Page 111 of Between Commitment and Betrayal
“Everly, so glad I caught you. I don’t know how this slipped through the cracks, but I’m checking your medical charts, and I know you said you were on birth control at your first visit, but when we did that bloodwork, everything looked great except that, well, you don’t have to try for a baby. You’re already pregnant.”
“I’m sorry?” I gripped my counter. “What?”
“I know. I was surprised as well. Rings are quite effective as birth control, but there’s still about nine in a hundred women who get pregnant. Have you gotten your period?”
“No.” I knew it’d been probably three months without it. I just hadn’t worried. “But the doctor said I would be irregular once coming off birth control and—”
“Well, that about confirms it.” The woman sounded excited even as I felt like I was about to faint, about to have my life completely changed. “We’ll have you come in for a test to see how far along you are. We’re so sorry we missed that with all the genetic testing we were doing, our new staff must have overlooked putting that in your MyChart. What day works best for you and Mr. Hardy?”
“What day works best?” I repeated, in total shock. No day worked best. We weren’t having a child. We couldn’t be. We’d been protected at that time. There was no way I was having a baby.
Except I was. And Declan had told me he didn’t loved me. We had divorce papers in our possession. He was driving Anastasia around. For all I knew, he could be sleeping with her by now.
“Would Friday at 3 p.m. work?”
“I can come Friday,” I said in a monotone as my heart galloped away, trying its best to catch up and pump blood through my veins like it felt me slipping. My vision blurred, and I sat down. “I’ll be there Friday,” I repeated again and hung up.
I sat there for hours. I didn’t reach for the phone. Didn’t reach for the TV remote. I simply sat with tears streaming down my face as I considered how I could make this work on my own. I vowed never to tell him. I vowed to raise my child in love, and I knew forcing Declan to stay in this marriage wasn’t what either of us wanted.
Plus, Andy was coming. I knew he would.
And when your past catches up to you, you don’t run. You fight it off and make sure the blowback doesn’t injure the ones you love around you. I needed to handle this on my own so my baby and I could have a clean start.
Declan had been right to leave me behind. He’d been born in love, wrapped in it, secured by it. His family was the epitome of love.
I was born into a home where my mother worked diligently to provide for me and teach me that I could only rely on myself in the world. I longed for love and went looking for it, not knowing I was looking in all the wrong places.
I wouldn’t do that to my child. So I signed the divorce papers and went to sleep clutching them as I sobbed.
* * *
The next morning,I folded them up, slid my ring off, and opened the front door to go drop off the envelope. Instead, I found coffee on my doorstep, steaming hot like he’d just left it. My phone beeped.
Declan: Coffee’s there for you. Driver should be there soon too. Have a wonderful day at work. Won’t be there today.
Perfect, I thought, but then immediately my mind wondered where he would be even as I went to stash the envelop in his mailbox.
Maybe he wouldn’t see for days. Maybe I could plan where I would move to and pack up before we had to talk. Maybe he didn’t care to talk at all. Anastasia potentially could have smoothed all the waters.
His driver took me to work where I did yoga with the kids and then followed up with one-on-ones. I meandered over to Clara’s bakery after work and to let her know what I could. “I’m leaving in a little less than a month but I’d like us to keep in touch.”
“No you’re not,” she said in disbelief and then yelped in the kitchen. “Shit. Now I burned my hand.” She rounded the corner and made her way to my side of the bar so she could sit down next to me. “What’s going on?”
“I’m just done here. My time is up. I don’t think I ever really belonged here in the first place.”
“You’re insane. You’re the only real thing around here, and we can’t lose you. Noah is finally acting like a real human, and Wes finally has his ego in check. Dom almost got punched—which was a long time coming—and Declan…” She stopped and took my hands in hers. “He’ll be devastated without you.”
“He’s with your sister now.”
She wrinkled her nose. “Don’t remind me. She’s acting like they’re together but…” She got up and went to grab two brownies from the glass case next to the register as she narrowed her eyes and shook her head. “Something’s not right. Declan barely talks to her, doesn’t even look at her. Anastasia won’t even talk to me about their relationship and that means there probably is no real relationship to talk about. They’re supposed to go to dinner tonight and she thinks—”
“They’re going to dinner?”
Clara took a big bite of her brownie and offered me one. I snatched it because no one turned down her brownies, but I also needed an indulgence now more than ever. “It’s probably nothing,” Clara grumbled, but we both knew that wasn’t true. “Oh, Evie, don’t let it get to you. I know he loves you. He’s just…”
“He doesn’t love me.” I shook my head and closed my eyes while I took a big bite.
“Should we drink?” she tried.
