Page 53 of Bedding the Baby Daddy

Chapter Fifteen

Aurora frowned down at her phone. A small worm of worry had started to work its way through her brain. She’d texted Dante twice but hadn’t heard back from him. Now the workday was over and she was supposed to meet him and Michelle at his place in about an hour. But damn it, she wanted to talk to him now. This time, however, she tried calling his office phone.

“Callaghan.”

Her breath caught in her throat at the sound of his voice. Both because she loved him and his voice did stuff to her. But also because it appeared she’d been right to worry that he’d been ignoring her texts.

“Dante.”

Several seconds ticked by before he clipped out, “Aurora.”

She cleared her throat, suddenly grappling with the very strange sensation that she was speaking with a stranger. “Is everything alright? I tried reaching out a few times earlier today.”

“Everything’s fine. Same as it always was. Apparently.”

What? She had no idea what that was supposed to mean. “Listen, do you have time to meet me now? I know we’re supposed to meet at your place in a while but—”

“I know what you have to tell me. And I don’t have time for it.”

“I—what?” Aurora’s heart stuttered in her chest. Her breath came out in a strangled puff. She couldn’t have heard him correctly.

He knew she was pregnant? How?

“I came to your office earlier, Aurora. I saw you. I know.”

Aurora’s breath left her in a heavy rush and at the cold tone in his voice, she doubled over as if she’d been gut punched. One of her hands instinctively curled around her belly. “You saw?”

* * *

“You saw?”

At Aurora’s guilty tone, Dante gritted his teeth. The image of her holding Gio so closely, so intensely, seared through Dante’s brain for the five hundredth time. He’d trade five years off his life to have that memory scrubbed from his brain.

She was silent on the other end of the line now, obviously searching for something to say. He felt a sick sense of satisfaction over having stolen the words from her. He knew how calm and collected she was. How much thought she’d probably put into preparing what she was going to say to him. He was sure her little speech would have been gentle and respectful. And he wanted to hear it like he’d wanted a hole in his head.

He couldn’t do it. Couldn’t listen to her confess that she still loved Gio and they’d decided to be together. Couldn’t do it and stay the same man that he was.

All that mattered was getting out of this shit ass situation alive. With his soul intact. And that meant severing things quickly and efficiently. It meant walking away from her before she could walk away from him. It meant being cruel.

Something clenched in Dante’s gut. As mad as he was at her, as hurt as he was, he didn’t want to treat her poorly. He loved her, goddamn it. Even now, with the image of her wrapped around another man, the man who truly had her heart, he still loved her. But he needed a clean break.

“Yes. I saw, and I can’t do this with you. It’s over. You know it. I know it.”

* * *

Dante’s words were poison in Aurora’s ears but somehow she still managed to gasp out, “That’s it? That’s all you have to say?”

“I’m not sure what more you want me to say.”

“You don’t want us in your life at all?”

“I don’t see how I could.”

The silence between them stretched on. The idea of hanging up the phone and finalizing their separation was terrifying for Aurora, but what else could she do? Finally, she managed to take a deep breath and channel her inner strength.

She refused to permanently slam the door on her child’s father. Her child deserved to have some hope of a future where he or she could know Dante. If she said something terrible, out of pain or anger, then she might close off that future forever. She wouldn’t do that.

“If you change your mind, Dante, I’ll never cut you out of our lives.”

“Goodbye, Aurora.”

She didn’t say goodbye. She simply hung up the phone and stared, dimly, unseeing, into a future much more lonely than she had ever imagined for herself.

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