by Maisey Yates
Madison slapped a hand on the table. “I knew it.”
“How?”
“I have a sense for these things. You’ve been avoiding me. And you don’t do that. So, I knew there was something you didn’t want me to know.”
“Okay, fine.” She growled. “It happened. It happened once. It isn’t going to happen again. Because he’s my boss.”
“Right, your boss who was angry at you because you reminded him of his ex-wife. Is that why he had sex with you? Is he hung up on her?”
Her stomach twisted and went into a free fall. “I don’t...think so.”
“Well, I hope not. But if it only happened once I guess it doesn’t really matter.”
“It matters for my pride. The thought of being some kind of weird ex-wife security blanket isn’t a very good one.”
She thought back to that night. To the way he had talked to her. They had talked about the fact that she’d never been able to orgasm with a partner before, and he had set about to right that wrong.
He had done it spectacularly.
She couldn’t believe that he had been thinking of someone else the whole time. Not when what they had done was so specific to the two of them.
“Well, whatever, that doesn’t matter. He didn’t take advantage of you?”
“No,” she said, feeling defensive of him for some reason.
“Well, I have to do the big sister thing. He didn’t hurt you, you had safe sex...”
Suddenly, the little thought that had been chewing at the back of her mind on and off for a few weeks hit her in the side of the head like an anvil.
“No,” she said, feeling all of the color that had flooded her face earlier drain away.
“What?”
“Oh, no.”
“What?”
“We didn’t use a condom.”
Horrified silence settled between them. The world’s worst after-dinner treat.
Then Madison mobilized.
“But that’s fine,” she said, her words rushed. “That doesn’t mean anything’s wrong. I mean, it’s not super smart, but just talk to him about, you know, his health and safety and things. And make sure that you don’t need to get tested. I’m sure it’s fine. It isn’t like you’re late or anything.”
The other anvil dropped. Straight on her head.
“Oh, no,” she moaned, reaching down to the floor by her chair and rifling through her purse, pulling out her phone. Madison wasn’t talking anymore. She wasn’t offering any platitudes, wasn’t telling her everything would be okay anymore. Which sucked. Because Sierra really needed her to tell her it was okay.
Except, they both knew it might not be.
She pulled out her calendar and looked for the little markers she used to indicate the starting point for her period. “I’m not very late,” she said.
Madison screwed up her face. “How late is not very late?”
“Only like a day.”
Her whole face relaxed. “That’s not late at all. I mean, a day could be anything.”
Except they both knew that a day a few weeks after you had unprotected sex was a little more terrifying than a day under any other circumstances.
“I could just wait and see what happens,” Sierra said.
“Yeah. There’s no point panicking over a day.”
“No. No point at all.” Sierra bent down, picked up her purse and gathered it to her chest. “Well, I have to go buy a pregnancy test.”
“I’ll go with you,” Madison said, popping up out of her chair. “I’ll just get the check.”
Another panicky thought occurred to her. “Where am I going to buy a pregnancy test? People here know me.”
“We’ll go to Tolowa. There’s no reason to do it here. Are you parked in a timed space?”
“No, I’m parked in the lot by the beach.”
“Great. I’m going to drive you out of town. And then we can go back to my place and you can take the test.”
Sierra bit her lip. “I’m not going to be able to wait.”
“Okay, fine, we don’t have to wait, we’ll use a public restroom. But let’s just go.”
Sierra felt like the world was muffled around her, like she was underwater. Like she might pass out and dry-drown right there on the floor in the restaurant. Which would create even more gossip than if Sierra West bought a pregnancy test in town, in front of God and everybody.
Madison somehow managed to keep her cool and pay the check. Which kind of irritated Sierra, since she had fully intended on paying for her own, and if Madison paid for hers, then indirectly, her father was kind of paying for it. She imagined living in Colton’s house was much the same. Though Colton had his own money, his own business.
Still, it had been funded originally by her father.
You’re still driving the truck he bought you, and using the phone he bought you, and you might be pregnant, so maybe chill.
Too bad for her, there was no chilling. It was a twenty-minute drive from the city center of Copper Ridge to the larger town of Tolowa a little bit to the south. Sierra rarely had occasion to go there. But when people in town needed to shop at a big box store, that was the place to go. They had more fast food, more chains of every kind. It was less homegrown and artisanal. It was practical.
And right now, the size was practical because she wouldn’t know every third person in town.
“Let’s just go to Freddie’s,” Madison said. “I know they have them. And the bathrooms will be nice enough.”
“Okay,” Sierra said, curling her fingers around her seat, tapping her foot impatiently. Madison found a parking space toward the front of the store and she pulled in. Both of them got out quickly, without talking.
They hurried into the store through the automatic doors, rushing past the sales tables positioned at the front, making their way to an aisle Sierra had never needed to venture into before.
