Chapter 12 Amara
AMARA
Positive.
I would expect the nurse to tell Ransome in private, but as soon as she says she has the papers, he barks out for the answer. And since people don’t usually say no to Ransome, especially when he’s in a fit of rage, she blurts out the answer. An answer I already knew without question.
And yet it feels like a nail in a coffin.
The baby is Ransome’s. He knows that now. And I am guessing, by the look on his face, he will stop at nothing to make sure we go back to NYC with him.
Of course, my overprotective siblings aren’t so keen on the idea, especially my younger brother.
“No fucking way,” Gianni says. “She’s not going anywhere.”
“I don’t think that’s for you to decide, kid,” Ransome says.
“She’s my sister,” he argues.
“She’s carrying my child.”
“A child you didn’t even know about because you exiled us out of the state of New York!”
“You would be dead if you had stayed there,” Ransome states.
“And you will be dead if you kidnap my sister and my nephew!”
“That’s enough!” I snap at both of them. “Nobody is going to tell me where I’m going or where I’m not going.”
“He can’t just come in here and demand a paternity test and then decide your future for you,” Gianni snaps. “Again.”
“I agree,” Eliza adds bravely. “She’s been through enough in the past year. We all have. And it doesn’t look like much, but we’ve made a life for ourselves here. A nice one, even. Uprooting her isn’t going to be good for her health or the baby’s.”
“Amara is carrying a Rozanov heir,” Ransome says. His words make Gianni snort and swear under his breath, but he chooses to ignore it. “No son of mine is going to grow up in the middle of nowhere.”
“She does get some say in that, you know,” Eliza says.
“She’s right,” I agree. “I do get a say. And what I say right now is that I need the three of you to go home.”
“What?” Gianni snaps.
“Amara…” Eliza argues.
“I mean it,” I say. “You guys need rest and you shouldn’t miss any school or work. Go on home and let me talk to Ransome.”
“You’re talking to him just fine,” Gianni grumbles.
“Alone,” I say. “Now go home and let me figure things out.”
My siblings are reluctant, but after a moment of them staring at me and me not blinking, they listen.
“Let us know if you need anything at all.” Eliza hugs me from one side, Bella from the other.
I force myself not to cry. “I will.”
“And don’t let this jerk pull one over on you.” Gianni scowls. “We have rights, and that baby is just as much Parker as he is Rozanov.”
“Thank you, Gianni. Now go.”
He’s the last to leave. As he walks out, he shoots Ransome one last glare.
Once they’re gone, my attention falls on Ransome. He’s staring out the window like we’re standing in his office back in New York. It floods me with memories, ones I’m not really sure how to feel about.
“Before you say anything,” I start, “you should know that I’m not giving up my baby just because you are the father. And by the way, I always knew you were the father. It would be biologically impossible for him to belong to anyone else.”
“Him,” he muses without turning around. His voice is hollow, and I can’t read the tone. But I don’t really care right now. “Since when have you known?”
“That I was pregnant?”
“That he was a boy.”
Right. Of course that’s all he cares about. Not that I’m pregnant with his child, but that I’m carrying his heir. Fucking medieval. “My first appointment was an ultrasound. They said I was far enough along to see the sex. I wanted to know.”
“You waited that long to go to the doctor?”
If I didn’t know better, I’d almost think that was concern in his voice. Worry. For me and the baby.
But I do know better. At this point, it’s pretty clear to me how Ransome Rozanov thinks, and what he considers worth thinking about.
His legacy.
“Hard to find a doctor while driving cross-country,” I mumble.
“You could have stopped.”
“No, Ransome, I couldn’t have.” I draw myself up as much as I can.
“I was on the run. I had my three younger siblings packed into a car with nothing but the clothes on their backs. I needed to find a place to live. One that was far enough to fit your requirements, by the way. And ideally, somewhere I wasn’t going to be stalked, or kidnapped, or shot dead in my sleep.
” My tone is dripping with sarcasm now. “Two out of three, I guess.”
“I understand,” Ransome says.
“Yeah, right.”
“I mean it.” He finally turns around to face me. “I get it. I do.”
And maybe it’s because I see something on his face. A shadow of an emotion that isn’t just anger, and isn’t just betrayal.
But for a second, I believe him.
“You do?”
“Yeah.” Ransome nods gravely, like he’s made a decision. “I’m not going to drag you home kicking and screaming.”
Oh.
Well, I guess that’s something.
