Never Say Never, Part Three (Second Chance Romance, Book 3) (5 page)

She took out her phone and browsed through the numbers. Joseph would probably be busy, but it was worth a try. The sooner she got the ball rolling, the better. Liberating the kids from Brian was her first priority.
 

Amanda’s picture flashed on her screen and she frowned. Why was she calling? She hadn’t bothered contacting Emily for years.
 

Emily clicked the green button and placed the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

“Emily,”
Amanda whispered it into the phone, and the hairs on the back of her neck stood up. This didn’t sound good. She strolled off to one side in the busy street and stood beneath the material overhang of a butcher’s shop.

“Amanda, hi, are you all right?”
 

Hysterical sobbing answered her and those hairs tried to wriggle their way out of her skin.
 

“What’s wrong? What’s going on?”
 

The butcher came out and studied her for a moment, but she waved him away irritably. He huffed and disappeared back into the depths of his meaty store.
 

“I lost the baby.”
 

Whoa. Two and two made four in Emily’s brain and she slapped a hand to her forehead.
 

“You were pregnant. Why didn’t you say something?”
 

“What could I say?”
Amanda’s voice cleared for a moment. “You’re my husband’s ex-wife. I’m not supposed to talk to you at all.”
She dissolved into grief again.
 

“Start from the beginning. What happened?”

“I found out a couple weeks ago, but I didn’t know what to tell Brian. You know how he feels about –”
she choked up and petered off.

“Yes, I’m aware.”
Brian had been absent during her pregnancies, disinterested in the babies or her, or anything to do with the ‘magical’
time. It’d been one of the worst times in their relationship, sandwiched between other crap times.
 

Overall, the whole marriage had been a sham, perpetrated by Brian’s needs as a politician and a man. His egocentrism knew no bounds.
 

“Talk to me, Amanda, tell me what happened. I’m here for you.”
 

But the woman was still hysterical.
 

“All right, that’s it, I’m coming over there.”
 

“No! Please, you can’t do that. He’ll lose his mind if he sees you on the tapes again.”
Amanda’s resolve had clearly cracked. Maybe she’d realized her mistake in marrying the prick.
 

“Spill it. Let me help you.”
 

“All right,”
she murmured, her footfalls on the end of the line came a moment later, then the slam of a door and a key turning in a lock. “I found out about it and I was too afraid to tell him right away. I didn’t know how he’d take it and I’d already decided I wanted to keep the baby,”
she wailed the last few words.
 

“Easy, easy. Please continue.”
 

“Last night I decided to tell him. And I’ve never seen him so mad,”
she said, voice trembling and breaking, “he lost it completely.”
 

“What did he do?”

“Started screaming, called me a slut.”
 

What a piece of work. “What did you do?”
 

“I cried. And I told him I wanted to keep the baby.”
 

“I bet that went down well,” she murmured.
 

Amanda burst into tears again and replied, “He told me to get an abortion. He went on his tablet, horrid fucking thing, and started scrolling through numbers and messages. Then he went to the study.”
 

“To the study? Why?”
 

“I followed him to find out and overheard him talking to some doctor. He was organizing a date and time for me to get the baby aborted.”
 

She’d expect no less from Brian Ross, but it did seem he’d hit an all-time scum-sucking low.
 

“Please tell me you didn’t go through with it, Amanda. You don’t have to do what he tells you to. You realize that’s abuse, right?”
 

“I didn’t go through with it.”

“But then how did you lose the…
oh no. No.”
Emily shook her head, denying it and stepping further back, towards the glass front window of the store. People hurried past, ignorant of Amanda’s plight or of Emily’s for that matter.
 

“I walked into the study and asked him what he thought he was doing.”
Amanda obviously needed to get it out, to tell Emily the truth before she shut down again and refused to believe there was anything wrong with her beloved marriage, her beloved congressman.
 

“That must’ve taken balls.”
 

“He just stared at me like I was crazy with this look on his face. God, I’ve never seen anything like it.”
 

Emily was sure she’d seen that look before. She shuddered.
 

“He got up and told me to shut up or he’d make me regret it. And I asked him why he was acting this way. Doesn’t he want the baby? Doesn’t he want us to start a family of our own? Doesn’t he love me?”
She half-shrieked then toned down again. “But he didn’t answer, he just got up and told me if I didn’t do it, he’d leave me for good. I couldn’t let that happen, you have to understand that. I can’t lose him.”
 

Why the hell not? The man was a rabid dog. He wasn’t fit to be a father.
 

“I went a few days ago. Woke up this morning and it happened. The bleeding and pain. It’s over. My baby is gone, Emily, my baby is gone!”
She screamed it into the phone.
 

“You need to relax. I know it’s tough, but you have to calm down and gather your thoughts. You can’t stay there, Amanda, it sounds like he’s even more deluded than when we were together.”
 

