37
Orion
My breath caught as Sable walked Whitney through the front door.
She looked just as gorgeous as the last time I’d seen her, but now had the bonus of the little baby belly.
Something fluttered in my chest at the sight.
While I hadn’t wanted to be a dad, there was something about knowing that there was going to be a little person out there that carried half of my DNA that felt special.
Seeing Whitney become the mom she’d always wanted to be made her glow.
Maybe I had a chance to make things right. Especially if Whitney were here now.
She approached cautiously, taking slow, measured steps. It was strange how she kept looking back over her shoulder at Sable, but he just gave her a smile as she kept moving in my direction.
“Whitney?” I asked.
“Hey, Orion,” she said, her voice sounding so small and unsure.
I was off my stool because there was no way I was going to be the asshole who let her come to me. That wasn’t acceptable at all. I’d done this woman dirty for far too long. I should at least help her to a seat.
She rewarded me with a warm smile as I pressed a hand to her lower back, leading her to the stool I’d been sitting on. It didn’t matter that there was a bottle of beer sitting on the counter—she wouldn’t be touching it.
“Thank you,” she said as she sat, crossing her ankles together.
Seeing her again felt surreal. She’d been so mad at me the night she’d stormed out of the restaurant. When I went to collect some of my things from the house, she made sure she wasn’t home. I wasn’t even sure if she still lived there or not. It wasn’t any of my business anymore.
Whitney pulled an envelope out of her purse, setting it on the bar. She pushed it in my direction. I went to grab it, but before my hand could wrap around the paper, she snatched it back.
“I need to tell you something important, but I want to be very clear about this. If you open this envelope...” She took a deep breath before continuing.
“If you open this envelope, it means you want to be involved. The last thing I want to do after everything is to pressure you into doing something you don’t want to do. ”
I furrowed my eyebrows, eyeing the envelope. What the hell could be inside it that was so life-altering?
“What is it?” I asked, itching to peel back the seal to see what was inside. My entire body practically vibrated with it.
She took a preparing breath before looking me straight in the eye. “I had my twenty-week appointment today. If you wanted to know if we were having a boy or a girl, that would tell you.”
Now, more than ever, I wanted to rip open the envelope. I even started to rip the corner when Whitney’s hand covered mine. “I’m serious, Orion. If you don’t want to be involved, it’s better that you don’t know.”
While I’d never wanted to be a dad, knowing that I had a baby on the way whether I liked it or not had changed things. Even if Whitney and I weren’t together anymore, I had the chance to break the toxic pattern that my family had faced for generations.
I pulled back from Whitney, gave her a bright smile, ripping the envelope open the rest of the way.
Sable and I had talked about this. I had told him that if presented with the opportunity, I would want to be in the child’s life.
He was more than happy with that choice, saying he would do everything in his power to be the best bonus daddy he could be, even if it was something he’d never thought about.
The paper seemed so unassuming. Something that was about to change my life forever seemed like it needed to feel more significant.
Not that I was begging for something with bright blue or pink sparkles.
Half the fun was opening it, seeing what was on the inside.
It wouldn’t be the same if it were all over the paper.
The second I flipped the top of the folded sheet up, seeing the logo for the OBGYN office that Whitney was going to, my breath stuttered.
This was suddenly more real than I had ever imagined.
She was right—knowing whether the baby was a boy or a girl would change things.
I couldn’t pretend that they were out there, knowing nothing about them.
Before I opened it the rest of the way, I lowered the paper, reaching for Whitney’s hand. “I owe you an apology. A simple ‘I’m sorry,’ will never be enough, but it’s a start. Please know that opening up and talking to people about what’s going through my head is something that I’m working on.”
“It’s okay,” she said. As much as I wanted to believe her, it would never be okay. She’d been so out of the loop about absolutely everything. Nine years of marriage and she might as well have been married to a stranger.
“It’s really not.” Because now was the time to lay it all out on the table. If I didn’t, she’d never know all the details, and it would never be the right time to tell her.
She laughed, making me cringe. When she saw my face, her smile vanished. “What’s wrong?”
It was hard to form the words, but she had the right to know. My eyes burned as I tried to get the words out. It was stupid that I felt like I was about to cry, because I wasn’t the person who had been hurt. She was.
