Gabriel (BBW Shifter Secret Baby Football Romance) (Shifter Football League Book 1)

by Becca Fanning

  “I’m not!” Carolyn’s voice wavered and the tears flowed freely. “He just showed up. I didn’t want him here.”

  “No, I told him she was here,” Justin said.

  “And I have a right to talk to her,” Kenny said.

  “No, you don’t,” Carolyn said. “Stop thinking you have some claim on me. You don’t.”

  “If it’s my baby, I sure as hell do,” Kenny said.

  Justin held up his hands. “Okay, guys, come on. This yelling isn’t good for anyone.”

  “Especially not the baby.” Amanda put her arm around Carolyn’s shoulders. “Come sit down.”

  Carolyn followed her to the living room. Amanda poured her a glass of icy water and set it on the table as the guys came filing in.

  “There’s no way to find out who the father is until the baby’s born, right?” Justin asked.

  “Right.” Carolyn had asked her doctor. There technically was a test, but it was very dangerous and very expensive. The doctor said she wouldn’t do it even if Carolyn paid her to. So, no. A DNA test once the baby arrived was about it.

  “How long has Kenny been here?” Gabe asked, sounded only slightly calmer. “Did he spend the night?”

  “No! He just showed up a few minutes before you did,” Carolyn said.

  “That’s Justin’s fault,” Amanda said. “He thought they needed to talk, so he told Kenny that Carolyn was here and that it was okay for him to come over. Which it was not.” She glared and Justin scratched his head guiltily.

  “Sorry,” Justin murmured. “Thought I was helping.”

  “It’s not your fault,” Carolyn said. “I made a mess of this whole thing.” Her tears became sobs and Amanda rubbed her back to soothe her.

  “Yeah, you did,” Gabe said.

  “I know. I should have told you and Kenny, and I should have been more careful in the first place, but it’s done now. I don’t know what I can do to make it better.”

  “You can’t,” Gabe snapped.

  “Gabe, this isn’t an easy situation for anyone,” Amanda said. “Give her a break. She’s trying to make it right.”

  “By spending time with Kenny?” Gabe asked.

  “That’s not what happened,” Carolyn said.

  “No, it’s not,” Amanda said. “Just like she said, Kenny showed up because Justin told him it was okay. He was one here a short time before you got here. In fact, we thought he was you because Justin texted him back and told him not to come.”

  “Guess you didn’t get that text,” Justin said.

  Kenny looked down, but didn’t say anything. So, he had gotten it and came anyway. Nice.

  “So, what are you going to do now, Carolyn?” Gabe asked, arms crossed in front of him. “You going to stay with Kenny? Or stay here?”

  She looked up at him. His image, large and angry, shimmered in the veil of her tears. “Please, don’t do this, Gabe.” She stood and went to him.

  He didn’t change his stance.

  “What about your text this morning?” she asked. “It sounded like you were ready to talk.”

  “Yeah. I wanted you to come home, but that was before I showed up and found Kenny here.”

  Carolyn hung her head. “I didn’t want him to come. Why can’t you understand that?”

  “Because I can’t trust you. You’ve lied, you’ve hidden things, you sneak around, you sleep with whoever. How will I ever know what’s really going on with you?”

  She shook her head and pressed her lips together. “You’re being really unfair. I don’t sleep with whoever. I was lonely and made a mistake. You don’t remember what it’s like to be in pain?”

  His eyes narrowed slightly.

  “People do stupid things when they’re in pain. What else can I say, but that I’m sorry? I should have told you. I should have told him.” She gestured to Kenny. “But I didn’t.”

  “What else are you hiding?”

  “Nothing.”

  He stared at her for a long minute. “I don’t believe you. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to trust you.”

  Her stomach dropped and twisted. “Gabe, please.”

  “You broke my heart, Carolyn. I can’t do this.”

  Her stomach tightened further, enough to make her weak in the knees. She put her hand to her stomach and sat back down.

  “Are you okay?” Amanda asked.

  Carolyn put her head in her hands and sobbed.

  “This isn’t good for her,” Amanda said. “Kenny, I think you should go so they can talk.”

  “Why?” Kenny said. “She’s just as much mine as she is Gabe’s.”

  “I am not!” Carolyn whined. “I don’t want anything to do with you, Kenny. Even if it is your baby, I will never, ever be with you. I don’t like you, and I don’t want you. I’d rather be a single mother than be with you.”

