Page 45 of Finding Fate

She combs her nail tips through the top of my hair, pressing her closed mouth against my lips over and over again. Then she smiles against me. “I guess it’s a good thing you got to me before he did then. You showed me love at an impressionable age. I believe in falling in love first and then getting married because you can’t live without them, not getting married because two people work socially and hope you fall in love to make your life a little happier. And the first time my husband lays in bed with another woman I’m going to kill one or both of them. It’s probably better for his life status if he actually loves me so he’ll stay faithful.”

I laugh. “You know I’d never cheat on you.”

She looks at me, her dark eyes so telling, taunting, and then she pulls me closer. “That’s because you’re just as fucking crazy and jealous as me. It tends to make us explosive. You’d kill my ass if I did it too.”

We smile at the same time. “No, I’d kill him and punish you. Killing you would be too permanent and that would hurt me as much as you being with someone else.”

She runs her fingertip between the waistband of my jeans and my pelvis, giving me chills. “I’m glad we’re on the same page. The only person that’s getting me forever is the one that deserves me. Stop trying to prove something you proved years ago. You took that spot when you were seventeen. I’m all booked up.”

I grip her jaw in my hand, rubbing my lips up and down hers, my heart pounding away at my chest. I don’t even understand the magnitude of my love for her. It’s too big. There’s always just been something about her that keeps me coming back for more. “Yeah you are. Love of my life, wife, mother of my kid—all of those badges you wear belong to me. Mine belong to you too.”

She tugs on my bottom lip. “You shouldn’t sweat my dad so hard. If you’d really stop and think, I’m just like him in ways, and so are you. You’ll never let me go. I’ll never let you go. He refuses to let me go. I’ve been running from him since graduation. I scare him. He knows I don’t need his money to survive. He wouldn’t be trying so hard if it wasn’t driven by fear. I’m the one thing that’s always been his that he can’t completely control. Now I’m not a kid anymore. His threats don’t hold the same merit they did when I was a minor, and he knows it. He lost his wife to another man and never remarried. What’s the one thing that stands between him and me?”

I gaze into her shining coffee-colored eyes so dark you can barely see where the pupil ends and the iris begins, thinking. “I threaten him?”

“The fact that you’ve never picked up on it makes me question how much you actually pay attention. Since my mom left it’s just been the two of us. Then I turn thirteen—literally the beginning of my teens—and meet a boy that alters my entire world. By fourteen his innocent little girl is in love with a high school senior and not so innocent anymore. I was supposed to be a virgin when I married, and certainly not doing it that young. He got mad about it. He reacted. He was left with a pregnant fourteen-year-old. The men my family would deem appropriate to have my hand wouldn’t want a child they didn’t create to come with the package. Most high school couples don’t make it. In his mind, adoption was the best option. We aren’t most couples. After you left, aside from him taking our son, things were relatively calm until . . .”

“We got back together.”

“Yes. You set off his crazy. You’re the only person that could take me from him.” She rolls her eyes, while I’m standing here wondering how the hell he would know we were even back together that night. Until now I was so caught up in everything I hadn’t given it any thought. “Which is stupid if you ask me. Maybe he has abandonment issues that run deep. He’ll never admit it if he does. When he figures out I can have a relationship with both my father and the love of my life, he’ll quit acting like a psycho. In the meantime, we enjoy being back together and wait for his next move.” She kisses me briefly, handing me my keys.

My mind is still processing all of the possibilities, like could he take her from me again? No one just randomly knows where someone is. Even if he had been waiting for me to come back home, how would he have known she’d been with me? Maybe he was tracking her phone or car. Neither of those things she has anymore, making me relax a little. She playfully shoves me back. “Now go, we have a birthday cake to pick up. It’s our son’s sixth birthday today.”

Oh yeah . . . That. I’d almost forgotten. Then the thought occurs to me that even though we’ll be celebrating it, someone else is going to be singing happy birthday toourson. They will get to celebrate it with him and watch him blow out the candles and eat the cake. And when he runs to hug Mom and Dad for the cool gifts, another couple is going to be the ones he runs to, taking the credit for his happiness. I wonder if they joke about who he looks like between the two of them as if their DNA created him.

I blow out. My mood is soured once again. But then Gabby fucking smiles at me, big and bright, her teeth showing, stopping my heart from beating. She’s beautiful. But with that one heart-stopping smile I’m reminded that she’s been carrying this weight alone, and it’s almost like she’s finally in peace. She deserves a break, so I’m going to force a smile and sing over a damn birthday cake for a son that will never know we did it, then shove spoonfuls of it in my mouth while my heart breaks that’s he’s not here, celebrating it with us—his real parents.

