Page 38 of A Man of Prestige

We make it back to her apartment without being followed.

“You should come up. Have a drink with us,” Elena suggests as I pull up to the front door of the building, my security pulling in behind us.

“I’m sure Aiden has things to—”

“I’d love to,” I say, cutting Ella off and giving Elena a warm smile. If Ella could shoot daggers from her eyes, she would most definitely be doing that right now.

“Oh great! It’ll give you two some time to catch up,” Elena says, giving her sister a not-so-secret wink.

I pull around to the side visitor lot and park. My security parks next to me. He sends me a text saying he’ll stay here as long as we’re only going upstairs.

With a heavy sigh of annoyance, I follow Ella and Elena into the building. Elena’s phone rings as we enter the apartment. I can only assume she has arranged for someone to call her at this very moment.

“Sorry, guys, I need to take this. Important school project thing. It was so good to see you, Aiden,” she says, giving me a hug before running off toward a guest room.

I look at Ella, and she glares back at me.

“You can go now,” she says, her lips purse in anger.

“I know,” I reply.

“Aiden…just…leave. If you wouldn’t hear me out before, then why are you going to bother with it now.”

I let out a long slow breath. This woman has the ability to get under my skin and completely infuriate me.

“Was I not allowed to be angry?” I say through gritted teeth.

“Not as angry as I am,” she retorts.

“What are you possibly angry at? The fact that you got to decide the fate of our child. The fact that you never even told me. The fact that you kept all of this to yourself even after we were…” I trail off because saying “back together” doesn’t exactly reflect whatever the fuck we were up until this week.

She takes two long strides until she’s standing in front of me, and then she rises on her tippy-toes. She still doesn’t reach my face, but she’s at neck height now. She narrows her eyes and jabs a finger at my chest.

“I,” she begins, pointing back to herself before jabbing me again in the sternum, “didn’t decide anything. I”—she motions back to herself and then pushes her finger against me again—“was told by my then boyfriend that he never wanted children and that I was selfish to want them. I”—she motions again before poking me in the chest—“had to nearly bleed out while delivering our daughter at seventeen weeks. And I”—she motions back to herself—“would have been all alone if it wasn’t for Elena.”

Her eyes are glistening with tears now, and I feel like the biggest fool and worst human on earth. Fuck.

“Yeah, you really screwed up, Thomas,” she says, using my last name as she did in med school. “You made assumptions, twice now. I wasn’t being selfish, you fucking prick. I was trying to tell you that I was pregnant. Do you think I wanted to be pregnant? No. It was the wrong time. But the way you screamed at me. The way you carried on that I was selfish to want that…how could I have told you? You made it one hundred percent clear that you didn’t want Angela. And you know what? I fucking did. I wanted that little girl. I wanted her because she was a part of me and a part of you. I held her in my fucking arms for two hours after I gave birth to her lifeless body. She was so tiny. Elena held me while I cried over ‘our’ dead daughter. It should have been you,” she seethes and walks the fuck away from me.

What. The. Fuck.

I storm after her, following her into her bedroom where she whips open a nightstand drawer and grabs a small beautifully carved box, and tosses it on the bed.

I look at it and then at her.

“Meet your daughter, Angela Janis,” she whispers as tears stream down her face.

The power of her words nearly knock me to the ground.

I look at the small wooden box as emotions flood me. I feel my tears falling down my cheeks as I take three steps and pull Ella against me. Her body sags in my arms, but I hold her up. I have to be the strong one. She’s carried this alone for so long.

I’m angry at her, but more than that, I’m angry at myself. I should have tried harder to contact her. I could have tried harder, but I was young and proud and stupid.

I let us fall to our knees on the floor as I keep her in my arms. We both sob, for the loss of our daughter, for the loss of what could have been had we not wasted so much time.

“I’m so sorry, Estella,” I whisper in her ear as I kiss the side of her head. “I’m so fucking sorry.”

“It’s my fault,” she whispers. “I should have told you.”

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