardly, I guess I seem kind of normal. Or as normal as I get, anyway, so I guess it makes sense he’d jump to the conclusion that I choose to chuck up my guts for kicks.

I stare up into his sky blue eyes and realise this is the moment that I have to come clean. It’s also the moment I stop being the sexy little minx that rocked his world once or twice in our not too distant past, who he might like to bend over the kitchen counter and screw senseless, and instead become a walking womb.

“I don’t need to see a doctor, Jack. I’m pregnant, not bulimic,” I blurt out, and try to edge past him while his face is frozen in shock. He grabs my wrist and pulls me back to face him.

“What?” he whispers, and I’m surprised by the hurt I see in his gaze.

“Jackson, meet Mini Coop.” I wave my arm back and forth between him and my stomach.

He glances back and forth between my flat stomach and my eyes and then at Ana, as if he’s hoping that this is all some fucked up joke. “Tell me you’re shitting me, Hols?”

I don’t know what to say. I wish someone would tell me this is all some kind of joke, and then I’d grab his hand and run off to the nearest available horizontal surface to bang his brains out. Yeah, that ain’t happening, and this shit’s still real.

“It’s true,” Ana confirms, and Jackson swipes his hand over his face. His other hand is balled into a tight fist and I can tell he’s dying to hit something, or someone. I guess it’s a good thing Coop’s nowhere to be found, after all.

“Fuck!”

“No thanks, that’s kinda what landed me in this position in the first place,” I deadpan, but that just makes him angrier. Jackson’s really not taking this news well. I know we flirt and fight and carry on like an old married couple, but I didn’t know he’d be this affected by finding out I was pregnant with someone else’s baby. When he narrows his gaze and pens me in against the wall, my breathing becomes heavier. Wetness pools between my legs and my nipples harden into stiff peaks beneath my singlet top. Holy crap, I have a total lady boner for Jackson Rowe right now.

“How could you be so fucking stupid, Hols?” he’s seething as he says it, but there’s not just anger and disappointment in his tone—there’s hurt, too.

Aaaand the happy feeling’s gone.

“Jackson!” Ana chides.

“You know what, Jack? I ask myself that on a daily basis.”

“But you’re always careful?”

“Yeah, except for that one time where I wasn’t, and I trusted my boyfriend enough to believe that the condom we were using wasn’t centuries old, but then: surprise! Turns out you can’t trust any man these days, even the ones that claim they love you. Who knew, right? Now, if you’re done with your caveman bullshit, I have to get ready for work.”

“Who is he? Where the fuck is he?”

“Don’t know, don’t care.”

“What do you mean you don’t know? He’s gonna take care of this shit, isn’t he?”

Why the hell does he care so much? I know there’s this out of control chemical pull between the two of us, but I have no idea why he’d be acting like some jealous tool. This is Jackson Rowe we’re talking about. Jack doesn’t form emotional ties to anyone, that’s what makes him so freaking fantastic in bed. There are no inhibitions when it comes to sex with Jackson, only intense animal heat and multiple orgasms.

“I really hope you didn’t just refer to my baby as this shit. Because pregnant or not, I will take your arse down. And no, Coop won’t be taking care of this baby. He won’t even know about it.”

“What do you mean he won’t know? You’re not telling him he has a kid?”

“No. I’m not telling him shit.”

“What the fuck, Hols?”

“Jackson, lay off,” Ana butts in.

“Don’t tell me you’re alright with this shit?” Jackson shoots Ana an incredulous look before turning back to me. “The man has a right to know about his kid.”

“As far as I’m concerned, he gave up any rights he had when he left me here with his demon seed to go become a rock star.”

“Did you just call your baby demon seed?” Jackson says.

“Hey, I’m allowed to call him whatever the hell I like, he’s my baby. Just like the decision to tell his father is mine and no one else’s.”

“Oh yeah? Well, when the hell were you going to tell me about this? When I’m giving up my room for a nursery, and kissing my sex life goodbye because there’s a baby screaming into all hours of the night?”

“As if that would ever stop you. The entire house could be on fire, and you wouldn’t notice a thing until you’d blown your load.”

“Are you fucking serious right now?”

“Oh, I’m deadly serious. What I’d like to know is why you think you’re so fucking important that you deserve to know what goes on in my life? You’re my roommate, Jackson, nothing more.”