Chapter 10
ten
RYLEE
Rylee turned off her side and onto her back the moment her eyes opened. It was the sanitation truck outside of her brownstone that woke her. That, and the queasiness of her stomach.
She groaned as she pulled herself up into a seated position.
Rylee shouldn’t have been sleeping at that hour. It was 10 a.m., and on any other Tuesday, she would have been down in the basement in her home office, speaking with clients after dropping her children off at school.
But the kids had spent the night at Lennox’s parents’s home at their insistence, so they’d taken the children to school. And that was a good thing, considering how upset Rylee’s stomach felt that morning.
She kicked the covers off herself and stepped off the bed, heading straight to the bathroom.
On her way there, she tried to recall what she ate the night before.
Tomato soup and a grilled cheese sandwich. She always kept it simple when it was just her and when the kids were away.
But that didn’t explain it. She had a light meal that she’s prepared plenty of times in the past. It just didn’t make sense how upset her stomach felt.
“Let me just brush my teeth,” she reasoned with herself, as if trying to self-soothe. It was her attempt at pushing away the sensation that was creeping up her throat.
She was on the final few seconds of her brushing routine when she noted the day.
Specifically, the date.
Rylee’s period was like clockwork after having her son. Though it was once irregular, now it arrived the same time every month.
But it had been a few weeks since her cycle should’ve started.
The realization almost made her swallow the toothpaste in her mouth.
What started as a gradual thought turned into a slow, dawning dread that crept into her mental space and held her by the throat.
“No,” she whispered to herself in a tone that suggested she was being ridiculous. Rylee shook her head for effect. “No. Impossible.”
Except, it wasn’t.
She grabbed her phone that lay nearby to check her digital calendar. Because to her, she had to have the dates mixed up.
That’s when she noticed the reminder she’d set to meet up with Xander in the next hour.
They planned to visit an Italian restaurant out in Long Island for lunch, which didn’t help with her panic in that instance.
Things had been good between them. So good.
After that night a few weeks ago, when Rylee thought Xander and his fire company had been called to that fire in Park Slope, she’d been intentionally open. Less guarded. More accepting of Xander making a place for himself in her and her children’s lives.
But now this?
She swallowed hard when the urge to gag came over her. But swallowing just made her gag harder. Before she could process what was happening, she felt last night’s dinner rush up her throat, forcing her to turn on her heels and drop into a squat in front of the toilet bowl.
Sloshing sounds echoed around the en suite as Rylee heaved and coughed into the toilet.
Once her stomach felt empty again, she dropped back on her haunches and stared at the contents floating in the toilet water before flushing.
“No fucking way,” she exclaimed low, closing her eyes and pressing her hands to her face.
It wasn’t long before she was back on her feet, rinsing her mouth and brushing her teeth again, then heading for her closet to throw on whatever her eyes fell on so she could leave the house.
There was no way she could ignore how she was feeling. And what she’d just done.
She’d thrown up.
Rylee doesn’t throw up.
The last time she threw up was when she discovered she was pregnant with LJ.
And that thought alone had her taking large steps up Brooklyn Heights’ city blocks, headed straight for the pharmacy.
“Good morning,” the clerk greeted the moment Rylee stepped inside.
“Good morning,” Rylee forced a smile. “Can you please tell me where your pregnancy tests are?”
The question alone had her head spinning. Never did she think she’d ever need one of those things again.
And still, at the guidance of the clerk, Rylee found the test of her choosing, walked it to the register, and left with the test and a prayer that it would give her the result she was hoping for.
Negative.
She wanted the test to be negative. Needed it to be negative, actually.
Back home, in the downstairs bathroom near the brownstone’s front door, an impatient Rylee tore open the packaging, peed on the test strip, then placed it on the counter after covering it.
She didn’t move an inch.
Rylee stood over the vanity, eyes fixed on the strip as her urine moved along it, the test immediately producing two pink lines.
Her gasp was slow. Loud. Nerving.
She closed her eyes and held them tight as if she were trying to erase what she saw.
There was no way it would give a result so fast.
Except, it did.
And the result confirmed she was pregnant.
“Oh, my God,” she whispered. “Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God…”
She had no problem figuring out how something like this could’ve happened.
The anniversary of Lennox’s death.
It was the only time she’d had the audacity to guide Xander inside of her without a condom.