  Kenny glared and gritted his teeth. “Fine. Fuck you all. You two deserve each other. Two messed up people being jerks together. Match made in heaven.” Kenny stood to leave, but turned back. “I will tell you this, Carolyn. If that baby is mine, rest assured I will do all I can to take it from you.”

  He stomped from the house and slammed the front door hard.

  Carolyn resumed her sobbing and Amanda continued to rub her back. The tightening in her stomach came again. Something wasn’t right. This wasn’t just her being upset. This felt like what contractions were described to her as. But they couldn’t be contractions. It was far too soon for that. She still had eleven weeks to go. She took in deep breaths and tried to steady herself. Maybe if she just calmed down, it would be okay.

  “Drink,” Amanda said, handing her the glass.

  “Maybe I should go, too,” Gabe said. “I don’t want to get you all upset, but I can’t take you home, either.”

  “You can stay here as long as you want to,” Amanda said.

  Carolyn gave Gabe a pleading look. “Please don’t do this.”

  “It’s hard to even look at you right now,” he said. “I just keep seeing you screwing Kenny.”

  “Are you going to hold that against me forever? You’re acting like I cheated on you, but I didn’t. We weren’t together, and you hadn’t bothered to call me. I didn’t think you wanted anything else to do with me.”

  “So, now it’s my fault?”

  “That’s not what I’m saying. I’m just saying, yeah I slept with him. But it was in no way disloyal to you. Since we’ve been together, I haven’t even thought of anyone else. I don’t want to be with anyone else. I’ve been trying to do what’s best for everyone. I thought not telling you about the baby would be the best for you because you’re still dealing with Austin’s death, and I didn’t want to make things worse for you. I wanted you to be able to concentrate on your career and not have all this drama we’re having now. I was even going back to my asshole ex husband because I thought it was the best thing for you.”

  “Well, it wasn’t.”

  “I know that now. But I didn’t know you then like I do now. Now, I would never have done that, but I had no idea you were so sweet and caring, or that you wanted a family.” Another cramp rippled through her stomach, but she ignored it. She had to convince him. Had to get him back.

  “I did. But I don’t know what to think now. What if it’s not mine, Carolyn? Then what?”

  “We can still be together. I want to be with you.”

  “Right, so I’m supposed to raise another man’s baby?”

  “No, I don’t know. I don’t know what to do any better than you do. This is why I didn’t tell Kenny. I don’t want him to be involved. I don’t want him to be the father to my child, whether he is or not.”

  “Well, you can’t just wish him away. It doesn’t work like that.”

  She wiped tears from her eyes and ignored another cramp. She felt like she might throw up. “I know. But what else am I supposed to do?”

  Gabe ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know.”

  “Would you want to be with me if
there was no baby?”

  “I think so. It’s hard to know for sure because I’ve always pictured us as a family, but I…” He swallowed and looked away.

  “But what?”

  “Nothing. Everything’s changed now.”

  “What’s changed?”

  “Are you serious?” He dropped his arms and gawked at her. “Carolyn, I wanted to marry you, to have a family together. But now, I don’t know if it’s my baby, and I don’t know what to do if it’s not. I was falling in love with you, or I did, I don’t know, but now I just…”

  She looked up at him, pleading. Another cramp, harder this time, made her scrunch her face in pain. She put her hand to her stomach.

  “Carolyn?” Amanda asked. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing, it’s fine. Gabe—” She got to her feet again, but a pain shot through her middle so hard that she doubled over.

  He reached out his arms and caught her, holding her tight. “What’s wrong?”

  “I don’t know.” She pressed her hand against the pain in her stomach, but it didn’t help.

  “Are you having contractions?” Amanda asked.

  “Maybe? I’m not sure, but it hurts.”

  “I’m taking you to the hospital,” Gabe said.

  “We’ll come with you,” Amanda said.

  Gabe bent over and picked Carolyn up, cradling her in his arms as he walked to the front door. Amanda ran ahead of him to open the door.

  “Oh no,” she said.

  “What?” Carolyn asked, her face twisted in pain as she pressed her face into Gabe’s shoulder.

  “That asshole,” Gabe said. “He slashed my tires.”

  “We’ll take my car,” Justin said.

