by Jaymin Eve
I nodded my understanding. "Of course," I whispered, "because what if he was the one who’d hurt me, right?"
The doctor nodded. "He was in the waiting room during your examination, but I haven't seen him in a few hours. Are you happy to grant him access if he comes back?"
"Y-yes. Yeah. He's, uh, he is..." I couldn't even say the fucking words out loud. I wasn't ready to be a mother, no way in hell. On reflex, though, my hand went to my still-flat belly, and Dr. Mooney nodded.
"Got it," she said with a smile. "I'll make a note on your file. In the meantime, are you hungry? I'll get a tray of food sent up."
My stomach chose that moment to gurgle loudly, and I gave a watery smile. "Apparently."
My doctor laughed. "Alright, just try to rest. A nurse will be back to check on you soon." She gave my forearm another reassuring squeeze, then left my room with her folder of notes tucked under her arm.
Sinking into my bed, I tried to wrap my mind around the fact that I hadn't lost my baby yet. A baby I'd never even truly known existed until today. Placing my hands flat on my stomach, I just breathed in and out, feeling this moment.
Movement in the doorway caught my attention, and my head jerked up as I searched for the tall, gorgeous, dark skin of Dylan. Only the person there was not his height, and the only dark part of her was the hair and clothing she wore.
Riley Deboise. The absolute last person on the planet I wanted to see. I would have even preferred Blake because at least I could attempt to murder him if he were here. But Riley... what was she doing here? Was it to accuse me of more underhanded shit? Was she here to end things between Dylan and me? Was this about gloating or something? Warning me off the company fortune?
Today, I really wasn’t in the fucking mood as I was still bleeding from the last shit I’d encountered due to Riley and her company.
A hesitant smile crossed her face that I didn't bother to return. "Would it be okay if I came inside?" she asked, sounding less like the ballbuster she had at the camp.
I wanted to say no. I really wanted to say no, but the chance I might learn where Dylan was and what had happened to the men who’d attacked us had me nodding. "Sure, I guess so."
She crossed and pulled the chair from the wall, placing it right at my side. Great, looked like she was in for the long haul.
22
The silence between us felt awkward on my side, but Riley didn't look uncomfortable. I mean, her shoulders might have been a little stiff, but I wasn't going to make it easier on her. She’d come to my hospital room, so whatever she had to say, it was up to her to handle it.
"I think I owe you a bit of an apology."
I almost fell out of bed and nearly killed my child for the second time today.
"What?"
She twisted her hands in front of her. "In truth, my tendency to charge in headfirst was part of my personality before I ran a Fortune 500 company. Since taking over Delta, it's only gotten worse, and I understand now my previous approach was maybe not the best way to deal with this situation. I didn't think of you as a person with emotions and shit, more as a threat I needed to contain and deal with."
Swallowing down the lump in my throat, I simply stared at her.
"Dylan assures me that you did not steal from us." She lifted her head to nail me with those blue-as-blue eyes. "And I believe and trust that is the truth. Not giving you a chance to even defend yourself with my abrasive approach was wrong of me."
I sensed that she didn't apologize often. Most of the time, in her world, people no doubt bowed down and worshipped every word out of her mouth. This apology meant a lot more because of that.
"I'm sorry too," I murmured, my voice raspy as I tried to clear my throat again. "I should have stayed, acted like an adult and dealt with the situation until we had it resolved."
Riley slumped forward. "Yeah, we both kind of royally screwed up, but you know what? We lived to tell the tale, and if there's one thing I've learned in my few years running with these guys, it's that if you're alive, there is always hope. Always a chance to right the wrongs."
Speaking of. "Where are the guys?"
One in particular, if I was being truly honest.
Riley straightened, her face drifting between annoyance and exasperation as she drew her brows together and let out a huff. "Dylan took off to kill Blake, and of course Beck had to follow his brother and keep him safe."
"What?" I startled, then moaned as my ribs screamed at me.
Riley immediately fussed at me, pushing me back to the bed. "Come on, girl. You can't be hurting yourself like that."
