Nobody Knows

by Vale, Lani Lynn

  As for your question—who says that you can’t do it yourself?

  Well, you’re right.

  So I went ahead and did it.

  I turkey basted myself with someone’s frozen sperm.

  Now I’m losing my shit.

  And if you were serious about texting, I’m down.

  I’ll put my number on the back of this card.

  Love,

  Sierra

  • • •

  Present day

  I licked my lips and smoothed my shirt down over my belly.

  I wasn’t showing yet, but just knowing made me more than aware of what I’d done.

  Steeling myself for my parents’ reaction to my news, I pushed my way into the house that I’d grown up in, unsurprised to hear my brother and my father bickering the moment I entered.

  “Hey, honey.” My mother smiled. “Where’s Mark?”

  I bit my lip.

  I hadn’t told them that I’d broken up with Mark.

  In fact, it’d been a while now since I had and it was getting to the point that I was starting to feel deceitful.

  “Umm,” I hesitated. “Mark and I broke up. Where’s Blue?”

  My mother stopped in the middle of the kitchen with a pot halfway suspended over the stove.

  “She’s at Perry’s. And you what?” she asked in surprise.

  “Why’d you go and do that?” Sammy asked.

  I glared at Sammy.

  “Because he doesn’t want kids,” I said as if that was answer enough.

  I wasn’t sure what my family’s obsession was with Mark.

  He was, by far, my family’s favorite of the men I’d ever dated. Though, I’d seen the false act that Mark always put on when it came to my family.

  He wasn’t the same around them, and I’d always been amused by it.

  Now, not so much.

  “Oh,” my brother said. “That sucks.”

  “Are you sure he doesn’t want kids?” Dad asked from his spot on the couch. “Maybe he was just scared?”

  No, it wasn’t just that.

  “Mark doesn’t want kids, ever,” I said. “In fact, he doesn’t want kids enough that when I told him that I did, he broke up with me and said that if I ever changed my mind about not wanting them, he’d be waiting.”

  Dad just shook his head. “That sucks,” he admitted.

  It did.

  But it was also very enlightening.

  Him being so adamant about not wanting kids had made me wake up and realize that there were more things about Mark that I didn’t like.

  Such as his constant bitching about my car—I had a lifted Jeep Wrangler.

  His incessant need to always be right—God forbid you ever correct him.

  His inability to sleep over at my place because he was literally disgusted by the location—I lived in the middle of the city, in the part of town that didn’t have much life left in it.

  But the rent was cheap, and my place was decent.

  Yet, despite all of that, he didn’t want to have anything to do with my place.

  Apparently he just ‘wasn’t cut out for the roughing-it life.’

  And God forbid you ever ask him to go on a walk.

  I’d once asked him if he would, and the man had flat out refused, citing that there were probably gang bangers in the shadows, and he wasn’t cut out for protecting me.

  I’d have to protect myself.

  Yes, he’d literally said that. Those had been the exact words that had come out of his mouth.

  But, that hadn’t been the thing that broke the camel’s back.

  Him not wanting a baby with me, to the point where he got wigged out even thinking about it, had been the final tipping point.

  I swallowed hard and steeled myself before walking farther into the kitchen.

  Today was the last dinner we’d have before they went on vacation—again—to Ireland this time.

  “Hi, Hastings.” I smiled at my sister-in-law. “How are you?”

  She patted her belly with a smile. “I’m good. How about you?”

  Now or never.

  “I’m pregnant,” I announced to the room.

  My father’s head whipped around so fast that I thought it might spin off.

  “You’re what?” Sammy bellowed.

  I winced and looked at his wife, Hastings, who had a small smile on her face.

  She’d known, of course.

  As had my best friends.

  Reggie and Amelia were extremely aware of everything that I’d done to get into my current state.

  As well as my pen pal, now texting buddy.

  He’d actually been super, duper supportive.

  Which was what I’d always craved from someone—i.e. Mark.

  I licked my lips nervously and made sure that I had everyone’s attention.

  I did.

  The only person in the room that didn’t look stunned by the news was my sister-in-law.

  “I’m pregnant,” I repeated.

  My father opened and closed his mouth.

  “And you’re still breaking up with Mark?” my father barked.

  “I…” I started.

  “How could you let this happen?” my mother croaked. “You just got your dream job, Sierra. It’s not like they’re going to wait for you to have a baby. Not to mention you’re a single woman… how do you think that you’re going to do this by yourself?”

  “It’s not with Mark,” I blurted.

  Sammy had to chime in then.

  “So you’re telling me that the man that you just broke up with… it’s not his child?” Sammy asked. “Whose child is it?”

  Hastings patted Sammy on the forearm.

  “Sammy,” she said softly, gently reprimanding him while also trying to calm him down.

  I winced. “I don’t… know.”

  Okay, well, I could’ve led in with something more… appropriate.

  I probably should have.

  Yet, I hadn’t quite thought about how it would sound.

  I mean, I didn’t technically know whose kid I was having.

  I mean, other than the obvious, my kid.

