Chapter 59
***Memphis***
Carter sat across from me at the patio table and ate his breakfast while I drank a smoothie. He lifted his head to look at me every so often, but mostly he didn’t need company. He was a solo boy, through and through. Meanwhile, I was desperate to speak to someone who could speak back.
I was doing everything I was supposed to do, according to Bea, who I thought might have a dominatrix streak to her, but I still couldn’t escape the truth of what I’d done and what I’d lost. No amount of food, soap, or sleep was going to fix me.
It didn’t help that their mom’s books were made up of a large percentage of romance novels.
I’d read through everything else, from a homeschooling book to a book that just described illnesses and medical procedures.
If I wanted to read anything else, it had to be romance and I couldn’t do it.
It’d only been a week since all hell broke loose.
I couldn’t remember the conversion formula for how much time was acceptable for grieving a relationship, but I was still in my allotted time frame. Probably.
I’d been avoiding going outside the front door because I was frankly terrified of seeing the guys again.
Throwing myself at their feet and begging for forgiveness probably wouldn’t get me very far, but it was what I figured I’d do.
Staying inside the house day in and day out was slowly driving me back to the point of insanity.
Seeing how easily I’d slid into that pit of despair really made me aware of how fragile I was at that point in time.
Bea stopped by once a day, but she said she was so busy at the main house that she couldn’t come more than that and she never got to stay long. I worried that I’d made her hate me, too. There were a lot of hours in the day for me to just sit and think. I was going to have to venture out.
Carter finished his breakfast and cleaned himself while staring at me. When he was done, he strolled over to the steps I’d made him and left me sitting there.
“That leaves me no choice.” I finished my smoothie and washed my cup before looking through my clothes and wondering if I could make my wardrobe last through a pregnancy. Most of my clothes being too small wasn’t a good sign.
I had one dress made of out a T-shirt material and while it technically fit, looking at myself in it made me feel beyond strange. It hugged my belly and made me look way more pregnant than I felt. It was also fire-engine red, so I felt like the Kool-Aid man.
I wasn’t going to let a dress stop me from going out and hopefully running into a friendly face. I just wouldn’t look at a mirror again. No problem.
The front door felt like a portal to a land I wasn’t supposed to enter. I felt like I was breaking all kinds of laws when I walked quietly down the path and out of the gate. I almost felt like a cat burglar, if cat burglars were starting to waddle and wore the least sneaky outfit ever.
I kept to my side of the maze and just walked around the path, looking at the flowers and hoping to run into Pete, especially. I nearly cried when I wound my way around a curve in the path and saw Pete trimming a hedge across the way. I moved off the path and rushed across the yard to see him.
“Pete! Oh, thank God. I’ve—” I cut myself off when I saw the look on his face as he saw me coming at him. “What’s wrong?”
He started gathering his tools and just held them to his chest as he made a quick beeline towards the main house. When I called his name a second time, he stopped and turned to face me with a sad look on his face. “I’m so sorry, Memphis. I can’t lose this job. You know it’s perfect for me.”
I held out my hands, trying to show that I had no ill intent. “I don’t want you to lose your job either, Pete. I was just coming to see if I could help you with anything. I...what’s going on?”
He looked around us and moved closer. “They told us all if we interact with you, they’ll fire us. They’re serious, honey. I’ve never seen them like this.”
I froze. “They said they would fire anyone who talked to me? Are you sure they said that? That’s so crazy, Pete.”
He looked over his shoulder and started backing away. “They made it very clear, Memphis. I’m sorry.”
I stared after him as he rushed away from me, dropping tools and scrambling to grab them as he went.
I couldn’t understand it at first. It didn’t make a difference if I talked to their staff.
Unless they wanted to hurt me. Cutting me off from their staff meant taking my friends away, leaving me miserable and all alone at the back of their property.
Anger was slow to build, but once it did, I’d worked myself into a frenzy.
It was wrong, what they were doing. I was stomping across the yard, towards the main house, without taking a moment to consider if it was a good idea.
I was going to give them a piece of my mind.
I deserved their hate and coldness, but making me suffer all alone was cruel.
I burst in through the backdoor and went towards the dining room, where I heard speaking and could smell something delicious. If they were shocked to see me standing at the end of the dining room table, blazing mad, they didn’t show it.
I planted my hands on my hips and opened my mouth to shout the house down, but seeing them was a hit right to the chest. They looked different somehow.
I wasn’t sure what it was, but they did.
Their coldness was like a second skin that disguised the men I loved.
I hated it. I hated everything about what I’d done and how I’d hurt them.
Jake’s words came back to me then. Hurt people hurt people. I’d hurt them and they were getting even. I didn’t like it, but I’d started it.
I let my arms fall loosely to my sides and did what I’d tried to do but hadn’t been able to.
“I’m sorry. I am so incredibly sorry for hurting y’all.
I didn’t think past my own selfish needs when I lied about where I’m from and my background for the surrogacy application.
I should’ve known better and I should’ve been a better person.
I deserve your anger. I earned it with every lie I told.
I hope you know that my feelings, our time together, that was all real.
“You probably don’t trust a single thing I say and I understand that, but I felt everything.
It was me, through and through. I talked to Knox about you constantly, so much that he probably knows everything about all of you.
Each of you mean so much to me and I’m just so sorry I didn’t tell you the whole truth before all of this. ”
They didn’t look up at me. I knew they heard me because they’d frozen in place, but they wouldn’t even look at me.
“Please, give me a chance to explain everything. Give me a chance to make it right. I’ll prove to you that I’m the woman you spent so much time with.
I don’t want it to end. I don’t want to lose y’all.
I...I love you. I love each of you and it’s killing me that I hurt you.
” I’d started crying at some point and the tears poured out of me.
They still didn’t look up at me. “Did you hear me? I love you! I love each of you so damn much in a way that I never thought I would feel. Just...look at me! Please!”
Nothing changed. They didn’t budge.
“I don’t need the money. Let me prove to you that it’s not about the money, or anything else.
I just want the three of you in my life.
I’ll sign something right now that says I’ll forfeit the money.
I’ll move out and find a job. I can support myself and show you that it’s not about any of that.
Just give me a chance. I’m begging you.”
The silence was deafening again. I felt fingers wrap around my hand and looked back to see Bea, her face etched in pain. She gently pulled me out of the room and down the hallway that would leave me on the outside again.
“I’m so sorry, Memphis. Let me walk you back to the house and we can just cry together tonight. Okay?” She wiped tears from my cheeks and clenched my hand hard. “I think it’s time we talked about something I should’ve told you from the start.”