"Why did Dylan go after Blake?" I asked with urgency, ignoring her hands pushing at me. "What was he thinking?"
I looked around for a phone, but there was nothing in reach and I still didn't have a cell. "Don't bother,” Riley said, clearly figuring out what I was after. “He smashed his phone."
At this point, I reached out and latched onto her arm, not even caring if I was grabbing a billionaire who could have me thrown in prison for assault. "Tell me every fucking thing," I demanded.
She only laughed, seeming unoffended. "Dylan was mainly speaking in four letter words." Her amusement died off as her expression turned serious. "But the basic idea I got was that he seemed to think Blake... raped you?"
I blinked at her. "Are you serious?" What... why? I mean, in what fucking universe would he think that?
Riley nodded. "Oh yeah, he was raging about you being pregnant and bleeding and how he had to kill Blake for a multitude of reasons."
"Blake is my brother," I said, tasting bile in my mouth. "Why would he think he'd be the father of my baby?"
Riley's complexion shifted to something quite green. "Yeah, in our world that's not as weird as you might think."
"Your world is fucked up."
Riley snorted. "You have no idea."
There was a moment of silence as we both absorbed the insanity of what she’d just said, until finally I had to speak. "It's Dylan's baby."
Now it was her turn to be rendered near speechless. She stared at me, and then her eyes shifted to my stomach before returning once again to my face. "Are you sure?"
My laughter at this point was dark and near hysterical. "I was a seventeen-year-old virgin when we met. I've never had sex with another man, including my damn brother. So, yeah, I'm pretty sure."
Riley opened and closed her mouth, before she slumped into the chair. "And you almost lost it?"
I nodded. "Yeah, they're still watching me pretty closely. I have total bed rest and minimum movement. At the moment, there’s a heartbeat, but I did suffer a shit ton of damage. It's basically in God's hands right now."
God, yeah, like I truly believed in that.
Riley was suddenly scrambling for her phone, yanking it up and smashing buttons so fast that there was no way she knew who she was dialing. "Come on, Beck." She cursed as the phone started to ring. "Fucking answer."
"What are you doing?" I asked, but she barely acknowledged me, too busy glaring at the screen as she sent off a superfast text. And then another and another. Her phone pinged a minute later, and then another four times in the next four seconds.
"Fuck!" She shot to her feet, stomping around the room. "Evan and Jasper have no idea where they are, and Beck is not answering his phone."
"Riley!" I shouted, and she stopped her frantic pacing. "Stop stressing. I don't need Dylan here to hold my hand. I have handled most of the shit in my life alone, and I expect this will be no different."
She just shook her head and laughed. "Oh Brooke, my sweet, naive, Brooke. Dylan is going to be so far up your ass for the rest of your life that you'll actually wonder if he's a new growth you might have to surgically remove."
My face scrunched up as the mental image of that flashed across my face. "Just because I'm pregnant doesn't mean we’re going to play happy family. Fuck, it doesn't even mean I'll be pregnant tomorrow. I'm still lightly bleeding, there's nothing they can do to definitively save th
e fetus right now, and… let’s be real, Dylan does not want to be a father."
I’d seen his face. The utter shock on it was one thing, but there’d been so much more there I hadn’t had time to unpack.
Riley wore a knowing look, like I was being an idiot but she would indulge me because I was pregnant. "We look after our own, Brooklyn. Even before the baby, I knew you were going to be part of our world. Dylan would never have ripped us to shreds for just anyone. I've never met anyone he cared enough about to fight for like this. And that was long before the baby news."
My hospital door smashed open and two hulking dudes lurched through the doorway. After being attacked by strangers, I wasn't sure if I should panic or not, but when the nurse followed a moment later, shouting at them, I simply lay back to watch it all play out.
"You are not allowed in here!" she yelled, trying to wrestle them out the door.
Guy one, who wore his blond hair in a shaggy, surfer do, slapped a smart-assy sort of smirk on his face. "Nurse lady, seriously, you don't want to get in our way. We're the major donors for this hospital, and there's nothing you can do to stop us."