  I knew that it was donor number 38883. I knew that he had dark hair, hazel eyes that changed from gray to blue to brown depending on the light, an Italian background, and had an IQ one step under Albert Fucking Einstein.

  But I didn’t know his name.

  “How do you not know?” my father growled. “Who doesn’t know who they sleep with?”

  I opened my mouth to tell them everything, starting with how and why I’d done this the way I did it, but Sammy started laughing.

  “This is just rich.” Sammy laughed. “I told you that you were going to step in it, didn’t I? Mark was a good guy.”

  Mark was a good guy.

  Honestly, I’d always liked Mark.

  The only problem was that Mark liked Mark better than he liked me.

  I narrowed my eyes.

  “I didn’t cheat on him,” I said. “Mark and I were well and truly broken up with each other for a month before this even happened.”

  Before I’d gotten the courage to do what I wanted and taken the bull by the horns, so to speak.

  “Well, obviously this isn’t going to be something he’ll ever get over.” He shook his head. “A child by another man? What, were you trying to drive him away permanently?”

  That had my back stiffening. “Listen here, asshole. What Mark and I do and don’t do is up to us. Mark isn’t even a part of me anymore. Now, I think it’s time for you to…”

  “Sierra,” Mom pinched the bridge of her nose. “I think you need to just go for a little bit. Give me some time to get my head wrapped around this.”

  I took one look at my mother, then my father, followed by my brother and realized that this hadn’t gone the way that I’d planned it.

  And instead of clearing all the stuff up that I could’ve cleared up rather easily, I gritted my teeth and turned around, walking out o
f my parents’ house.

  By the time I got to my car, I was a powder keg of emotions.

  Instead of losing my cool completely, I texted Gabriel.

  He answered immediately.

  Sierra: That didn’t go well at all. Even my mother is mad at me.

  Gabriel: It’ll all work out. I promise.

  Sierra: I don’t think that is the case this time. They told me to leave.

  Gabriel: They’ll come around. It’s a shock.

  Sierra: It was a shock, but they looked at me like they didn’t know me at all. What the hell? Even my brother lost his shit. And he never loses his shit when it comes to me.

  Gabriel: They’ll come around.

  I rolled my eyes at his repeated use of ‘they’ll come around.’

  Sierra: They didn’t even allow me to tell them that I was artificially inseminated. They pretty much called me a slut and yelled at me for not being more careful. They think that I’m a loose goose, Gabby.

  Gabriel: Actually, I’d love it if you stopped calling me Gabby. Every time I read it, it comes out like the girl name. Not what you’re intending. Gabe—eee. Just sayin’. And, if it makes you feel better, we can be pretend boyfriend and girlfriend. Tell them that I loved you and left you, and you had no clue I was such a loser.

  Sierra: They assumed that it was Mark’s. And I don’t want them to think that you’re a bad person. I will borrow you as the baby daddy, though. They’d understand it more if I told them I borrowed a friend’s sperm and not some random Joe’s off a sperm bank.

  Little did I know that our little agreement would turn into something a lot bigger than either one of us suspected.

  CHAPTER 4

  CSI: Can’t stand idiots.

  -Malachi’s secret thoughts

  MALACHI

  Gabriel,

  Today is my 18th birthday.

  Want to know how I’m spending it?

  At work.

  I got a job at the Taco Bell near my house.

  I have to tell you, I am totally enlightened.

  Also, did you know that the Taco Bell bathrooms have to be cleaned five times a day?

  There really is a schedule… and the saying is true. Taco Hell.

  If I had to take a gander, I would say that the chances of making it home to use the bathroom are fifty-fifty.

  Like literally, no joke.

  If Taco Bell was this bad on your bowels, why do they eat it?

  There’s one guy that gets it religiously on his way home. He picks up four chicken quesadillas, two regular tacos, and a bowl of beans. He NEVER makes it home. He always eats in his car, then comes in and uses our bathroom.

  Honestly, if he’d just wait to get home…

  Anyway, today’s bathroom cleaner is me. I’m so excited.

  Also, you might want to wash your hands after you read this letter.

  LOL,

  Sierra

  • • •

  “Put your hands on your head and step away from the car,” I ordered the kid.

  The kid looked at me like he knew he could outrun me.

  He couldn’t.

  But he looked at me like the teenager he was, and I knew the moment he’d made up his mind.

  Between one breath and the next, his body was tensing.

  I sighed. “Don’t do it.”

  The kid didn’t listen.

  He took off instead.

  With two running leaps and a bound, he was over the guardrail that prevents crossovers from oncoming traffic.

  I followed at a much more sedate pace, calling in the pursuit on my mic.

  “Kid!” I called. “Come back!”

  “Suspect is running south on Fuller Street away from the high school,” I said as I watched the kid throw something from his pocket into the nearest bush. “He just tossed a white plastic bag away in the bushes in front of Super 1 Foods.”

  “10-4,” the dispatcher said. “I’ll send someone to that location.”

  I didn’t bother responding, just kept running after the kid, wondering how far he would go.

  He turned the corner of the grocery store and ran into a dead end.

  I knew it.

  He didn’t.