“I don’t know what to do.”
 

“Get out. Get out now.”
Emily commanded.

“I can’t.”
Amanda’s voice hardened. “I love him.”
 

Then it was pointless talking to her. If she didn’t have a sense of her own wellbeing, and put that creature before it, then she was as weak as Emily had suspected all along. What could she do? Take it out of Amanda’s hands? She’d only end up getting killed at this rate.
 

“Then I can’t help you.”
 

The line went dead.

CHAPTER NINE

Emily stared at the phone in her hand for a few minutes. Brian’s depravity knew no bounds. This had gone too far. He’d forced Amanda into an abortion and if he had that little disregard for her, and his unborn child, then there wasn’t a slim chance he was an appropriate on her children.
 

It was time to liberate them.
 

She searched for Joseph’s number, but she shook with anger. Her mind was consumed with a desire to lash out at the man who’d started this. Who’d driven her over the edge and turned her own mother against her.
 

This was a final straw. Or one of the thousands of final straws. She’d been a camel for two damn long.
 

She found Brian’s number and hesitated. This might not be the wisest course of action. But what the hell.
 

She dialed and the phone rang on the other end.
 

“Brian Ross speaking, how may I help you?”
 

“You can help me by relinquishing custody of my children, you prick.”
It was the worst she’d said to him thus far, and it etched satisfaction into her memory.
 

“Who is this?”
 

“Are you some special kind of stupid?”
Emily paced back and forth, glancing into that damn butcher’s every now and again. The guy was behind the counter in his white overalls, one eyebrow raised and holding a cleaver.
 

He slammed it down into a carcass and separated off a joint for hanging.
 

“Emily,”
Brian answered with a grunt. “What do you want, girl?”
 

“I want my children and I’m calling to tell you I won’t stop until I get them. Do you understand me, Ross?”
 

“I understand that you don’t have a hope in hell and that this was a total waste of my time. Goodbye now.”
Brian’s voice faded as he moved to hang up.
 

“I know what happened with Amanda!”
She blurted it out, raising her voice a few decibels so he’d hear her for sure.
 

“What?”
Brian asked in a clear monotone. That’d caught the bastard’s attention.
 

“I know what happened with Amanda.”
Emily repeated it super slowly, so that the gravity of that knowledge would sink in.
 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about. Goodbye now.”
 

“Oh, so then that hysterical phone call I received from your wife was a fake out?”
 

Brian’s breath hissed into the earpiece and Emily moved it from her ear for a second. Mr. Perfect was angry.
 

“What are you talking about?”
 

But he didn’t sound so self-assured any more. His balloon head had deflated a bit now. That was good for her.
 

“You made Amanda get an abortion. Now, I wonder how that would look in a custody battle. Or in the papers for that matter.”
 

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,”
he answered, but there was such contained rage in his tone than shivers spiraled up and down her back. Bursts of laughter and conversation echoed in the background. He was at work, all right, and she had him right where she wanted him.
 

There was no way he could verbally accost her in front of his colleagues. He’d never risk losing that much face.
 

“I suggest you gather your thoughts and return to me when you have a clearer picture of the situation.”
Political speak made her antsy, and Mr. Ross was plainly agitated.
 

Still she pushed harder. “Tell you what, you obviously can’t handle being in charge and let’s face it, you only want the kids to be in power or whatever, so why not surrender custody to me before I take what I’ve just heard to my lawyers.”
 

“What lawyers?”
Brian barked it, then cut off.
 

There was a muffled bang on the other end of the line and the chatter in the background was silenced. He was in his office, most likely.
 

“You have no idea who you’re dealing with,”
he grated at her.
 

“Oh, I know exactly who I’m dealing with, but I think you’ll find it’s you who’s in trouble. Because Brian, you’ve never dealt with the likes of me. If you harm a hair on either of my children’s heads, I will be on you so fast you’ll think hell is a holiday. Got it, big guy?”
 

“What occurs in my marriage is none of your business and has no bearing on the custody of my children.”
 

“I beg to differ, Bri,”
she snapped back in a supremely mocking tone.
 

“If you come near that house again, you’ll regret it. Do you understand me, girl?”
He wanted to make her feel small, but there wasn’t smugness in his tone and it gave her strength.
 

It meant one thing: Brian Ross was threatened by her.
 

He’d ruined everything for her with Chase and with her kids. This was her sweetest revenge.
 

“Brian, I will visit those children when I like, because they are my children. They deserve better than what you can offer them. Don’t for a second think I’m afraid of you.”
 

“You should be,”
he threatened.
 

She chuckled, though inside she was filled to the brim with nausea and rage. “Sorry, but there’s nothing you can do to me. I’m not exactly pregnant with your child, am I?”
 

“I will –”

“I didn’t call to mince words with you. I called to tell you to watch your ass, because in a couple weeks I’m going to be chewing on it.”