22. Raleigh

CHAPTER 22

Raleigh

There’s no point in hiding anything now, I guess. Shaking, still nauseous, I force myself to my feet. Force myself to meet Derrick’s furious blue eyes.

It’s the most terrifying thing I think I’ve ever done. Telling this man, the potential father of my baby, the truth? Suddenly I realize that this is what I was actually planning to run from all along.

Not Thomas’s disappointment in me or my own humiliation, but this. Derrick, and the undeniable connection between us.

“I only just realized I might be pregnant… like yesterday,” I rasp, my throat raw, voice barely above a whisper. “When I threw up at your place… it hit me. I haven’t taken a test yet.

If I am… it’s… it can’t be anyone else’s.”

Derrick takes a step back, another step back since he first guessed the meaning of my silence, absorbing that admission. That he was my first and there was no one else after. His jaw is so tight I imagine I can hear his teeth grinding.

I take a quick breath and force the rest out, like I’m pulling out a giant splinter. “I met with Silver because I thought I could tell him to back off, and if he didn’t, I’d find some way to kill him. I told you the truth about that. But now more than ever, I really wanted to clean up all the messes I caused my brother, my family, before I leave.” I swallow. “You were originally one of those. If I could find evidence of your involvement with the Speares or the bribes you took and leak them to the media-.”

His head snaps up. “I’m sorry, what ?” he demands.

I open my mouth to repeat myself, but he’s not talking about my ill-laid and abandoned plans for him. “You were just going to leave? Where the fuck were you even going to go?”

“What the fuck else was I supposed to do?” I burst out. “Tell you I’m pregnant and expect you to just take me in with open arms and we live happily ever after?! If I stayed on the estate I’d be infamous forever for having a baby with my brother’s enemy. If I stayed with you- well, I couldn’t stay with you !”

Derrick sucks in a sharp breath at that, but I don’t let him ask why not.

“So yeah, I’m leaving!” I barrel on. “I’m going to Italy, or Switzerland, or literally anywhere but here! In fact, I think now’s an excellent time for us to part ways.” My throat is burning, and it’s not just from puking. I’m screaming like a mad woman on the side of the road, and I don’t even care. “You can drive me to the airport, and I’ll catch the first flight out, and neither of us will have to see each other’s stupid faces ever again!”

Derrick is quiet for a long time. His eyes are colder than they’ve ever been, and there’s a muscle jumping in his jaw. He’s not bothering to disguise his rage.

I don’t blame him, but I also don’t care . It’s way past time for me to fucking go. In fact, I should’ve left yesterday. All this bullshit I told myself about cleaning up my own messes has only made things worse. I provoked Silver, I got myself caught by Derrick, I lost my head in his arms, and couldn’t even hide my dreams of fleeing the country with a potential baby growing inside me. I’ve been a fool, failed in every way possible.

All that’s left for me is to run. I can’t undo my mistakes or take down Silver, but I can still do what’s best for my baby. The only way to give this child a safe, worry-free life is to leave. It’s the one thing I can control. Thomas will come around eventually, I hope. Derrick is a different story. But no matter what, this baby will be safe and happy- even if it means leaving behind everything I’ve ever known.

Finally, Derrick takes a step toward me. His voice shakes with repressed rage when he speaks. “If you think I’m letting you take off with no plan and the chance that my baby’s inside you, you’re more insane than I ever imagined Raleigh Warwick.”

My whole body shivers. My baby . The words are like a plucked string in my gut. I have to force myself to ignore the hum of it.

“I’m way more insane than that,” I spit. “I’m leaving, Derrick. I don’t care if you don’t like it. If there’s a baby, it’ll have nothing to do with you-”

He crosses the rest of the distance between us in three angry strides. “ Nothing to do with me ?!” he demands. He’s still not shouting, but the throbbing vein in his temple tells me it’s taking all his control not to. “How the fuck can you say that? How the fuck can you just decide without saying a goddamn word to me that a baby that wouldn’t exist without me has nothing to do with me? You’d rather fly around the world with no plan than ask me what the hell I think?”

“Yeah, that’s right. Because I don’t give a shit what you think!”

