by Erin Wright
Tiffany just stared at her for a moment, one eyebrow arched, and then looked pointedly down to Kylie’s stomach, as subtle as a wrecking ball. Even before her mouth opened, Kylie felt a rush of dread wash over her, cold and clammy.
“Interesting,” Tiffany said cattily, in that tone of voice that said that she didn’t believe Kylie, not one bit. “You see, I’d been hearing around town that you’re prego. Are you sure that isn’t why you came running back to Mommy? And, I see no engagement ring, either.”
The outburst of sound – gasps of horror and outrage – swirled around Kylie. She was dumbfounded. What the hell? What is wrong with this…this bitch?
Ezzy snickered behind her hand at the look on Kylie’s face.
Make that two bitches.
“I really don’t know what business it is of yours,” Kylie retorted, her ears red and her cheeks red and the anger boiling like molten lava inside of her.
Tiffany shrugged, studying her fake fingernails nonchalantly. Kylie noticed that the ball of yarn in her lap hadn’t been touched yet. Tiffany hadn’t even tried to pretend that she was there to knit anything.
“I was just curious, is all,” Tiffany said innocently. “I mean, if you got pregnant without a guy willing to make it right by marrying you, well now, that’s between you and God, isn’t it? It does make me wonder if he isn’t married already, though…”
She trailed off significantly, arching one eyebrow, waiting for Kylie’s defense.
Kylie felt like she’d been thrown into a pit of vipers. This was the Knit Wits group? It was supposed to be a group of sweet old ladies who gossiped about who did the best job dyeing and covering up grays, not…not this.
“I’m not feeling well,” Kylie announced, standing up, struggling to hold back her tears. She was not going to cry in front of this woman. Never. “Mom, I’d like to go home now.”
She marched towards the front door, her needles and yarn clasped in her hands, trying to act as if nothing was wrong. Nothing at all.
It really was too bad that she was such an awful actress.
Behind her, the sound of chatter and uncomfortable laughter swelled up again. She didn’t know and didn’t care who was laughing. She was never going to see any of these women again. She was going to move to Mississippi and dye her hair black and adopt a southern accent and pretend her name was Susan Blackeye. She hated this town and this state and especially people named Tiffany and Ezzy.
She threw herself into the passenger seat of her mom’s Prius, finally giving into the desire to cry her eyes out. She was crying so hard, she was hiccuping when her mother made it to the car, starting it and driving until they pulled into the empty parking lot of the library behind a small row of bushes. She turned off the car, and then pulled Kylie up against her side, holding her as Kylie let out a jagged breath, then howled with anger and hurt again.
She didn’t know and didn’t care how much time passed before she finally calmed down enough to pull out of her mom’s arms. “Why?” she whimpered. “Why would Tiffany do that? I hardly even know her.”
That, more than anything, was the most hurtful part of all. If she’d been in a Hatfield-McCoy feud with the woman all through school, well, it’d make sense, at least. But Tiffany had graduated years before Kylie. She’d probably been in elementary school when Tiffany had been a senior.
“It just doesn’t make sense,” she whispered.
Her mom hugged her hard. “I’ve never particularly liked Tiffany,” she said regretfully. “I was a little worried when her and Ezzy started showing up to the Knit Wits meetings a couple of months ago, but she never did anything wrong, per se, so I just bit my tongue. She never seemed all that interested in knitting or crafts in general, though, but real damn interested in the gossiping part. She probably just had a hunch that you were pregnant and asked tonight, wanting to get a rise out of you, hoping to get a reaction. So I’m going to say that the secret is out, darlin’, ‘cause no one back in that bakery was fooled in the slightest. Have I mentioned lately that maybe you shouldn’t consider a Broadway career among your many options?”