But I’m not negotiating with the devil to be satisfied with something. That’s the bare minimum, and the days I would have accepted that from Ransome are long fucking gone.
“This is my home now,” I say.
“You’re right.” Again, his words surprise me. “But you need the best care. For you and our son.”
“Our son.”
I roll it over my tongue. It sounds so odd. I’ve gotten used to the idea of the little guy inside of me being my son, but hearing the word come out of Ransome’s mouth is… something.
“Yes. Our son. He needs the best of the best. He’s a Rozanov. And you’re not going to be able to get that kind of care here.”
I should have known. All those pretty words, and what for? To buy himself an easier time pushing his agenda.
Disappointment curls inside me. “So you are asking me to go back to New York.”
And then, before I know it, Ransome is sitting next to me on the bed.
His expression isn’t hard. It’s actually… gentle. In its own, carved-in-ice way.
“I want the best care for you too,” he tells me.
But I’m not buying it. “Of course you do. The two kind of go hand in hand. If I’m not healthy, the baby isn’t healthy. It would only make sense for you to care by default.”
I know I’m being a bitch, but I think I’ve earned that right. After all, I have been living in a knock-off version of Manhattan on his orders. Now he changes his mind, and I’m supposed to just trot back? Like a well-trained dog?
Fuck, no.
I’m wrapped up in those thoughts when he jerks me away from them with a single sentence.
“I care about you too, Amara.”
All I can do is blink.
Ransome has never spoken to me that way. He’s been sweet, in his own way. Soft, as much as he is capable of being.
But this is different. And while I search his expression for a motive, I can’t seem to find one.
He’s being so… human.
“I feel like I owe you an apology.”
If I wasn’t already laying down, his words would have knocked me on my ass.
“Oh?” I ask, all breath.
“Yeah. I don’t think I ever treated you the way I should have, considering the amount of weight you were carrying between your two jobs.
Not to mention the position you were put in with my family and even the Chadovichs.
” He pauses, long enough that I start to wonder if that’s it.
But it’s not. “I should have taken better care of you. I shouldn’t have accused you of being unfaithful.
And from here on out, that’s what you’re going to get.
The best care possible. Not just for the baby, but for your needs as well. ”
I swallow hard. It’s all I’ve ever wanted to hear him say and then some. Everything I allowed myself to dream about in my moments of weakness, up here, surrounded by mountains and memories.
Then narrow my eyes a little. “And what’s the catch?”
He shakes his head once. “No catch. Just me realizing that I need to treat you better. That I owe you for everything you’ve done for me. I want to make this right, in any way you see fit. But I can’t do it from across the country. I need you to trust me and come home with me, dorogoya.”
Dorogoya. It means sweetheart. I looked it up the first time he said it and have fallen asleep hearing him say it over and over. I honestly never thought I’d hear it again. A lot of things he is saying, I never thought I’d hear.
Yet here we are.
“I want to trust you,” I tell him. “But it’s a little hard, considering the way you reacted to those photos of Tristan and me. To that video.”
Ransome bites his lips. His eyes fill with thought. Who knew they could even do that—react with anything but impulse. “I understand. I jumped to conclusions. The idea of seeing you with another man, and that man specifically… It just filled me with a rage I can’t explain.”
“Why?”
Ransome looks at me incredulously. “Why? I’ve heard pregnancy brain is a thing, but you do remember who you belong to, don’t you?”
I swallow hard. Meanwhile, I’m pinching myself under the blanket. Surely this isn’t real. Surely Ransome Rozanov isn’t standing here in my hospital room asking me to come back to New York, claiming that I am still his.
I should tell him to shove off. To get lost. I should go back to my house, back to the new life my siblings and I have built.
Move on and never look back. Even if my time with him was the wildest, hottest time of my life.
Even if I still dream of the orgasms he gave me and the warmth of his hands when he pulled me close after.
I should tell him to leave and never think of him again.
But I don’t.
“You,” I say softly. “I belonged to you.”
“You still do, Amara. And I want… need… to know you are being taken care of. By me. Personally.”
Ransome waits for a response, but I literally have no idea what to say.
I’m honestly having a hard time believing any of this is real.
I would be lying if I said there wasn’t a small part of me that always dreamed of this happening.
I laid awake at night hoping something like this would happen.
And yet, now that it’s actually happening, I don’t really know how to feel about it.
Which is why I haven’t said yes.
And I’m going to need more convincing if I’m going to.