She released a long, heavy breath that sagged her shoulders and forced her to take a seat on the toilet lid beside the vanity.
It was one time.
At least that’s what she reasoned. She’d been caught up in the moment but still aware of what she was doing. But Rylee honestly didn’t think this would happen. What were the chances, honestly?
Her head was in her hands a second later, fingers running through her braids, tossing them over her shoulder before she pushed herself back to her feet.
She had to see the test again. By now, surely it had been enough time to prove she was trippin’.
Rylee believed she just had to be trippin’.
Her eyes met the test window again and just like the first time, her heart and stomach dropped.
The lines were abundantly clearer now. Two bright pink lines.
“Fuck,” she whispered to herself, her voice shaky. “This can’t be real life.”
She and Xander had just gotten to good. She’d just started to feel okay about them.
Now this?
The test sat on the counter where she’d placed it, bright and impossible to ignore.
Rylee pressed both hands to her cheeks, trying to feel something other than panic.
She’d done this before. Stared down at proof that her life was about to change. Always alone. Always the first to know.
But before, the news was always joyfully tethered to Lennox.
With Nova, she’d told him in person.
With LJ, she’d told him in spirit.
But this time, upon discovering she was pregnant, it wasn’t joy she felt first.
Fear came first.
Fear of doing it alone.
Fear of what people would think.
Fear of how much more room she’d have to make in a life that already felt full and fragile.
Underneath all of that, annoyingly steady, was something else. Something familiar.
A small, stubborn warmth.
She’d barely wrapped her mind around it and already a corner of her heart was reaching for this baby she wasn’t even sure she wanted to keep.
She wasn’t supposed to be here again. Not like this. Not without Lennox.
And yet, still…
Beneath the fear was something small and warm and terrifyingly hopeful.
A whisper she wasn’t ready to name.
Not that she had a chance to.
The chime of her doorbell echoed around the brownstone, pulling her eyes away from the pregnancy test and toward the front door.
Rylee pulled her phone from her back pocket and saw it was already 11 a.m… the time Xander told her he’d arrive to pick her up so they could go out to lunch.
Rylee wasn’t supposed to still be in bed at 10 a.m. She was supposed to have already been up. Just like she was supposed to have used a condom with Xander that night.
“Shit,” she spat, debating for a moment whether to clear the pregnancy test and its packaging or not.
Not wanting to look suspicious or keep Xander waiting outside for too long, Rylee decided to just close the bathroom door.
She ran her sweaty hands down her jeans and made her way to the front door, pulling it open to find a smiling Xander on the other side.
He held up a small bag with the logo of the candle store Rylee loved to frequent in the city.
“Guess what I got?” he said, his smile growing as he winked. “Went out there this morning so we’d have something good to come back here to. I’m thinking a bath with this burning, since you like keeping your candles in the bathroom.”
He laughed as he leaned in to give her a peck on the lips.
Rylee’s head was somewhere between the bathroom and the front door.
The thing every woman would normally love, an on-time man, did nothing to ease her anxiety in that moment.
She was pregnant.
Rylee was so dazed and disoriented that Xander noticed it the second he leaned out of the kiss.
He tilted his head to one side. “What’s that face?”
Rylee parted her lips to speak, but nothing came out.
“Oh, no. Uh-uh,” Xander teased, stepping over the threshold and gently moving her to the side. “You not gon’ look at me like I popped up without calling when you knew I was coming.”
Rylee’s heart was pounding, the words right there at the tip of her tongue… but she refused to let them fall.
“I texted,” he continued, toeing off his Jordans. “And I’m on time. Not early or late, because you said no surprises.”
Xander turned to look her way, then bent his knees like he always did when talking to her. “So what’s up? What’s this face?”
“I… I don’t have a face,” she insisted, forcing a smile.
He snorted. “You don’t have a face, huh?”
Rylee swallowed hard.
“You definitely got a face, Snoop.”
Xander stood to his full height and lifted her chin to give her another peck on the lips. This one deeper.
“A very beautiful face.”
She sighed, blowing the air out through her lips after he stepped out of their kiss.
Xander’s brows wrinkled before he chuckled nervously. “You trippin’ me out right now, but I’mma let it slide because I’m hanging out with my baby today… and ain’t nothing about to bring me down.”