Chapter 48
***Aggie***
“I’m not driving you any farther unless you agree to at least take a fast shower and brush your hair before you see them.” Dad cast a long look at me and made a face. “You’re not winning anyone over right now.”
I scoffed. “I’m not trying to win anyone over. I’m going there to kill them, one by one, for turning my face into a news story!”
“Uh huh.” Dad turned away from the city, towards home. “Donnie took your car to the shop a few days ago, so your only way into the city is looking at you right now.”
“This is insane.” I crossed my arms over my chest and shook my head at his antics. “This isn’t some sweet love story, Dad. This is humiliating!”
He hummed along with the radio. “Yep. Humiliating. Sure.”
“You should want to strangle them, too!”
“Why?” He laughed at the frustrated scream I let out. “Are you ready to hear the answer to your question?”
I bit my lip and paused. Had the guys reached out to him? “Yes.”
“Shower and brush your hair? You look like hell. Promise me that and I’ll tell you.”
I glared at him. “Fine. I promise. Maybe I’ll even put on a pretty dress and curl my hair, for God’s sake.”
“I’m changing the promise. You have to wear a pretty dress and curl your hair.” Dad grinned like the cat who ate the canary and turned onto the road to the farm. “I’m brilliant.”
“I’m not wearing a dress.”
“Do you want to know if they called? Maybe even some details?”
I hissed out a breath and agreed to his demands. “Now, just tell me.”
“They messaged me every day.” He chuckled. “Persistent little shits.”
Staring at my dad, I felt a wave of heat hit me. The anger that had slacked with exhaustion came raging back to the surface. “You spoke to them every day?”
He parked in front of the house and turned the truck off. “Not at first. I wanted to knock their heads together for being so stupid. Seeing you so hurt wasn’t easy to sit back and let go.”
“But?”
“They love you, Ag. I could feel it in every message they sent me. Those are messages I’ll keep forever, so if I ever worry about you, I can see them and feel comforted.” He reached over and patted my knee. “They made mistakes. They’ve paid for them, in my opinion.”
I shoved the truck door open and got out, just to lean back in and jab a finger at him. “How could you keep that from me?”
“They didn’t want me to tell you, Ag. They wanted to respect your choice and I was inclined to agree with them. Your mother was never great at being led in a certain direction, either. I hoped you’d forgive them eventually and I knew that my pushing you to do it wouldn’t help.”
“Did you tell them things? Did you tell them I was pregnant before I could?”
“Hell no. That wasn’t my place. I haven’t spoken to them since we left for our trip and you conveniently had us pretend to not own cellphones.
Whatever you wrote to them in that letter must’ve pushed them to act.
Last I spoke to them, they were still sad sacks, all three of them depressed and moping. ”
I frowned. “Did they ask about me?”
Dad laughed easily, unfazed by my anger. “God, yes. Daily. I’ll be glad when you go back to them so I can quit giving them daily reports of how you are, what you ate, if you cried. Honestly, if you don’t see that they love you, Agatha Bailey, you’re trying not to see it.”
“They asked if I cried?” My heart thumped painfully in my chest. “And what I ate?”
“I’ll show you some day, Ag. But for now, I need you to go get showered and dressed. I’m dying to get back home and sleep in a real bed tonight. Next time I think a road trip is a good vacation, remind me that my back is too old to sleep on the ground.”
I stared at him for a moment more, debating what he was saying, but I could see he wasn’t budging. I grunted and shut the door, talking to him through the open window. “I’ll be back in less than ten minutes.”
“If you’re not in a dress, this truck isn’t moving.”
Moving through the motions of showering and getting dressed felt like moving through quicksand.
I didn’t care about anything except confronting the guys.
Everything agitated me as I tried to rush and ended up taking longer than if I’d just moved around normally.
When I did make it back to the truck, I was so frustrated that I wanted to hit something.
“Wow, Ag. You look...”
“Dumb? Yeah, I’m aware.”
Dad didn’t take his eyes off me. “You look stunning. Just like your mom when she was pregnant with you.”
I blinked away tears and flashed him a quick smile. “My stomach is sticking out a little, but the other dresses I owned made it look even worse.”
He wiped his own eyes and started the truck. “You’re beautiful. You’re going to make those men the happiest men in the world, honey. They’re lucky to have you.”
I crossed my arms over my belly and sighed. “I’m not theirs. I’m just going to tell them to stop their ad campaign.”
“Is that perfume you put on?”
“You’re a pain in the ass, Dad.” I huffed and turned away from him. “It’s just the body wash I used.”
The smile on his face could be heard so clearly in his voice. “And the mascara?”
“Shut up.” I blew out a controlled breath and squeezed my shaking hands between my thighs. I didn’t know what to expect when I saw them. I was nervous. “What if it’s all a joke?”
“You shut up.” Dad chuckled, not a care in the world. “I can’t wait to tell you I told you so.”
“You’re insufferable.”
“You’re stubborn.”
I stared out the windshield and swallowed past the lump in my throat. There was no more swallowing it down. It was too big for that. Any minute, it was going to turn into a sob, but there was nothing I could do about it. Pregnancy made me weak.
The closer we got to the city, the more I shook. I was driving myself crazy, going through a million scenarios. Like always with them, though, I couldn’t work out any solutions. I got to a certain point of the imagined conversation and just...froze.
“If you do lose your mind and decide to beat up another rich guy, do you have my number memorized?” Dad asked with a giant smile as he pulled to the curb in front of TGC.
“I can’t deal with you anymore, old man. Go home.”
“So, you don’t think you’ll need me for a ride home, then?” He laughed and waved out the window. “You’re being spotted, honey. You’d better hurry.”
I glanced back and saw people pointing at me and pulling out their phones. Renewed anger filled me as I got out of the truck. “Well, I guess the baby is about to be out of the bag. There’s no hiding it in this dress. Tell the cousins before they read it somewhere else.”
Dad tipped his imaginary hat at me and winked. “Love you!”
“Love you, too, Dad.”