A Gorgeous Villain

by Saffron A Kent

  His jaw clenches then, as he stares at me and slowly stands up, his bar stool screeching against the floor. Again slowly, he puts his hands on the island, his fingers splayed out, his veins standing taut. As if he’s using the island to keep his balance.

  As if his body is trembling as badly as mine.

  “Tell me,” he says in a low voice, the muscles of his shoulders stark in his white t-shirt. “Give me the words.”

  I wanted to tell him a week ago when he asked me at the bar. But I’m glad I didn’t because I had nothing figured out then. I have a plan now and he’s a very important part of it.

  And so I’ve thought about him a lot.

  I’ve thought about what’s going to happen between me and him, between us.

  But like he said that night, there’s no us.

  There will never be.

  That’s why everything happened and that’s why we’re here. So I’ve decided that I’ll give him a choice. And he’s going to decide what he wants.

  I cradle my stomach and watch his chest move with a breath as I whisper, “I’m pregnant.”

  At first, he doesn’t do anything except remain still. Making me think that his breath has frozen. Even his blood has stopped flowing.

  But then his lips part and he exhales.

  His chest moves again and his hands, glued to the island, shake slightly.

  “Pregnant,” he repeats.

  I press my belly. “Yes. With your baby.”

  He drops his eyes to my abdomen, making my fingers feel a sudden heat, making me think that he wanted to do it, to stare at my belly, for the longest time. But he was stopping himself for some reason.

  “With my baby.”

  This time when he repeats my words, his voice has whittled down to a whisper. His bruised, beat-up features have whittled down to the most minimalist of expressions.

  And I’m not really sure what he’s thinking, but like I did with Con last night, I have to stay strong. I have to keep marching on and say all the things that I want to say. “And I’m keeping it.”

  He looks up. “You’re keeping it.”

  “Yes.” I raise my chin and widen my stance as I continue, “I’m keeping her. I’m not getting an abortion. I can’t get an abortion. I just can’t. I can’t even bring myself to say the words without wanting to throw up, so, I can’t do it. But I understand if you’re not okay with that. I understand. I mean, what guy wants to be a dad at twenty-one? Not to mention, our situation is even more complicated. We have issues. You have issues with love. I have issues with you. And every time we come together, all we ever seem to do is make things even more complicated and hurt each other. And I wanted that to end. We were supposed to come to an end that night. Instead now we’re tied… for life.

  “So I understand if you don’t want any part of this. I understand if you think this is a mistake. But she’s not a mistake for me. I want her. I’m keeping her and I don’t expect anything from you. I can do this on my own and I will. I have a plan and —”

  “What’s the plan?”

  This is the second time someone has asked me about it, and even though I’m still reeling from Conrad’s anger and rejection, I tell Reed. Because I will keep telling anyone who asks. I will keep repeating it until the whole world knows that I’m going to fight for her.

  I keep my chin lifted and my battle stance grounded as I say, “I’m planning on quitting school. I’ll talk to the principal this Monday, move out and get a job. I was planning to live with Con but I think I’m gonna get my own place now, something cheap, and save up. Of course, Juilliard is no longer an option and that’s fine. I know I have other talents. I can figure things out for myself. But I’m not getting rid of her.”

  The silence that follows feels excruciating.

  Maybe because I’ve been talking a lot. I’ve said too many words and now the quiet is unbearable.

  Especially when the only thing that’s filling it is my panting, heaving breath.

  “Her.”

  Even though he’s only said one word after my deluge of them, flutters move and swirl in my belly, and for the second time since last night, I say, “It’s a girl.”

  I detect another shake of his arms. “Y-you already…” he swallows, “know…”

  It’s the shake in his voice that gives me some indication. Some clue as to what he wants. Because I’ve never ever, in all the time that I’ve known him, seen him this unsure, this shaken and taken aback.

  But I’m afraid to hope.

  I’m afraid.

  “No, I don’t. I can’t… it’s too early. But I want it to be.” Before I can stop myself, I ask, with stupid hope in my voice, “Do you have a problem with that?”

  He slowly shakes his head. “No.”

  I exhale a breath. “You don’t?”

  “No.” He licks his lips as he keeps staring at me. “I’d like a girl.”

  My eyes circle wide. “You w-would?”

  “Yeah, a tiny ballerina in a pink tutu with blonde pigtails. I’d like that.”

  He’d like that.

  He said that, right?

  He said, he’d like that. He’d like a girl with blonde pigtails and a pink tutu and Jesus Christ, I think I can breathe. Relief bursts through my veins and my body sags. “Well, she could… she could have dark hair.”

  Like you.

  Like her…

  Like her daddy’s.

  I think he hears my unspoken words because his lethal, animal eyes melt. “No, she’s going to have blonde hair.”

  Like you. Like her mommy’s.

  He doesn’t say it either but I hear it. He’s not done talking though and these next words he says fiercely. “And she’s not a mistake. It doesn’t matter how she… she came into existence. But she’s not a fucking mistake.”

  His words, intense and spoken with so much heat, shock me. They leave me speechless for a few seconds and all I can do is blink at him.

