Page 88 of Accidental Vegas Vows

I swallowed, but it did nothing to stop the rising acid in my esophagus. “I’m pregnant.”

It felt like a fucking grand piano had been lifted off my shoulders. But somehow, it also felt like being hit by a semi-truck.

His silence struck me, and as much as I wanted to look away, I needed to see him. I needed to see his reaction, needed to gauge what he was feeling. I dragged myself back to him.

A steeled jaw and an averted gaze were all I got in response.

“Are you going to say something?” I asked.

“How long have you known?” The words were dark, twisted, angry. If I hadn’t been leaning against the door, I would have taken a thousand steps back.

“I knew before I found the papers,” I gulped. “I’m eight and a half weeks.”

“Are you positive?”

“About the timeline? Yeah, I?—”

“No, Olivia. That you’re pregnant,” he snapped.

The back of my head knocked against the door as I reeled back from his tone. “Yes, I took a million home tests and did a blood test.”

He ran a hand through his hair, his gaze drifting to the ceiling. “Fuck.”

My gut twisted. I knew I’d picked an inopportune moment to tell him, but this wasn’t how I’d imagined he’d react. Even knowing he only wanted one child, even knowing the friction between us.

“And you want to keep it?”

Fucking nail in the coffin.

Acting on instinct, I reached for the door handle and peeled myself away from the wood. This was worse than what I’d thought two seconds ago. This was hell, this was horror, and I needed to get the fuck out, needed to run and cut him off. I needed to abandon whatever small amount of hope was still left inside of me and mourn the loss of Noah and a would-be father to the child growing inside of me. I needed to mourn what I once thought I had a shot at.

I slipped through the door before he could say another word that hurt me.

Chapter 36

Damien

Olivia stood in front of me, her chestnut waves tucked up into a ponytail, in a yellow sundress that hit her mid thigh. The shade from the redwoods that sprouted off the beaten path of the San Francisco Botanical Gardens kept us from squinting in the early autumn sun, and everything about her screamed that she was a fucking image plucked from my dreams.

But the look on her face told a different story.

“Why am I here, Damien?” she asked, her nose scrunching as she looked up at me.

“Because although I am forty-five years old, I still act like a child occasionally and you don’t deserve that,” I sighed.

“For fucks sake,” she sighed, her arms dropping to her side as she turned. “I didn’t come here to listen to another Goddamn apology spew from your mouth. Goodbye.”

I grabbed her by the wrist and pulled her back, making sure not to bring her too close this time. “Listen,” I said. “I’m not going to sugarcoat what I’ve done, and I’m not going to try to justify it. I fucked up. I destroyed this. But I’m also aware that I reacted incredibly poorly when you told me you were pregnant, and I can’t just let it end on that. I can’t not apologize for that.”

“You said you wanted to talk about child support,” she snapped. “You lured me here?—”

“I do want to discuss that. But I also need to talk about this.”

“You don’t, Damien,” she groaned, slipping her wrist out of my grasp.

“I do,” I insisted. The way she looked at me, her mouth parted and her exhausted expression, did little to help with the swirling nerves in my stomach. “I reacted fucking horribly. I panicked. I was surprised, and in my head, I’d just been picturing the three of us?—”

“And I destroyed that fantasy,” she said, her lips pursing together.

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