Chapter 21 Jennifer
JENNIFER
My head feels a lot better than it did when I was in pre-heat, even if my mind is racing all over the place.
I lie on the bed with no intention of getting up, and then I start going through the craziness of the last couple of days with Anna.
I know talking to her will make me feel better, and in some ways I wish I never came here, but just headed straight to Cedar Ridge.
Fate really has a crazy way of messing with my mind.
"What did their old omega look like," Anna says. "Describe her."
"Anna," I plead, because that's the last thing I really want to do right now.
"I'm just curious. Who needs TV when I think your life can't have any more drama in it, and it does."
I pull my knees up to the side, it makes me feel more comfortable.
I still feel warm, so I take the blankets off me.
"Petite. Blonde. Blue eyes. Tulip scent, but she makes the alphas look like mice when she walks into a room.
I wish I had that level of confidence. It's weird, isn't it?
Us plus-size omegas feel as if we're not good enough, but the petite ones seem to make them weak at the knees.
" I pause. "She announced herself like she was filing a claim.
Like she had a certificate. Their omega.
Those exact words. To my face. While I'm feeling and looking like a tired potato. "
"Don't describe yourself like a potato or her as what they want. If that was the case, what happened in Vegas wouldn't have happened."
"Which part? Taking me up to their suite, or leaving me five thousand dollars?" I question, because quite a few things happened in Vegas, some parts I'm proud of, and the other, well, let's just say I'm trying to forget it.
My omega keeps telling me to drop the subject, but it's hard.
"Jennifer, stop it. Think about the positives only."
I am.
I'm so uncomfortable no matter what I do, so I get off the bed and head to the window.
For a second I wonder what they are doing on the other side of the wall, in their own rooms, and whether any of them are sleeping any better than I am.
Probably not. The guest room they moved me to sits between Santos's and Tomas's, and I am aware of that in the specific way of someone trying not to be aware of it.
"I told her she could have them," I say flatly.
"You what."
"One second she said their omega and the next second I said you can have them and then it was just out there in the hallway existing."
"Did you mean it?" Anna says.
I look at my hand on my stomach. She shifts, small and unhurried, the way she does when I'm paying attention.
"No," I say. "When they apologized before the pre-heat started, I realized they'd regretted their actions. It was weird, they seemed so confident, but then during that moment I saw another side to them."
"Every time one of them says the bastard who knocked you up, I'm sitting here thinking: You ARE the bastards. And I don't know which one of you it is either!"
Anna and I start laughing. We can't help ourselves.
I shake my head as I reflect back to when they kept saying it. "It is funny now I think about it."
Anna cackles down the phone. "Fingers hilarious. Right," she says. "So, Jennifer. Tell them."
"Right, yes, brilliant idea. I'll just open my mouth and say the words.
" I cross to the dresser and grab a grape because I haven't eaten since this afternoon and she's been on at me about it for an hour.
"Every time I rehearse it in my head, it goes great.
Everyone's calm, nobody cries, Matteo doesn't do the jaw thing.
In real life, I open my mouth and nothing comes out and I just stand there like a very pregnant garden ornament. "
"Because," Anna says.
"The last time I handed them something real, I woke up alone with cash on the nightstand," I say. "I've had fourteen weeks to sit with that and it still lands the same way every time."
"Okay," Anna says, and I hear her shift forward, which means she's about to use the serious voice.
"I hear you. What they did was terrible and I wouldn't trust them either.
But Jennifer, that baby doesn't care about your feelings about the nightstand.
She has a date and she is keeping it. And when she gets here you are going to need more than a three-month contract and a herb garden. "
"Tomas hired a PI and they want to find Ricardo, get the truck back."
She loses it. The real laugh, not the polite one. The one that comes from the chest and takes everything with it and cannot be stopped once it starts. I have heard this laugh my entire life and I know exactly how it runs.
"They are hunting themselves," she manages. "Jen. They hired a PI to hunt themselves. I bet it wasn't just the truck he's trying to find. Anyway, they canceled a business deal. And they wanted to take care of you. If you don't get the hint that they're sorry, I don't think you ever will."
"I know."
"It doesn't mean that what they did wasn't wrong. Don't think I'm excusing it, Jennifer."
"I know."
It's the only words I can think to say.
"Were you even slightly tempted? To say, Tomas, I have some news, the bastard is you—"
"I was," I confess, and now I'm laughing again too.
She absolutely loses it again.
"This is the funniest thing that has ever happened," Anna says, recovering. "You have to tell them. Not just because of the baby. Because I need you to see their faces and call me immediately after."
"That is not a good enough reason to blow up my life."
"It is an excellent reason," she says. "Jennifer. Come to Cedar Ridge."
"Anna—"
"As soon as the storm passes, just do it. Okay."
"Yes," I say.
There's a knock at the door.
"Hold on," I tell Anna.
I open it expecting Tomas or Santos or some fresh development in the ongoing series of developments that is apparently my life.
Carmen.
She's holding a tray with tea and the good bread and the honey and the fruit she has apparently noticed I reach for first.
"I didn't mean to eavesdrop but I did hear some of the conversation," she says. "The door isn't thick. I'm sorry."
"How much did you hear?" I ask.
"Enough," she says.
I tell Anna I'll call her back later and hang up.
"I'm not sure about that. With the storm the lines will probably go dead soon," Carmen says.
Great.
Carmen comes in, sets the tray on the dresser, and turns to look at me with the direct gaze of someone who has decided exactly what she is going to say and is saying all of it.
"I've worked for them for years," she says.
"I want you to know something. I have never, not once, in five years, seen them behave like this.
Not for a deal, not for a delegation, not for anyone.
" She pauses. "They are moping. Three billionaires, moping around this island like dogs who lost their favorite toy. I do not use that word lightly."
I sit on the edge of the bed. "It might be Chiara. She's here now. They have history."
She straightens up. "No. She used to come here sometimes, but there would be drama and she would leave. Before today I haven't seen that omega in years." She picks up the empty glass from the nightstand.
So Chiara is lying, and they were telling the truth, that she isn't their omega. I didn't give them a chance to explain, because of our history they don't have the best reputation, but then as Anna said, maybe that is changing.
"Thank you, Carmen," I whisper. For everything, but the words don't leave my mouth as a lump forms in my throat.
She heads toward the door, leaving me speechless.
The door closes.
I sit there with my thoughts, not wanting to speak to Anna just yet.
If the lines do go down then I know I need to speak to her again tonight.
Right now I'll eat something and get my head together.
I need to tell them, but tonight I'll just get through this pre-heat, because I still feel a little weak, and get my head straight.