  But then I notice something.

  On the island, where he’s still standing bent over.

  A book, and as I stare at it, my words burst forth. “You’re reading a book.”

  He straightens up abruptly. “And?”

  I ignore his defensive tone. “I’ve never seen you read a book before. Not even in school. But…” I’m still staring at it when it occurs to me. “It’s a pregnancy book.” I snap my eyes to him. “You’re reading a pregnancy book.”

  His cheekbones are flushed and he rubs the back of his neck, frowning. “It’s not exactly noteworthy.”

  He even picks up the book from the counter and puts it in the drawer, as if he’s embarrassed at being caught. And I can’t… I can’t help but think it is.

  It is noteworthy and it is crazy and gosh, adorable that he’s so embarrassed. And so unlike him.

  And I can’t help but ask, “You’ve been preparing, haven’t you? You’ve been reading up. For the past week. Like me.”

  He stares at me a few moments, his jaw tight before he replies, “Yes.”

  Yes.

  He has. He’s been preparing like me.

  Even though I’d been running from him, even though I hadn’t told him myself, he was getting himself ready. He was reading up on things like me.

  “What if I had told you…” I pause to calm down my racing breaths. “What if I’d said that I didn’t… I didn’t want her.”

  His eyes pierce into mine. “Then I’d have…” Now he pauses and I know that it is for the same reason as me, to calm down his heaving chest. “I’d have taken care of it. If that’s what you wanted.”

  I know he would have.

  I can see it on his face. In the determined look of his eyes. I also know that he wouldn’t have liked it; that’s also apparent on his face, but he would’ve let me make the decision.

  Up until this point, up until he said it, I hadn’t known that it was important to me.

  This freedom of choic
e.

  As important as it is that he wants her too. He really wants her. He doesn’t think she’s a mistake, and suddenly, everything sinks in.

  Everything settles in my bones, the relief, that I feel dizzy.

  I feel it so much that I stumble.

  But he doesn’t let me fall.

  Like last night, he’s there to catch me. He’s there to put his hands on my waist to steady me. Not only that, he also picks me up and puts me down on the island.

  “Are you okay? Are you… are you going to be sick?” he asks, his warm hands holding me tightly, keeping me grounded.

  Without really thinking about it, I move closer to the warmth. I latch onto it with my fingers, grabbing onto his forearm and trying to breathe.

  And I get a whiff of that scent again.

  That scent which calms down my stomach, and I whisper, “What is that?”

  “What?”

  “T-that scent. It…” I swallow and dig my nails in his forearms. “It makes me…”

  “Makes you what?” he asks, a thick frown between his brows. “What the fuck is going on, Fae? You want me to —”

  I steal his words by fisting his t-shirt and pulling him close. I bury my nose in his chest and breathe him in, moaning, “Oh God.”

  He cradles the back of my head, his chest swelling and contracting against my burrowed-in face. “What —”

  I cut him off again, this time with words though. “What is that scent?”

  His fingers flex on my waist. “What scent?”

  I look up at him. “That scent. Coming from you. Your t-shirt. It makes me feel better. I know it’s not your regular scent.”

  “What’s my regular scent?”

  I nuzzle my nose in his hard, heated chest first before replying, “Wildflowers and woods.”

  He’s offended, his chest vibrating with his words. “I smell like flowers.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “Bullshit.”

  I can’t believe I want to laugh when my body is rebelling against me, even though his scent and his heat have helped a little, but I do. I also want to tease him a little bit more so biting my lip, I tell him, “You do. It’s like super sweet and —”

  “Yeah, let’s not talk about it.”

  “What, boys can smell like flowers.”

  “Your brothers tell you that?”

  “They can also twirl, Reed,” I tell him primly.

  He squeezes me slightly, his eyes liquid. “Thanks for all the information, Fae.”

  “You’re welcome.” I nod, my lips trembling with an oncoming smile. “Oh, and it’s okay for them to taste like cupcakes. Like you do.”

  I let my lips go then and grin. I chuckle even. But it only lasts a second, a microsecond actually.

  When I realize what I just said.

  I realize that I mentioned his taste and now it has come alive in my mouth. On my tongue.

  It’s crazy because I’ve only ever tasted him twice. How is it that I remember it so well? How is it that even now I want it, I want to feel it, eat it, inhale it like I’m inhaling his scent.

  But that’s not even the thing to worry about here. The fact that I’ve said something that I shouldn’t have and now I can’t get his phantom taste out of my mouth or I can’t stop looking at his slightly parted ruby red lips.

  The thing to worry about is that he’s heard me.

  And he’s gone still.

  Like a stone. A rock. A towering mountain with hard heated muscles and a battered gladiator face.

  “I didn’t…” I trail off because I was going to lie.

  I was going to say that I didn’t mean it, but I did. I did mean it because he does taste like cupcakes, sweet and toxic for my dancer’s body.

  Before I can say something else however, his jaw moves, still bruised and stubbled from last night, and his fingers clutch at me tightly for a second before they let go.

  Before he moves away.

  And in that process, I realize how close he was to me.