I turn around, letting her get on my back without prompting her. As soon as she’s latched onto me, I shut the door and grab the underside of her thighs, already making my way through the parking lot as the alarm sounds on my truck, securing it. She kisses my cheek and then places hers side by side with mine. “I love you. I’m so glad I don’t have to hide this anymore,” she says, driving the stake into my heart even more. I wish she’d never had to hide it at all. We would have been good parents.

“I love you to, Gab. Always will.”

Twenty-Seven

Gabby

Ilook through my basket full of every color fingernail polish a girl could imagine, deciding what I want to go with. Since I can’t leave this darn house to get my nails and toes painted, I’ve had to start ordering my own online, and since colors look different in a photo, I usually order many colors at one time.

Madden shoves his foot in my rib, which is something he does when he doesn’t like my position. It takes my breath away. I settle onPool Partyby China Glaze—a bright neon pink that makes any pair of hands and feet look fabulous. I should probably go with a more ‘fall appropriate’ color, but given that I’m fifteen and pregnant, this likely suits what any adult is going to think of me—immature.

I press down on my round belly beneath my rib, trying to move him. He kicks at my hand instead, sending me in a fully upright position to try and stretch my short torso. “You’re just like your daddy already. Stubborn with a temper.”

I waddle over to my bay window and slowly lower myself, pulling my leg on it to reach my feet. My belly is too big and being folded up this way is hard to breathe like he’s squished against my lungs. This isn’t going to work. I stand again, after finagling a little to push myself off with my hand. The doctor keeps saying she’s going to induce me if he doesn’t come in the next day or so. I’ve stalled as long as I can, trying to have more time with him.

I glance down past my protruding belly button at my feet that I can barely see. If I have to shove my legs up in the air for all to see, my toes are going to be painted dang it. I’m determined somehow to get down there. Forcing the bottom of my foot on the edge of the bay window seat, I try to somehow go at it from the side, but suddenly my panties feel wet.

Did I pee a little on myself again? Ugh! Gross. I toss down the unopened polish and walk to my panty drawer, the wet ones already being shoved down my legs just before reaching in to pull out a clean pair. When I open them and bend forward to step in one leg hole, a stream of something clear drizzles out of me like chocolate syrup off of a spoon. It reminds me of baby oil gel, like it’s somewhere in the middle of a liquid and true jelly. Every time I make a major movement more comes out, and each time it’s higher in volume. That can’t be pee.

The conversation I had with my doctor about signs of labor and explaining my water breaking comes back to me.No. I’m not ready.Dad will be pissed if my water breaks all over the floor since it’s carpet. Grabbing the top item out of my laundry hamper, I shove the bundle of fabric between my legs and reach for my phone, before hobbling out of my room into my bathroom to get in the bathtub.

The pinch of a cramp tightens in my abdomen, bringing my hand to the site of the pain on my belly. I breathe in and out, until finally, it subsides. I slowly lower to my knees. If I tell my dad, he’ll take me to the hospital. I’m not ready to go there. I don’t want to give him away. He’s mine and Maddox’s. I’ll just have to sit here and wait. Worst case, I can lay in a warm bath, or deliver him without any help and maybe Dad will be forced to let me keep him. I can do this.

Toes pressed against the back of the bathtub, I lean forward on my forearms over the ledge of the tub, phone in hand as I stare down at our picture on the screen from the day he left. I could call him, and if Dad asks, I can tell him I dialed Maddox’s number out of habit tying to call him. I just want to hear his voice. I want to know he’s okay. I want to know if he still misses me after this much time. I want him here with me. He deserves to know. We should get to keep him together.

Tears sting my eyes, fear of getting Maddox arrested running rampant through my mind. I can’t do that to him. He doesn’t deserve it. A sharp cramp like something balling up inside me brings them forward, spilling from my eyes. I grit and yell through it. It hurts. God, it hurts. I’ve never felt this kind of pain. I’m scared.

It finally relaxes. I lay my forehead on the fiberglass, spreading my legs wider, trying to catch my breath for the next one. Amniotic fluid is constantly draining out of me. I was expecting it to be like dumping a bucket of water one time. Another contraction starts. I cry harder, wanting the pain to go away. I don’t want to do this alone.

I place my hand on my belly, forcing myself to withstand the heavy cramping that feels more like someone twisting my guts around. I’m starting to sweat. I move into a frog stance when my knees start hurting. “I’m so sorry,” I whisper, even though no one can hear me. “I hate keeping a secret from you. Please don’t hate me if you ever find out what I did. I love you so much, Maddox. I wish we could be a family.”

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