They both stood there, in the same pose, their arms curved tight around their bodies, hands gripping their elbows. This was the weirdest, scariest thing Sierra had ever done. But having Madison right with her made it bearable at least. “Why the hell are there so many different kinds of these things?”
“Search me.”
Sierra turned to her sister. “Have you ever taken one?”
“I took about five of them after I broke up with David. I wasn’t late or anything, I was just afraid. After I found out about everything. About what a liar he was, I knew I couldn’t be with him. I was so desperate to get away and I was scared... I mean it would figure, right? I’d get pregnant and not be able to get rid of him.”
Sierra scanned the shelves. “Why did you take five?”
“When I want cheese, I want a platter. To make sure that all of my cheese needs are met. I wasn’t going to be less thorough with something like that. It was kind of a pregnancy test sampler. To make sure that everything was right. I mean, I wanted a second, third and fourth opinion.”
Fear curled itself around Sierra’s stomach. “How many should I buy?”
“Maybe two. Don’t go crazy like I did. I mean, I was a lot younger than you are, so crazy was par for the course.”
Sierra sighed. “Maybe digital and... Is it analog? Do you call it analog when it’s a pregnancy test?”
Madison scoffed. “Who cares? Just take them.” She took a couple of tests off the shelf and thrust them into Sierra’s arms. “I can’t wait anymore.”
“You can’t wait? You’re not the one who might actually be pregnant.”
Her sister laughed. “Nope. No chance of that. Anyway, I doubt you are, either. So, let’s just pay for the tests and you can go take them.”
Madison led the charge across the store and over to the checkout. They opted for self-checkout. Which really was
a gift she had never truly appreciated before she’d had to buy such sensitive material.
Sierra held the small plastic shopping bag to her chest as they walked across the store and into the restroom. It was empty, thankfully. She disappeared into the stall and began to tear at the pink packaging. The thick foil wrapper that the test itself was contained in was impossible for her to tear open. She ended up digging in her purse and pulling out her truck keys, stabbing at the packaging until she managed to tear it enough to rip the rest open.
She read the instructions three or four times before commencing to follow them.
“Is it done?”
“No, Madison, you have to wait.”
“How long?” her sister asked. Sierra could hear her jingling on the other side of the stall door. Probably hopping up and down in place nervously, her jewelry and car keys clattering together.
“Eleven million years. Or, maybe three to five minutes? I don’t know. Does it really matter? Time is relative. And right now it’s relatively torturous.”
She looked back down at the little white sticks sitting on top of the toilet paper dispensers. Mocking her with their blank screens.
Slowly, she saw a pink line begin to fade in on one. Her throat dry. One was okay. One was safe.
Then another line started to fill in, a faint blush at first that turned into an angry slash across the white background. That was two. Two lines. Then she looked down at the digital one, sitting there, mocking her with a word that was already echoing in her brain.
Pregnant.
“Oh, dammit,” she said, sitting back down on the closed toilet.
“What?”
“Just...”
The stall door jiggled, and Madison curled her fingers around the top of the door, tugging hard. “Let me in.”
“No,” Sierra said, her voice shaky.
She stood up, her hands trembling as she collected the pregnancy tests and threw them into the trash. Then she pulled on the toilet paper roll, collecting far too much toilet paper for her purposes, and dabbed at dry eyes. She wasn’t crying. She kept expecting to. So she kept pressing the toilet paper against her tear ducts.
Her throat was dry. Her eyes were dry.
As though all the life was being drained out of her.
Was this some kind of weird pregnancy symptom? Did you have pregnancy symptoms after only a couple of weeks? She had no idea. She didn’t know anything about this kind of thing. She didn’t really want to know anything about this kind of thing.
She twisted the lock on the door and opened it. Madison all but tumbled into the stall. “What?”
“It’s not...negative,” she said, pushing past her sister and heading toward the mirror.
She looked like death. Completely white, her lips a strange bluish color.
“Oh. And it’s... It’s his?”
She turned around and faced Madison. “Yes. There aren’t any other candidates.”
Madison held up her hands. “Not judging. Just checking.”
“I broke up with Mark more than a year ago. And this is not my usual modus operandi. It was just a stupid thing. Just a stupid, onetime thing.”
She looked down at her stomach, which appeared exactly the same as it had three weeks ago. She poked it with her forefinger. “So, seriously... I can’t... I can’t believe there’s anything in there.”
Madison stared at her. “I keep thinking you’re expecting wisdom from me.”
Sierra looked up, meeting her sister’s eyes. “You’re two years older than me.”
“But I’ve never been pregnant. I have no idea what to tell you.”
“I don’t know. Something supportive?”
“I’ll stand by you no matter what,” Madison said, nodding.
“Thanks.” Sierra turned around to face the mirror again, turning on the faucet and splashing some cold water on her wrists. Then she splashed some on her face. “I’m never going to be able to eat salmon salad again. I’m going to have post-traumatic stress associated with that salad.”