“You’d wanted to be a mom so badly. Thanks to the way my dad and mom raised me, I didn’t think that was something I could do.
” Everything inside me screamed to look away, but I held her gaze.
“I was a coward for not telling you. Instead, I did something worse. I changed out the lubricant I’d insisted on using with spermicide. ”
Whitney gasped, covering her mouth with her hand. Fat tears welled in her eyes, and I wanted so badly to reach out and comfort her, but that wasn’t my place anymore. “If I could go back in time and take it all back, I would. I would’ve talked to you about my concerns.”
“All those times I thought something was wrong with me...”
And I couldn’t do it anymore. I dropped the papers in my hands and launched myself at her, pulling her into a tight hug. Whitney’s body trembled against me.
“There was never anything wrong with you. It was all me. I let you go on thinking it was you for years, and it was wrong. So damn wrong.”
We stood like that for what felt like an hour while she cried into my t-shirt. I knew it hadn’t really been that long because the bar would have had to open around us, but then again, Victor might have been keeping people out since we were all standing out in the open.
“I know that I’m sorry will never be enough to undo all the damage I’ve caused, but I want to work to prove it to you,” I swallowed around the words. “It’s why I want to make this right. This baby deserves to have both parents in the picture.”
Whitney pulled away and gave me a weak, watery smile. “I agree. And that was why I wanted to come here and give you a chance.”
I reached for the papers that I’d dropped on the floor, my heart beating a mile a minute.
They’d flipped over, which meant I could see the words.
It was stupid to be so nervous because it didn’t matter if the baby was a boy, girl, or even decided later that they were something else—I was going to love them, no matter what.
Boy.
For some reason, seeing it didn’t make me feel any less nervous. With it being a boy, there was so much more room for me to repeat the same mistakes. I hadn’t even realized I was shaking until someone touched me on my elbow. When I turned to look, I was surprised to see Sable standing there.
“Is everything okay?” he asked.
I swallowed thickly, closing my eyes and taking a deep breath. “Yeah. It’s a boy.”
When I opened my eyes again, Sable had a huge grin on his face. “That’s great news, isn’t it?”
Whitney sighed. “Most men want to carry on their genes—looks like Orion just won the genetic lottery.”
I lowered the papers and looked at Whitney, who still looked sad. I wanted her to be happy so badly, but I knew it would take time to get back to where we were. If we’d ever truly be friends again. I’d broken her trust in so many ways, there was no way to repair some of it.
“You know I would be happy no matter what, right? You’re getting your dream come true, and I got to give it to you.”
Her smile brightened a little at that before wrapping her arms around me in another hug.
Victor cleared his throat, all of us turning to look at him. “I’m sorry to break this up, but I do have a bar to open.”
Whitney looked confused because up until now, he hadn’t really said anything.
“This is Victor, by the way. It’s his bar, but I helped him open the place.”
Whitney nodded. “It’s nice to meet you, Victor.”
“Likewise,” he said.
As I went to lead Whitney back outside, Sable ran back behind the bar, grabbing her another bottle of water. As he handed it over to her, you could tell he was nervous. He practically vibrated with nerves.
“Please don’t be a stranger. I’d really like to get to know you better.”
Whitney’s smile felt more genuine at that. “I’d really like to get to know you better as well.”
And just like that, she was gone. I stood there in the middle of the bar, clutching paperwork from an OBGYN office proclaiming that I was going to be the father of a baby boy.
Whitney was giving me another chance. At least as a friend, anyway.
The only thing I could hope for at that point was that I didn’t fuck it all up.
The garage was busier than normal. Sweat gathered at my armpits—I prayed that the tape the detective had stuck to the microphone would stay in place. Dad would be so fucking pissed when he found out that I was turning him in, but I needed to do this. It was for everyone’s safety.
When I got to Dad’s office, there were three men inside. They eyed me suspiciously as I entered the room. I’d never seen them before. I couldn’t tell if they were clients or more new people to sell the shit Dad had circulating.
“Orion?” Dad asked as I stepped further into the room.
One of the men cracked his knuckles, but Dad held up a hand as if to tell him to wait.