And it moved.
Fuck.
My eyes shot to hers. “What is this?”
She wiped her forehead with weariness, but her gaze was just as evil, just as cruel. “It’s yours.”
A small mewl sounded, ripping my eyes down and shooting me with dread.
No...
With sick urgency, I brushed aside the peach fleece and stared at the downy head of a newborn. I almost dropped it in my rush to give it back. “Take it.”
Tallup shook her head. “I don’t want it. I never wanted it.” She laughed, a little crazed. “I was on the pill. This wasn’t supposed to happen.”
“You’re saying it’s mine?”
“That’s what I said, didn’t I?”
I gulped for air. “But that was months—”
“Nine months this week. It was premature. Eight days early. Guess it knew it wasn’t wanted.”
I turned stone cold. “How do I know it’s mine?”
“Because I say it is.” Her voice darkened. “It’s yours.”
“I don’t want a kid.”
“Neither do I.”
“What do you expect me to do with a baby?” I narrowed my eyes at the blackened street. No neighbours spied. No one heard our dark conversation.
“I don’t care.” She shrugged. “I honestly don’t care if you kill it.”
“If you care so little for its life, why didn’t you end it when—”
Her eyes snapped to mine. “I tried, believe me. I went to the clinic. I filled in the forms. I waited for a doctor to suck that nuisance straight out of me.”
I couldn’t hate her more than I did. A cold, oozing, insidious hate.
Her voice turned brittle. “I almost went through with it. but...I was raised better. We’re Christian. Abortion is a sin.”
I laughed out loud. I couldn’t contain it. “And raping a student isn’t?”
She stiffened. “I vividly remember you enjoying having your cock inside me.”
“I vomited after each assault. Did that not hint that I couldn’t stand you?”
Her face etched with fire. “You came.” Her lips twisted into a nasty smile. “If you didn’t, that thing wouldn’t exist.”
“That wasn’t pleasure, you bitch. I came because you force-fed me Viagra—”
“I don’t have time for childish nonsense.” She looked at the starless sky, then back at the peach blanket forced upon me. “Just because I couldn’t kill it doesn’t mean I want it. I hate children. And the past week has proven just how much I loathe everything about them.”
Instinctual protectiveness made my arm latch tight as if her words were spears. “Adopt it out then.”
She rolled her eyes. “That would lead to questions about who the father is.” Chilly calculation filled her face. “Do you want people to know it’s yours, Gilbert? Do you want me to tell them you forced yourself on me and this is the result?”
I shook with rage. “You forced yourself on me.”
“Yes, but who would they believe? Have you grown up so much you’re willing to put your life on the line to prove...what? That this baby isn’t yours? Because I promise you, a paternity test will undeniably show that it is.”
My mouth went dry as the baby squirmed and cooed. It didn’t know its very existence was being argued against. It didn’t know it wasn’t wanted.
Sadness filled me. Sadness for the life born from hate. A life that should never have been created.
“If you don’t take it, I’ll drop it off at the shelter. It can disappear into foster care. Maybe end up in a situation like yours—”
My blood ran cold. “You’d never do such a thing.”
How could she? She was a teacher, for Christ’s sake.
I clutched the blankets closer. “You teach kids for a living. Why can’t you love your own?”
She smiled tightly. “It’s because I teach that I don’t want my own. I only teach because my mother was a teacher, and that was what was expected. I don’t do it because I enjoy it. I’ve hated it since the moment I started.”
I forced my anger to subside, doing my best...for our kid’s sake. “This is yours as much as mine. Stop being such a cold-hearted witch. I know you could love—”
“Shut up, Gilbert. I’m not keeping her.”
“Her?”
My insides bottomed out.
My world changed.
My priorities shifted.
Her.
A girl.
I have a daughter.
I grew up in an instant.
I was no longer a boy, but a man.
A father.
A father who would never be like his own. Never be a parent who didn’t put their life on the line to protect his child.
I cuddled her close. So damn close.
Already in love with her and I hadn’t even seen her face.
How was it possible to fall so fast? How could my heart abandon Olin and replace it with a newborn so quickly?
I didn’t know how, only that it’d happened, and there was no going back.
Tallup didn’t notice the change that’d happened in me. She nodded stiffly, glowering at my daughter. “It’s a girl. A useless, loud, horrible little—”
“A perfect, brilliant little girl and you’re throwing her away.” I shook my head in disgust. I thought I hated this woman for what she’d done to me. I’d had daydreams of murdering her with my bare hands. I’d envisioned going to the police and having them on my side. Of explaining to O. Of winning her back and making my life right again.
But that hate was nothing, nothing, compared to my level of contempt now. I couldn’t look at her without wanting to strike her. I couldn’t stand her face, her smell, her soul. My voice vibrated with arctic snow as I looked down at the woman who didn’t deserve to live. “Who the fuck are you?”
She sniffed and braced her shoulders. “I just want my life back.”
I laughed darkly. “So do I.”
“Oh, come on. You’re still sore over losing Olin? She’s a nobody.”
“Don’t call her that.”
“I can call her whatever I want. I’ve accepted a job in Japan teaching English, now that this little...inconvenience is out of the way.” She grinned. “My life will be my own again. But I’ll still know if you’ve been naughty. You better not have been talking to her while I’ve been gone, Gilbert. Otherwise—”
“Stop.”
This.
All of this.
It was stupid, pointless, juvenile.
Who cared about power trips and forced assaults and teenage hearts that were broken?
Who cared about right and wrong and justice?
The world didn’t care.
Justice didn’t care.
And I didn’t care.
Not anymore.
The only thing I cared about was ensuring my daughter never had to suffer such things. She might’ve been born to a ruthless mother and a gullible father, but she wouldn’t pay for my sins.
She deserved an empire.
She deserved stability and family.
Family.
O was once my family.
She always would be.
I would always love and care for her.