  So I slowed down and came around the corner at a much more sedate pace than the kid had.

  Seconds after I turned the corner, the kid was turning around and heading my way.

  I braced myself for catching him and the kid bellowed in frustration when he realized he wasn’t going to get anywhere.

  “Fuck!” he cried out in anger.

  That’s when I saw that he was going to try to go at me.

  He hit me with the force of a battering ram.

  I fell into the blow, curled my body, and landed with him underneath me and me straddling his hips.

  I had him pinned to the ground and his hands behind his back in two seconds flat.

  “You have the right to remain silent…” I said through gritted teeth as anger started to flow through me.

  “I’m fourteen!” he cried out.

  Fourteen or twenty, you act like an adult, you get to be an adult.

  “Anything you say or do…”

  “I’m going to have my father sue you!” he continued.

  I continued reading him his Miranda rights. Only when I was done did I get off of the kid and start marching him back toward where my cruiser was.

  “You need help?” Saint asked as he rounded the building and entered the alley that I was just about to exit.

  He had his new police K-9, Smoke, on a leash and in front of him.

  Smoke growled at the kid when he tried to kick him.

  “If you wouldn’t mind putting him in your cruiser so I don’t have to frog march him all the way back to mine…” I tried to sound less angry than I felt, but it was hard.

  The kid had really pissed me off.

  Then again, it didn’t take much to really piss me off.

  I was hanging on by a thread and needed the kid gone—the sooner the better.

  “Sure thing.” Saint grinned. “He can sit next to Smoke in the back.”

  I snickered because that sounded like the best idea ever.

  • • •

  The last thing I wanted to do was talk to my superior after the day I’d had.

  But that was what I got to do when I started to head toward the back exit of the station.

  “Gnocchi!”

  My eye twitched at the harsh call of my name.

  Son of a bitch.

  “Yeah?” I called back, hands clenching into fists.

  “My office.”

  The twitch got worse.

  I didn’t ignore him, though. Instead, I headed into the office despite getting several ‘uh-ohs’ or ‘someone’s in trouble’ from the men of the SWAT team behind me.

  “Listen, Gnocchi,” the SWAT team leader, Bennett, said as I entered the office that he shared with Foster, our other team leader. “I’m not saying that I wouldn’t have done the same thing that you did today. But, as it is, this is the fourth such incident. If it happens again, I may not be able to protect you from the consequences.”

  I frowned. “I did nothing.”

  “We got a complaint that you roughed the kid up,” Bennett said, studying my face.

  Okay, so maybe I’d roughed up a few individuals lately, but I hadn’t fucking touched that kid.

  “I didn’t touch that kid,” I said stiffly.

  “But you can see why the accusation stuck?” he asked. “You have roughed up others lately.”

  I had.

  But they’d deserved it.

  Could I have handled things differently? Yes. But every single one of the assholes that I’d roughed up lately had deserved what they’d gotten and more.

  “The Chief wants to see you in his office before you go.” Bennett sighed. “To talk about what happened today.”

  I narrowed my eyes.

  “The kid you arrested was the ex-mayor’s kid. He’s all butthurt be
cause he lost. So he’s out for blood,” Bennett said. “Fuckin’ sucks, man. But Luke needs to talk to you and get the stories straight.”

  Fast forward five minutes later, and I found myself in the chief of police’s office with the door shut.

  “Last chance, kid,” Luke Roberts said, hard eyes on me. “I know that you’re pissed. I’m pissed, too. But there are other ways to handle your anger when dealing with a criminal. One day things are going to get out of hand and you’re not going to be able to stop it.”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t fucking touch that kid. Not anything that any other man wouldn’t have done. I caught him, took him down to the ground, and cuffed him. All the while he resisted. I handled it just like any other cop on this force would do.”

  “Even if that’s true,” Roberts said. “The ex-mayor has connections, and he knows that you’ve had a few complaints lodged against you lately from other people. This one isn’t going to be swept under the rug.”

  And that just fucking pissed me off beyond belief.

  Son of a bitch.

  “Did y’all find the drugs that he tossed?” I questioned.

  Luke nodded. “The kid claims that they weren’t his. That he found them and picked them up right before you started to ‘harass him for no reason.’”

  I looked at Luke drolly. “Oh yeah?”

  Luke’s lips twitched. “I have no love lost for Harrison George. He’s a piece of shit who thinks that his way is the best way when his way makes no fucking sense. But he’s a smart man besides his lack of knowledge when it comes to the government. He’s also got a lot of connections—which won him his place as mayor despite his ignorance. Unfortunately, this time, I’m not sure you’re going to win.”

  Well, wasn’t that just a kick in the ass?

  Not like it mattered, though.

  Even if I was let go from this job that was somehow keeping me from going too far into the dark, I wouldn’t mourn it.

  I honestly didn’t fucking care.

  And I was caring less and less by the fucking day.

  When I got home a couple minutes later, I was unsurprised to find my grandmother on my front porch, rocking away.

  For the first time all day, I had a genuine smile on my face.

  “Grans,” I said softly. “What are you doing here?”

  Grans looked at me with a sad expression on her face.