Page 76 of Enemy Ex's Secret Baby

“I did.”

“And yet you…you dangled her in front of me. For years,” Axel says.

“That wasn’t my intention,” I say. “You were going to be a part of my life regardless because of Lola. It was inevitable you would meet Stella, be around her…”

His brow furrows, eyes trembling. “Gillian, I came to see you in the hospital.”

I blink. I think I’ve blocked that out.

“I…held her. And I didn’t know. You didn’t tell me.”

Axel came with Lola and Jeremiah. I remember fear aching inside me when she told me she was dragging him along. I couldn’t fight it if I didn’t want to look suspicious. And neither could he. Now I understand she was trying to put the pieces together for me, right in front of my face. She knew all along and wanted to make sure the bond was created.

I remember how Lola passed her off to Axel. I looked away as long as I could, my heart pounding in my chest. But how could I not just see for a moment if the bond would be so strong he’d recognize her?

Back then, I thought he held her like an alien. Now I know he was just scared. She was so little. And despite that fear, I remember clearly how he smiled. “Last baby I held was you, Lola,” he said, cupping Stella’s hand in the palm of his hand. “And you immediately started crying.”

“Well, she’s doing a better job than me, huh?” Lola remarked.

Stella was indeed an angel in his arms. Like she knew. And though he only held her for a minute or so, it was enough.

“Axel, you didn’t even want to look at me. How could I have come to you to tell you that I was having your baby?”

His body bristles at the words. It’s probably still sinking in. “I would have stepped up.”

I nearly laugh. “No, you know that’s not true.”

“How could you say that?” Axel retorts, his voice inflamed with anger.

“Relax…” Lola says and brushes her hand down his arm.

Relax? Maybe he can, but there’s no way I can relax. I’m in flight or fight mode. “You don’t know what you have done, Axel. Hindsight isn’t–”

“I would have been there, Gillian. I would have been there for you and for–” His throat locks up. “I would have been there for her. The second I knew.”

While he’s so terribly emphatic, I know it wouldn’t have gone down like this. We’re much older now. So much has happened. He was twenty-five years old. It was a summer fling. He was about to step up at Hitchins. A baby added into the mix would have been the last thing he wanted. “I know for a fact you would have been scared out of your mind and –“

“Of course I would have been scared! But that’s–”

“Let her finish, Axel.”

Axel seals his lips together and falls back into his seat. For the first time, other than in the grips of passion, he looks messy. His hair is falling out of place, his suit looks rumpled. He looks so small. Like a little boy.

I take a deep breath. I’m getting tired of these revelations, but there’s another layer to this he doesn’t yet understand. “I thought about telling you. In fact, I was going to.”

“Why didn’t you?” Axel asks, voice nearly inaudible.

“Because…I heard you talking about your ex. And what she did to you. And I didn’t want to be that too.”

He frowns at first. He’s confused. He doesn’t even remember.

“I forget her name. Susie or…Sarah maybe.”

“Shelly,” he says, hit with a memory he hasn’t looked at in god knows how long, maybe years.

“Yeah.”

“She wasn’t my ex, she was just…a girl. That was, god, that was over a year before us, Gillian.”

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