“Well bad news, Raleigh,” Derrick snarls. “I’m your only set of wheels, and I’ll be dead before I take you to the fucking airport so you can fly off to fucking nowhere if you’re carrying my baby -”

My baby, my baby, my baby

“It’s not your decision!” I scream. “It’s your accident, Derrick. You didn’t plan for this! You didn’t ask for it. And you don't get to control what happens next. This is my choice- my body, my life, my future.”

“Then let me have a choice-”

“ No .”

That one word drops between us like a wall. Derrick lifts his chin, staring down at me with eyes that are totally empty. With a jolt, I realize he’s replaced his mask, the one he wears for everyone but me.

I don’t care. I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t .

“You want to tell me what I did to you to make you hate me this much?” he asks, slowly and evenly.

Nothing. He did nothing but hold me close, speak kindly to me, make me feel safe and heard, and fill my world with a life I never expected. Both in my heart and, hopefully, inside my belly.

“You double-crossed my family,” I say, just as evenly.

The corner of Derrick’s mouth quirks. It’s the most bitter disbelief I’ve ever seen, and it’s gone in the blink of an eye.

“The family you don’t even want to go home to?” he presses. “The one you’re not even willing to confide in about your possible pregnancy? Weird that you still hold their grudges for them. I’d understand if you wanted me to take you back to them. Hell, I probably would too, if you asked. But you’d rather burn every last bridge and be totally alone than go back there or stay with me-”

“ Shut up .”

He does, but it doesn’t feel like a victory. It feels like pity.

After a moment of silence, he says, “I’m going to clean the glass out of the car, then we can get back on the road.”

“ You can. I’ll walk back if you won’t drive me,” I tell him.

Wordlessly, Derrick reaches for his belt and pulls out a pair of handcuffs.

It feels like a slap when he holds them up in warning, because the last time I wore them, I’d voluntarily shackled myself to him.

To prove… I wouldn’t run off again.

I want to scream, but my throat closes. I want to cry, but I’m so, so tired. I turn my back to him, because it’s all I can do, but I don’t walk away.

Where the fuck would I go, even if I could?

I hear Derrick open the back door of the cruiser behind me, and Chance and Justice leap out for some much needed stretching and peeing on the curb, but they’re smart enough to stick close to the car and not wander into the road. After a moment, I sit in the grass, not caring that it’s still cold and wet with dew, and stare blankly down the empty highway.

I just want to disappear. I want to be anywhere but here.

A dog’s nose snuffles at the back of my hair, but I don’t bother to smack it away. The other dog wanders over to Derrick to inspect what he’s doing. Against my will, I watch Derrick pet him unconsciously while he swipes glass out of the seats with a balled-up towel. With quiet, patient commands he tells the dog to sit out of the way, then pets his ears again when he obeys. The dog nuzzles Derrick’s hand with obvious love, then looks right at me. As if to show me what I’m missing out on.

How can someone so warm and protective also be a slimy politician? Is this change in him something that happened because of my brother’s punishment, or has he just started to show me something that’s always been there?

I don’t care, I don’t care, I don’t care .

Derrick orders the dog away from him so he can shake the glass firmly out of the towel, then throws it into the trunk of the cruiser. He grabs their water bottles and food, letting them each get a sloppy drink and a treat, then opens the back door for them so they can get settled again.

When he finally looks up at me, I catch something in his gaze before the mask comes up again.

Hurt? Disappointment? I don’t know. I don’t care .

“Time to go,” he says, opening the passenger door for me.

I think about fighting, about saying fuck it to everything and just running. But there’s nowhere left for me to go and no one here I can lie to anymore. I get to my feet and slip wordlessly past him into the car.

Derrick pulls into the nearest gas station and pauses for a moment before heading inside. When he returns, he’s holding a small, unassuming bag. “I picked up a pregnancy test. We should find out for sure before jumping to any more conclusions.”

I glance at the bag and nod. “Fine,” I say, taking it from him and heading inside to use the restroom.

When I climb back into the car, Derrick’s eyes are on me with a mixture of impatience and concern. I hand him the two test sticks. “I used both, just to be extra sure.”

He examines them and asks. “So, two lines mean positive?”

“Yep.”

Derrick places the sticks in the center console, a slight smile tugging at his lips as he shifts the car into reverse and we’re off… to meet his mom… the baby’s grandma.

We make the rest of the drive in silence.