  How my legs were spread so shamelessly, like they were on that night, and how my dress had inched up to the tops of my thighs. And how, how, it feels when his coarse jeans rub against my smooth skin.

  How it takes my breath away.

  When he’s standing at a distance, I snap my thighs closed and lower my dress, a blush burning my cheeks.

  This is not the time to think about that. It’s never going to happen again.

  I don’t want it to happen again.

  Reed’s wolf eyes flash before he says, “It’s my fabric softener.”

  “What?”

  “The scent. I’ll stock up on it.”

  “Oh.” I grab the edge of the island and press my thighs together, feeling cold and bereft without his heat. “Thanks.”

  “What else?”

  My heart thunders then.

  Not that it stopped, really. It has been thundering ever since I found myself in this strange yet cozy house. Ever since I told him, and ever since he told me that he wants her.

  But this is something else.

  This is even more savage, this thundering.

  It comes from his question. What it means and the look in his eyes when he asked it.

  It’s the same look that he has when he watches me dance. The intensity, the eagerness, the way his big body goes taut as a string.

  He wants to know. Things about me.

  He wants to know what I’ve been going through these past days. Doesn’t he?

  “Uh, I just get dizzy sometimes,” I say hesitantly and I’m proven correct when his eyes flare with curiosity. “And I throw up a lot.”

  At this he frowns though. “What’s a lot?”

  I tuck my wayward hair behind my ears. “Like in the mornings. And also at night.”

  “Fucking morning sickness,” he mutters angrily.

  I can’t believe he knows that.

  I mean, morning sickness is the most common symptom of pregnancy and he has been reading books but I just… it’s surreal.

  So surreal that this is happening.

  That I’m pregnant. With his baby.

  And he wants to be a part of this. Not only that, I’m talking to him about my morning sickness. In all my planning, I never planned this.

  I never planned that I would want to tell him. That I’d be talking to him like a girl who’s pregnant by a guy she loves and so she wants to share every little detail, every little complaint, every tiny change that she’s experiencing.

  And I definitely never ever planned that he’d want to know, that he’d get upset over these changes and look so helpless standing there with his fists clenched and his angry frown. Like he’s really a guy who loves that girl back and he wants to do everything that he can to make things easier for her.

  And like always when he gets upset about something, I want to put him at ease. “But it’s fine. I mean, saltines help. Also tea. Ginger tea if I can find it in the cafeteria.”

  “I’ve got saltines,” he bursts out. “I don’t have ginger tea though. But I’m going —”

  “It’s okay,” I cut him off, assuring him. “Just tea helps too.”

  “What else?” he asks again.

  I bring my hands on my lap and wring them as I share. “I hate meat now. Can’t stand it. And coffee.”

  “Not fucking Peanut Butter Blossoms though.”

  “No, not Peanut Butter Blossoms. Not so far at least.”

  “Good.”

  “And I cry a lot these days.”

  “What’s a lot?” he asks again with the same concern and anger on my behalf.

  “I don’t know. A lot. The other day Poe, one of my friends at school, stole peanut butter for me from the kitchen and I was so overwhelmed by it that I started crying.”

  His lips twitch. “And what else?”

  “And then my other friend, Wyn, she drew a picture of me and a cute little baby and gave it
to me during English lit and I literally started sobbing. In the middle of class. My teacher had to send me away.”

  His frown comes back then. “Who’s —”

  “And I feel her.” I speak over him because if history is any indication, he might do the same thing he did with my ballet teacher, give her a piece of his mind or blackmail her.

  “What?”

  “I mean, all the books say that I really can’t feel her right now because she’s only a collection of cells but I don’t care. I do.”

  His gaze drops down to my flat stomach before he says, “Books can go fuck themselves.”

  “You really shouldn’t curse, Reed.”

  His wolf eyes flash again. “Cursing is the least of my crimes, remember?”

  I swallow when he flicks his eyes over my face, my whole body actually. Looking me from top to bottom, getting my heartbeats up.

  When he comes back to my face, the intense look in his eyes makes me clench my thighs together and ask, “Are we really doing this?”

  “Fuck yeah.”

  I bite my lip. “It’s going to be difficult.”

  “I’m not afraid of difficult.”

  I remember what Con said about our dad and the words slip out before I can stop them. “It’s a lot of responsibility.”

  “I know.”

  “You might not…”

  “I might not what?”

  I swallow again, crossing my dangling ankles, curling my toes. “You might not be able to have… fun and stuff. Like you used to.”

  His eyes narrow. “Yeah, I don’t have fun anymore, remember? Not since I met this blonde ballerina and made her dance for me.”

  You haunt me, Fae…

  His raspy voice from that night floats across my brain and I suck in my belly. And the fact that he tried but he hasn’t been with anyone in the past two years.

  Don’t think about that, Callie.

  “My brothers –”

  “I’m going to handle your fucking brothers.”

  And then I blurt something else out and surprise him once again. “Where’s your bathroom?”

  The sudden change of subject throws him. “Is it –”

  I slide off the island and come down to my feet. “No, I’m fine.”

  “Then what…”

  I approach him and crane my neck up. “Because I need to know.”