She went super pale, which was impressive since her heritage seemed to be from an Asian country. "My apologies, sir. I didn't recognize you in casual clothing."
He waved her off, and before she could say another word, ushered her out the door and slammed it closed. Then, blondie and his brown-haired friend spun to smile at Riley.
"I told you fucking idiots to stay in the lobby and keep guard," Riley snapped. "What are you doing in Brooklyn's room?"
Blondie moved closer, examining me as if I was some sort of science experiment. "We can protect you better from here," he said, and I saw the gun at his waist. He'd concealed it so well I hadn't noticed it until now.
Riley sighed. "This is Jasper," she said to me, "and the other is Evan."
Their names gave the flash of recognition that their faces hadn’t. The other heirs, in the flesh, and I honestly didn't recognize them at all. Though to be fair, I pretty much only stared at Dylan whenever Delta was on the news, and occasionally Beck and Riley because they were just so striking. The other two were a bit faceless and nameless to me.
At least they had been until this point. Funnily enough, they were both very handsome, tall and muscular, and I wondered if “supermodel hot” was the minimum requirement to join their crew.
"This is Brooke," Riley continued. "She’s our current mission to protect, so I need you both at your top game—"
"Do you think I still need a protection duty?" I interrupted.
Jasper nodded. "Oh yeah. And that was before we found out about the..." His eyes dropped to my mid-section. "But, yeah, D asked us to watch over you while he killed a motherfucker, and as much as I wished I could go on a hunting trip, I'm expecting some action here too."
Anxiousness gripped my chest, and I shook my head. "No, I'm done with all of that. No more action here, thanks."
Evan just gave a casual shrug. "It'd be cool if that's how it worked."
Jasper snorted a laugh and shot his friend a look. Clearly, I was missing some inside joke there... or perhaps their lives really were dramatic enough that this was their version of normal.
Riley let out a long sigh. "What Tweedledee and Tweedledum mean is that until the blueprints have been recovered, goons are going to keep coming for you. Your brother has been messing with some seriously dangerous people who are not nearly as understanding as Delta-Huntley."
I wrinkled my nose. "You're the benchmark for understanding?"
She gave me an amused grin. "Well... we didn't put you in the hospital, did we?"
"Fair point," I mumbled with a wince. My hand moved back to my midsection, like I was subconsciously comforting my baby. How the hell I'd gone from praying I wasn't pregnant to desperately needing my baby to be okay, I had no idea. Near-death experiences tended to provide profound moments of clarity, though.
For me, it was simple. I wanted this baby, no matter what Dylan had to say about it.
"I think Blake’s dead," I said, my head a mess of random thoughts. "The guys that attacked last night told me they’d tortured him to get the information. I doubt they would have just cut him loose after he spilled his guts."
Jasper snickered. "Knowing who he tried to screw over, I’d say they probably literally spilled his guts."
Riley scowled and shot him a death glare. "Shut the fuck up, dickhead. That's Brooklyn's brother."
"Her brother who systematically beat the crap out of her for years," Evan reminded her. "I doubt Brooklyn would be real cut up if that douche was pig chow right now, right, B?"
What was with these guys using nicknames for everyone? Not that I minded. It gave me a small, warm, fuzzy feeling, like I was somehow a part of their crew. B, like D.
"Not really," I admitted, "but it would be nice to know for sure that he's really dead. Because if he's not..." I shuddered, then groaned as the movement made my ribs protest. "I hope he is. But I'm just saying, Dylan is wasting his time. If Blake’s alive he won’t be found."
Jasper and Evan exchanged a look, but it was Riley who replied.
"Sometimes, you just gotta let them get it out of their systems. He still thinks your brother has been raping as well as beating you, so right now he's dealing with some serious anger issues." She gave me a lopsided smile. "You'll get used to it, the alpha male bullshit. Dylan is almost as bad as Beck in that department."
The boys grinned, and Riley rolled her eyes before they could make any smart remarks.
"Dickheads, can you fuck off back to the waiting room? Brooklyn is meant to be resting and shit. You're suffocating us with all this testosterone. Shoo."