Kylie pulled back, a hysterical laugh spilling out of her. “Not Broadway, huh?” she said, scrubbing at her eyes. “And I so thought I had a chance…”
And then she grew serious. “I knew it’d come out at some point, of course – you can’t hide a baby forever – but I guess I just didn’t think that people would be rude enough to ask me about it to my face. I knew there’d be gossip behind my back, but there’s a difference between that and right here in front of me. And how did she know that Norman was married?!”
That was the bad part. That was the part that was going to cause her the most trouble, for damn sure.
Her mom pulled her against her soft side, cradling Kylie against her body. “Small towns can be vicious,” she said softly, running her fingers through Kylie’s hair as she talked. “Last I heard, Tiffany had been chasing the new county extension agent but apparently he fell in love with the younger McLain daughter instead. Maybe Tiffany turned her sights on Adam, and thought that you were her competition. She’s the kind of person who’d look at the world that way. Which, by the way, is there anything between you and your hunky boss?”
Kylie pulled back with a startled laugh. “Of course not,” she protested automatically.
Her mom just stared at her.
Kylie stared back…and then blinked first.
Dammit.
“Maybe,” she allowed.
“Maybe, as in…?”
“As in we’ve kissed. But just once. He hasn’t kissed me since. Maybe I’m not a good kisser.” She gave her mom a pained smile. Her mom rolled her eyes.
“Knowing Adam, it’s probably more that he feels like he can’t take advantage of an employee, and especially not one who’s so much younger than him.”
“Okay, yeah. Probably,” Kylie allowed. That did make a bit more sense.
“How much older is he than you?” her mom asked, settling back into the driver’s seat and turning on the car. Being a hybrid, the start-up process hardly made a noise.
“Like, fifteen years? Maybe? I’m just guessing. I haven’t actually asked him.”
“That’s quite a difference when you’re only in your 20s, but when you hit your 40s, it won’t be much of a difference at all.” Her mom paused for a moment and then added, “But, since you’re in your 20s right now, I’m not sure how much of a comfort that is to you.”
Kylie let out a hollow laugh. “Well, I’m not sure if it matters either way, honestly. He’s not going to want a girl who’s pregnant with a bastard child.”
No one did.
Chapter 22
Adam
Adam hurried into the dining room, behind as always. He could snag a cup of coffee from the kitchen, swing by and pick up Kylie, and then get to work without being too late. Hopefully.
Well hell, who was going to fire him? It wasn’t like he had a boss he had to explain himself to, right?
It still bothered him, though.
He pressed a kiss to his mom’s cheek, as always, as he rushed past. “Good morning, Mom,” he called out cheerfully from the kitchen, pouring himself a cup of coffee. “How’d you sleep?”
She didn’t answer but instead folded up the newspaper and put it neatly off to the side. Her unexpected silence caught his attention and he went back into the dining room, coffee cup in hand. She looked…upset. Angry. Worried.
Something not good, anyway.
“Adam, dear, there’s something you need to hear and I think you ought to hear it from me,” she said slowly.
Adam slid into his chair, kitty corner from his mother’s, and picked up her hand in his. “What’s wrong?” he asked, worried. His mother wasn’t one for the melodramatic, so this was unusual, to say the least.
“Kylie VanLueven is pregnant.”
He jerked his head back and shook it instinctively. “No,” he whispered. “That can’t be right.”
Then he r
emembered the flash of her rounded belly in the sunlight when Dumbass had been trying to eat her shirt, and how she always wore sweatshirts and yoga pants and…
He was such an idiot. Such an idiot.
“How do you know?” he demanded defensively. “Are you sure?”
His mom nodded slowly. “That Tiffany gal – you know her? A couple of years younger than you – confronted her last night at the Knit Wits meeting. I sure don’t like that Tiffany woman, or her friend Ezzy. Nothing good ever seems to happen around them. Anyway, Tiffany seems to think that the father of Kylie’s baby is married to someone else, although she didn’t have any proof for it.”
“Did Kylie actually say that she was pregnant?” Adam demanded. He felt his world spinning off its axis.