  A moment later, she heard the garage door open, and Gabe gently put her down in the backseat of Justin’s car, then ran to the other side to get in.

  They sped off and Gabe squeezed her hand. She was panting with the pain now. He rubbed her back like Amanda had.

  “What can I do?” he asked.

  “I don’t know,” she whispered.

  “Drive fast, man,” Gabe said.

  “I am,” Justin said.

  “Do you have a doctor?” Amanda asked. “Someone we can call?”

  “I have the number in my phone,” Gabe said. “I’ll call.”

  She squeezed his hand hard as he dialed and told the doctor what was going on. He hung up and told her, “The doctor is going to meet us there. She said you might be in early labor.”

  “But, it’s too early,” Carolyn squeaked.

  “They have ways to stop it,” Amanda said. “Don’t panic. That’ll just make it worse.”

  “Right.” She tried not to think about all that could go wrong. But trying not to panic was like trying not to think of the color red when someone told you not to. She breathed in and out slowly, trying to steady her rushing heart.

  Justin stopped the car. “We’re here.”

  Chapter 14

  Gabe picked her up again and carried her inside the ER. They got someone to bring a wheelchair and he lowered her carefully down into it.

  “We’ll get someone to see you right away,” the nurse said. She looked at the group of them. “Immediate family only.”

  “He’s the father,” Carolyn said and reached out to grab Gabe’s hand.

  He squeezed back and followed as the nurse wheeled her into a room. Gabe helped her get onto the examination table. The nurse hooked her up to multiple gadgets. A heart monitor for her, for the baby. Another little square device that measured contractions. A few minutes later, her doctor entered the room.

  “Carolyn,” Dr. Clayton said. “How long have you been having contractions?”

  “The last hour or so?”

  “That long?” Gabe asked, visibly shocked.

  Another pain came and she squeezed his hand, pressing her other hand against her stomach.

  “Are they getting more intense and closer together?” the doctor asked.

  Carolyn nodded.

  Dr. Clayton looked at the readout of the heart monitors. She checked on her clipboard and then the file in her hands. “You’re only 29 weeks, is that correct?”

  “Yes,” she said, and it came out as a half word, half sob answer. Gabe squeezed her hand again.

  The doctor had her lay back and did a quick exam.

  “You’re in labor. We’re going to try to stop the contractions,” Dr. Clayton said. “There’s a good chance the baby would survive if he was born now, but we want to try to stop it to give him as much chance as possible. The longer he’s in there, the better.”

  “What if you can’t stop it?” Carolyn asked.

  “Then you’ll have a baby. But he’ll have far fewer complications if he can stay in another few weeks.”

  Carolyn remembered the long list of complications from the books she’d read. Anything from lung and breathing problems to developmental problems. Her baby could have a lot of medical issues from being born too soon.

  “You keep saying ‘he.’ Is it a boy?” Gabe asked.

  “Or she,” Dr. Clayton said. She checked her notes one more time. “Do you want to know the sex?”

  Gabe and Carolyn made eye contact. They had talked about this and decided to make it a surprise. They had names picked out for a girl or a boy and clothes for both. His mom had tried to convince them to find out, since it made gift buying easier for the shower that was planned for next weekend, but they’d both decided that it would be more fun to wait. Maybe things had changed now, though.

  Gabe raised his eyebrows at her and she shook her head.

  “No,” he said. “We want it to be a surprise.”

  “Then I’ll go with ‘he’ for simplicity’s sake,” Dr. Clayton said.

  Carolyn had tried to get a sense of the baby’s sex for months. She’d imagine a little girl in a pink dress and pigtails. She’d been so sure it was a girl. But then, she’d imagine a boy in blue, tossing a football with Gabe, and that felt right, too. She really had no idea which it was. And now she might find out too soon.

  She tried not to worry. The doctor seemed confidant, and she had read plenty of stories of babies surviving as early as 28 weeks. But it was risky, and there were so many possible complications. Plus, it would mean a lot of time in the hospital, and a lot of expense. The expense was the least of it, but it was still a concern. She focused her worry there, though, because if she thought of everything that could go wrong with the baby, she started to get panicky and her heart raced. That couldn’t be good.

  The nurse put in an IV and hooked up a bag of liquid.

  “This will slow the contractions, and hopefully stop them,” Dr. Clayton explained. “What were you doing when they started? Any sort of physical activity?”