My shoulders dropped, and I unknowingly curled tighter around the innocent child I held.
“Excuse me, what? I’m not worth it?” I asked, seething. I was always the good little girlfriend. Went along with just about anything he wanted to do. That was partially due to my desire to be wanted and also because I was normally a pretty easygoing person.
Most of the time.
But he’d just pushed me past acquiescing.
My whole body shook, but when I spoke, it was with a vicious-edged calm. “So if I told you I was pregnant, what then? Would you tell me to get rid of it?”
“That’s different, and you fucking know it,” he growled.
“Then, if I took her back, I could go off birth control and we could have a baby?” I asked, forcing him to answer honestly.
He froze, his jaw twitching. “I’m not ready for that.”
“And I’m not ready for this,” I hissed. “But guess what? Life doesn’t always make you ready for things.”
“I love you, baby, but this—” he waved his hand at the baby in my arms “—isn’t happening. Not with me. I’m not staying.”
A harsh laugh left me. “You fucking selfish bastard. You love me?” I scoffed and rolled my eyes. We were finally at the pinnacle of what had been building under the surface for a long time. “I’m sure you haven’t even kept it in your pants the last four months.”
We hadn’t had sex in longer than that, which made me wonder—if he wasn’t getting it with me, who was he getting it from? By the pink mark on his neck, it was his coworker, Jennifer. I’d watched them flirting at the holiday party his work had the year before. He denied it then, but things had definitely cooled off between us after that.
“I’m selfish? You didn’t even talk to me about this. And you don’t know what you’re talking about as far as my fucking dick is concerned.”
“Would it have changed anything?” I asked, my teeth gritted.
“It still would have been fucking no.”
Again, there it was. The truth. We’d become too comfortable, and our relationship was stagnant. No longer growing or evolving.
It was still difficult to process that it had come to this. That he wanted to throw our relationship away because of a baby. Though I knew that wasn’t true. We’d been building to this, but he was too much of a fucking coward to break up. The baby was an excuse he was taking full advantage of.
“Then I think it’s time for you to go,” I said through clenched teeth.
“You’re making a mistake, picking that over me,” he sneered.
Another harsh laugh escaped. “I think my mistake was thinking we ever had a future.”
He stood there fuming before he turned and stormed into the bedroom. After quickly packing a suitcase, he hit up the bathroom, then came back into the room and picked up his laptop. I never moved from where I was standing as my relationship crumbled around my feet.
“I’ll be back for the rest,” he said as he walked to the door and threw on his coat. He turned back and stared at me. “Last chance.”
My eyes locked with his. “Get out.”
He turned and walked out, the door slamming behind him. As soon as he was gone, I let loose a sob as the silence soaked in.
The baby started to cry with me, and I pulled her close and pressed my lips to her forehead.
“It’s okay,” I whispered to the tiny baby in my arms as tears slipped down my cheeks. “We don’t need him. We’ll be okay.”
Pete’s decision hurt. Badly. Regardless of whether I held part of myself back from him or not, we’d spent so many years together. His response to the precious newborn was the last straw. It forced us both to see our relationship for what it had become.
I should have known I couldn’t trust him. Looking back at our relationship, I knew he’d let me down in so many ways—from failing to pick me up after I had my wisdom teeth removed, to small things like using all the towels and not washing them.
None of that mattered now.
Still, I mourned the loss.
It was going to be hard, but once I had her in my arms, I knew I was never letting her go.
10 months later…
“Craaaap,” I whined as I glanced at my watch—late again.
I was still wiping formula spit-up off my shirt as I stepped onto the elevator. Why did I decide to wear white today? After only three or four hours of inconsistent sleep, I was lucky to be standing.
Thank you, espresso machine.
Kinsey had kept me up half the night—more teething, but hopefully it was the last of it for a while.
When I took on the guardianship of my niece, it was sink or swim. This was a sink kind of day, and to top it off, it was Monday.
It could only get better, right?
Oh, the lies I told myself. Even as I thought about it, I laughed.
It was fifteen minutes after eight when I flew out of the elevator toward my desk. I flashed a glance at Matt’s office as I ran by, but he wasn’t there.
Shit.
The moment I hit my cube, my bag was on the ground and I was waking my computer up.
“Late again, I see,” Matt said from behind me.
I jumped and cursed as I turned to look at my boss. “I’m sorry.”
He waved me off. “You know the drill by now.”
I nodded and smiled at him. “Short lunch for me today!”
I had an arrangement due to my situation—as long as I got my hours in each day, I was good. However, that often led to working through my lunch breaks.
“Maybe I could use you later to pick up my lunch for me?”
I nodded and let out a sigh of relief. Maybe the day wouldn’t be so bad after all.
Picking up Matt’s lunch wasn’t a punishment like many in the office thought it was. I wasn’t reduced to acting assistant or anything. In fact, my boss was one of the few people who knew why I was often late, even if it was only a few minutes most of the time.
By picking up his lunch, it ensured that I would also get a meal, but purchased on company time, not using my extremely limited break for lunch. It was a break I was bound to work through anyway.
“Thanks.”
He tapped his hand on the top of my cube wall. “Don’t forget to get that new social media pitch in today.”
“You’ll have it this afternoon.”
For two years I’d worked at Donovan Trading and Investment in the marketing department. It was a great company, and I actually loved my job. It helped that the owner happened to be a friend. I’d met James Donovan and his wife, Lizzie, a few years prior in the emergency room—me with my sister and them with their daughter, Bailey.
We’d struck up conversation that turned into a great friendship—one of the few that survived the last ten months.
It was due to our friendship that I’d learned about the opening in the marketing department. While it was my friend’s company, the only help I received was the link to submit my resume.
Lizzie was my rock those first few months with Kinsey, as she had a six-month-old at the time. I couldn’t thank her enough for helping to keep me sane.
My pitch was ninety-five percent complete, and I spent the next few hours combing over it, fine-tuning my ideas.