Not again…
“I don’t know. I wasn’t there. You know I can’t anymore…” She held up her gnarled hands. “But a couple of my friends called afterward and told me what had happened since Kylie is your employee and all. They thought you deserved to know. I know that nowadays, in some places, it’s okay to have six children by six different men and never marry any of them, but this is Sawyer. If it’s true, she’s not going to have an easy time of it. And you aren’t either. There are some prudes in town who might not want to use you as their vet because of this.”
Adam nodded mechanically, but honestly, he didn’t care about that part. He had enough business to keep him running at full speed 24/7. If he lost a little business, he’d probably be better off for it.
But Kylie…
All this time, and she didn’t tell him. Why didn’t she tell him? Did she think he didn’t deserve to know?
Not again…
He stood up from the dining room table. “I better get to work,” he said woodenly. “See you tonight.” He kissed his mom goodbye and climbed into the truck.
He didn’t remember a thing about the drive over to his old place. When he pulled up in front of the older farmhouse, he looked around, blinking. How had he gotten there? He could only hope he hadn’t run any stop signs while driving on autopilot.
And then it all washed over him again and the haze disappeared and the anger rushed back and he jumped out of the truck, hurrying to the front door, pounding on it. Kylie opened up, a big grin on her face, a platter of food in her hands but before she could say anything, he demanded, “Are you pregnant?!”
Her face crumpled and her shoulders slumped. She put the tray of food on the entryway table. She looked back up at him.
She nodded slowly.
“How far along?”
“Four months tomorrow,” she whispered.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” he demanded. The pain swirled through him at the betrayal.
Not again…
“Would you have hired me if you knew?” she retorted right back, planting her hands on her hips and glaring up at him.
“Of co—” He stopped his instinctive response and thought about it, really thought about it. She hadn’t known anything about animals. She didn’t have any billing experience. She wasn’t 50 and she didn’t have gray hair and she sure as shit didn’t have a steely-eyed glance. He’d been so close to turning her away as it was. Would he have hired her if he’d known she was pregnant?
Probably not.
His hesitation gave him away.
“I needed a job,” Kylie said flatly. “No employer hires someone who is months along in their pregnancy. Oh, they come up with fake reasons for it – shit that has nothing to do with the pregnancy – but honestly, employers just don’t want to be inconvenienced by hiring someone who has to take medical leave just months after starting, no matter how good they are in the meantime. And, in case you haven’t noticed, I’m not married, and this is Sawyer-freaking-Idaho.
“So yeah, I didn’t tell you.”
Adam sputtered, his mind spinning in circles. He didn’t know what he wanted to say or do. He needed some time to think, some space from Kylie. Maybe a nice round of vaccinations with a herd of cows that were dumber than a pile of rocks would help him get his head on straight.
“Well, are you ready to go?” he growled. He wasn’t normally one to snap at people, but he couldn’t make himself care at the moment. He’d care later. Right now, he felt too mixed up and stirred up and chaotic and panicked to be kind and thoughtful.
“‘Go’? Hold on, you still want me to come to work?”
“Of course. I sure as shit don’t want to have to start sending out invoices again.” He turned back and started stomping down the walkway, his boots not making any noise on the dirt path. Dammit. What he wouldn’t give for a concrete sidewalk in that moment.
They climbed inside and for a second day in a row, the drive to work was uncomfortable and awful and awkward as hell. Adam pulled to a stop in front of the clinic, waited for Kylie to climb out, and then drove off. He could go buy a cup of coffee from Mr. Petrols. Right now, he needed some space from Ms. Kylie VanLueven, and the chance to figure out what in the hell he was going to do.
Chapter 23
Kylie
Well, that went about as awful as she thought it would go.
Actually, scratch that. It went way worse than she’d thought it would. After Tiffany at the bakery last night and then Adam this morning, she’d had about all she could stand of judgmental Sawyerites. There was a reason she’d moved to Oregon to get her associate’s degree, dammit. She had wanted to be far, far away from this town and its small-mindedness, but then, when the shit hit the fan, where did she go running back to?