“The salad isn’t what got you pregnant.”
“Fine. I’ll never be able to look at a penis again.”
Madison frowned. “That I am familiar with.”
“I know.”
Madison reached out and wrapped her arms around Sierra’s shoulders, then pulled her in for a hug. They both wobbled before Sierra regained her balance and settled into her sister’s hold. “This is really awful,” Sierra said, feeling sorrier and sorrier for herself with each passing moment.
“It is. What are you going to do?”
Sierra took a step back from Madison, scrubbing her hand over her eyes. “I... I’m going to deal with it.”
“Okay. What does that mean?”
She didn’t know what it meant. She felt...uncertain and terrified and so very tempted to just make it all go away. Before anyone knew.
Her throat tightened, her muscles tensing. It was a galling thing, to understand her father. To have that sudden, strong impulse to hide it all no matter what.
She had options. She could even...disappear from town for nine months and give the baby up for adoption.
There was no shame in that, she knew.
But could she do that to Ace? Could she give up his child without ever giving him a chance to decide?
But if she did that it would mean no confrontation. It would mean her baby could have a normal family.
And when it came to Ace, there would be no reckoning of any kind.
That was so, so tempting.
A while ago, a month ago, it was what she would have done. Games and hiding, because that was what she did. Keeping people at a distance, avoiding anything hard.
It wasn’t her anymore.
“I mean...” She took a deep breath, clarity coming to her in small increments. “I made a mistake. And I have to face up to that. I have to deal with it.”
“You mean you’re going to have a baby?”
The sentence wrapped itself around Sierra’s throat and threatened to strangle her. “I guess so.”
“Really?” Madison asked, her expression concerned. “And you’ll keep it?”
“I think I will.”
“You really want to do this?” Madison pressed.
“I am doing it. It’s too late for regrets now. At least, for me. I’m not going to be like Dad. I did this. It’s a result of my actions. At the very least, I can’t hide the baby from Ace.”
Through all of the panic, all of the pain, her chest burned with one thought. She wasn’t going to sweep everything under the rug to make her life easier. It was exactly why she had left her parents’ house. It was why she had to separate herself from her family. Because she couldn’t condone the way her father had handled things with Jack.
She’d been so hard on her dad in part because she believed so firmly you had to own up to your own mistakes. Now she had to prove how deeply she believed that.
She had to figure out who she was. Had to learn to stand on her own two feet.
Well, this was going to test her ability to do that.
Madison let the silence stand between them for a while. Then finally, she spoke again. “Do you want me to help you with Mom and Dad?”
That made Sierra feel like she had been kicked in the head. “I don’t... I don’t think I want to tell Mom and Dad yet. It’s really early. Anything could happen. At least, I’ve heard people say that in movies, so I’m pretty sure it’s true.”
“Yeah. That’s true. I think.”
“So, we don’t need to worry about them. Yet. Maybe at all.”
Sierra swallowed hard.
“And your boss?”
“Yeah, him I will have to tell. Not just because I might have to take time off fo
r morning sickness, but because it is his baby.”
Madison forced a smile that looked more like a grimace. “Okay. Do you want me to go with you?”
Sierra shook her head. “No, I’m going to have to tell him on my own. He’s really not terrible. He’s actually been really nice lately. I’m pretty positive he won’t want an audience. And I’m sure that he won’t...freak out.”
“Are you sure?”
“Well, no. Because I have a feeling that I’m about two seconds away from completely freaking out.”
Madison wrapped her arm around Sierra’s shoulders and started to lead her from the bathroom. “Come on. Let’s go back to Copper Ridge. I’m driving, so you can freak out in the car.”
“I will take you up on that.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
THERE WAS SOMETHING different about the way Sierra walked in at the start of her shift. It took a few steps for Ace to realize just what it was.
She wasn’t bouncing.
She crossed the room, her hands locked in front of her, her lips pressed into a flat line. “Can I talk to you?”
“Sure,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest and leaning back against the edge of the bar.
She looked around, her expression shifted. “Not here.”
“Do you need help burying a body? Because I’m not that involved of a boss.”
“I’m serious,” she said, closing her eyes. “I need to talk to you in your office.”
His stomach twisted, his heart pounding a dull rhythm in his chest. Because there was something about all of this, all of this great seriousness that seemed a little bit too familiar. That picked hard at the thing he had been trying to ignore for the past few weeks. But he wasn’t going to guess.
In spite of that resolution, his brain was trying to do a lot of guessing as they walked through the bar area, past the other employees and into his office. He shut the door behind them, and she turned the lock.
For one, strange fraction of a second he thought maybe she was going to try and seduce him again. Well, she wouldn’t have to try and seduce him, he was seduced already. He was just doing a better job at holding himself back from acting on it.
If she took a step toward him, he knew that all of his restraint would be gone.