Still smirking, they gave sarcastic salutes, filed back out of my hospital room, and closed the door behind themselves, leaving me alone with the girl who—until recently—I’d fully believed Dylan to be in love with.
Maybe that was a conversation we needed to have.
23
As it turned out, Riley Duboise wasn't quite the big, bad bitch I'd made her out to be in my brain. I mean, we were a long way from being friends, but after spending the better part of a day with her hanging out in my hospital room... yeah, she wasn't so bad.
The most important takeaway from my bonding time with Riley? The absolute, unquestionable certainty that her and Dylan were never going to be a thing. She admitted he'd had a crush on her back when her and Beck first got together but that was a thing that’d long since passed.
"Dylan faux-dates," she'd told me when I’d questioned her about all the models and actresses he was constantly photographed with. "He makes public appearances with women he barely knows, girls that the Delta-Huntley PR manager sets him up with. But it's just for show. I don't even think he fucks them at the end of the night."
I'd cringed at that, but deep down it made me weirdly pleased. Did that mean he hadn't been whoring that monster cock out all over town while we were hooking up?
Our conversation shifted onto more neutral topics after that, but an hour or so later it drifted back to Dylan.
Or, more accurately, Dylan and me and how the fuck I'd ended up a homeless, pregnant eighteen-year-old.
"So, a seventeen-year-old virgin when you guys hooked up, huh?" Riley asked with all the tact of a freight train. "How'd that conversation go down? I'm guessing there was alcohol involved."
My cheeks flamed crimson, and I groaned. "There was definitely alcohol involved, and... it just didn't."
She frowned in confusion, sipping a coffee that Jasper had fetched not long ago. "I'm not following."
I drew a deep breath and puffed out my cheeks as I exhaled. "The conversation... it just didn't happen. I was out with my cousin that night, using her ID to buy a drink, and when Dylan assumed I was her, I just went with it. We look pretty similar, so..." I shrugged, embarrassed as hell to finally confess this lie.
Riley looked stunned. "Wait. Wait. You had sex that night, and you never told him you
were a virgin before?"
I shook my head, my face aflame.
"Well, shit. What did he say when he found out?" She looked like she was on the verge of laughter.
I groaned again, covering my face with my hands. Luckily, Riley was a smart girl and caught on without me needing to say it. She sucked in a shocked gasp and started chuckling.
"Oh my god. He doesn't know? How? How the fuck was that even possible? I mean this in the most platonic way possible, but I've seen his dick and you're a tiny girl. There would have been evidence..."
I mentally kicked myself for deciding to be so painfully honest. But I was down the rabbit hole now. "We were in the shower and it was dark. Just candlelight. So... you know... no evidence to be seen."
Riley gaped at me with a mixture of shock, amusement, and admiration. "Wow. Just... wow. I feel like I underestimated you, Brooklyn."
I snorted a bitter laugh. "I wish that were true, but I doubt it. I'm pretty fucking unremarkable on the best of days. A broken bird, Dylan called me, and he was totally right."
"I did not." The familiar rumble of that voice shocked right through me like an electric bolt. "You called yourself a broken bird, Brooke. I've never thought of you that way."
My mouth opened, but no words came out as I stared wide-eyed at the gorgeous man in the doorway of my room. I hadn't even heard the door open, too caught up in my conversation with Riley. Fuck, how long had he been standing there? Had he heard my confession?
Screw it. I was going to need to tell him sooner or later; otherwise, he was likely to ask for a paternity test or something.
"I'm... going to leave you two to talk," Riley said in an exaggerated whisper. She gave my wrist a reassuring squeeze, then grabbed her jacket from the chair and headed for the door. She paused in front of Dylan, tilting her neck back to look up at him. Whatever she said was too quiet for me to hear, but based on the way his eyes narrowed and his jaw clenched, he didn't like it.
She turned briefly to shoot me a smile, then left the room. Part of me wanted so badly to call her back, but that would give away just how freaking nervous I was about Dylan and I being alone.