Sawyer-freaking-Idaho.
Argh.
The phone rang, and Kylie cleared her throat hurriedly and then answered as cheerfully as she could. “Whitaker’s Vet Clinic, this is Kylie speaking,” she said, working extra hard to add a pleasant lilt to her voice. Just because she was having a shitty day…no, week…no, month…well anyway, it didn’t mean she should take it out on the rest of the world.
Her cheerful greeting did her absolutely no good, unfortunately. She hardly got the word “speaking” out before Mr. Stultz began in on a 25-minute diatribe, angry because he’d received such a large bill in the mail the day before.
Kylie tried to explain a couple of times that Adam had gotten behind on his billing and so when she’d taken over, there was quite a backlog in place, but there was no reasoning with Mr. Stultz. All he took from that information was the idea that this was all her fault.
“So I can thank you for this huge bill?” he demanded angrily.
“I think you can thank your animals – they’re the ones who needed the care,” Kylie retorted and then squeezed her eyes shut. Whoops. She probably shouldn’t have said that. Wasn’t there some awful saying in the customer service world about the customer always being right?
Adam was really going to regret hiring her after he heard about this phone call.
“Listen here, you little twit, it isn’t my fault that Dr. Whitaker couldn’t get his bills out on time for months on end, and I sure as hell ain’t gonna pay this gigantic thing now that he’s finally gotten around to doing his damn job! So, tell him that if he wants any of this money, he’ll call me.”
And with that, Mr. Stultz hung up the phone.
Kylie’s hand was shaking as she put the phone back in the cradle. Did she just get into a shouting match with a customer?
What
a
day
She wandered into the back and opened up the cage for Pugsies, a miniature pug that they were running some tests on, and snuggled his small body against her. “Hi, Pugsies,” she whispered into his fur. “Do you still like me?” He licked her chin. “You might be the only one,” she told him seriously. “You’re adorable, so of course this town likes you, but me? I’m just a stupid girl who doesn’t know how to pick a boyfriend or run a condom.” She smiled, just a bit, at the phrasing, and then her shoulders began to shake as the tears began to run down her face.
Again.
This time, instead of having to wipe
them off with the backs of her hands, though, Pugsies just reached up and licked her face, his stumpy little tail wiggling hard as he tried to comfort her.
“Such an idiot,” she whimpered, her voice breaking, and then there were strong arms wrapping around her, pulling her tight up against a muscular chest. Adam reached out and put Pugsies back into the cage and then turned her around in his arms, running his hands up and down her spine as she just gave in and cried, letting the roiling fear and worry that’d been boiling in her guts spill down her face instead.
“Whhyyyy…” she wailed.
“Why what?” Adam whispered.
“Why are you here and not out vaccinating cows?” she blubbered.
She felt his chest shaking against her cheek.
“First off, kudos for having my schedule memorized,” he said, laughter in his voice even as his hands continued their long, rhythmic strokes down her back. She felt a little like a cow getting milked, but instead of milk coming out, all of the stress and worry that she’d been carrying around with her were flowing out instead.
“Second of all, I’m here to apologize. I…it’s better if I show you. Will you forgive me long enough to go on a drive with me?”
She snuffled, pulling back and wiping at her cheeks with the backs of her hands. She missed Pugsies’ kisses just then. Adam disappeared for a moment and then he was back, pushing some Kleenexes into her hands. She took them gratefully, blowing and wiping her nose.
“Will you come with me?” he repeated. “Just let me tell you what’s going on. Then you can decide whether or not to forgive me.”
She nodded as she looked up into his warm, whiskey brown eyes, wrinkles in the corner as he peered down at her, worry etched on his face. “Yes,” she whispered.
He took her hand, plucked the goopy tissues out of them before she could protest – he didn’t want to touch those things! – threw them away for her, and then started tugging her towards the front. He flipped off the lights and the open sign, and then locked the door before leading her over to the passenger side of his truck.
