Never to Keep (Accepting Fate #1) (25 page)

Alex’s smile was breathtaking. I would’ve never been able to compete with her. I shouldn’t be surprised that a man as handsome as Sawyer would have women lined up around the block for a chance to be with him.

I told him we couldn’t be together; I pushed him away. I knew I had no claim to him, but that didn’t stop a tight ball of pain from forming in my chest. This just proved I hadn’t been special to him. I was easy to replace after all.

“Come on in while I look at your book,” she said.

“Can we, Mama?” Peyton asked as she bounced on her toes.

“Sure, I’ll wait here.” I pulled my eyes away from the happy couple and focused my stare on the sidewalk.

“Hi, you must be Madison.” Well-manicured fingers came into my field of vision.

“That’s me.” I took her hand briefly.

“Sawyer talks about Peyton all the time. It’s nice to finally meet you both.” Finally? How long had they been together?

“That’s nice.” I couldn’t bring myself to look at her.

“Come on in. It’s hot out here,” she insisted.

I reluctantly followed her into the beautiful house.

“She’s my girlfriend,” Sawyer whispered from behind me without preamble. “She’s absolutely perfect, don’t you think?”

The fear of throwing up the chocolate bar I’d just eaten kept me from giving him my hateful retort. I was saved from the awkward silence when Alex started asking Peyton about the different types of candy in the book. Focusing on my breathing while they talked kept me occupied.

“What’s your favorite kind, Madison?” Sawyer’s girlfriend asked. I took shallow breaths through my nose to keep my stomach in check.

“Oh, shit, I know that face,” she said. I hadn’t realized she was looking at me. I couldn’t hold it in much longer. I clasped both hands over my mouth and started toward the front door. “Sawyer, go show Peyton your videogame systems,” she commanded. He took Peyton’s hand and complied without question.

Alex grabbed my elbow and hauled me into a small bathroom. I dropped to my knees and let go of my mouth. I told myself I didn’t care if his supermodel girlfriend watched me hurl.

“Mama, are you okay?” Peyton was standing in the hall just outside of the bathroom door. It wasn’t until then that I realized Alex was kneeling on the floor beside me holding my hair. I felt her twist it up and pin it back with a plastic clip before she moved away. Peyton took her place at my side.

“Yes,” I said between stomach spasms. “I’ll be okay.” I was down to dry heaves, but couldn’t pull myself away from the commode. Peyton patted my back as I listened to a lively discussion in the other room.

“I told you to play video games with her. You were barely gone thirty seconds,” she scolded.

“She didn’t want to play,” Sawyer said casually.

“Don’t be a jerk.” I had no idea why she would defend us to him. Although I should hate her, I found her extremely likable.

Alex came back a minute later and helped me to my feet. She dug through the medicine cabinet and found a brand new toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste and handed both to me.

“Peyton,” she said, “will you go sell Sawyer a bunch of crap he doesn’t need? I think the form is in the kitchen.”

“Thank you,” I whispered hoarsely. “Why are you being so nice to me?” I squeezed some minty, white paste on the brush and began to clean the disgusting taste from my mouth.

“I know he can be an ass. The two of you don’t deserve to be treated that way.” She rubbed my back as I rinsed my mouth.

“You might be the best thing that ever happened to him,” I said. He obviously had strong feelings for her, and she seemed to know how to put him in his place. “I hope we can be friends without it being awkward.” I could never have a conversation with her about her love life.

“Definitely.” Her genuine smile gave me something I hadn’t had for a long time. Hope.

Madison

The pounding on the entry door rattled all of the windows on the front side of the old house. “Keep cleaning your room,” I hollered up the stairs to Peyton. I knew she’d want to come down and see what all of the commotion was about.

The knocking abruptly stopped, and the doorbell began to ring incessantly. “Hold your horses!” I shouted. I put the last of the folded towels in the laundry basket on the floor next to the couch before I headed over to the door.

I wasn’t sure what I expected to find when I opened the door, but an angry Sawyer on my porch hadn’t even crossed my mind. “What on earth do you want?”

He jerked his hands through his hair before he answered. “Why—how—?” It was bad if he couldn’t even string two words together. “What gives you the right to come to my house like that? I was doing perfectly fine, and then you show up and make yourself at home as if nothing happened.”

“I’m sorry. We didn’t know where you live or that you have a live-in girlfriend.” He’d never even told me his address, but he let another woman move in with him. “I hope we didn’t cause any trouble between the two of you. She seems really nice. I’m glad you found someone you have a shot at a real relationship with,” I blabbered in an attempt to distract myself from the barbwire knot tightening around my stomach.

“Will you please shut up for a minute?” He was on the verge of yelling. He took a deep breath to calm down and then locked my eyes in an unbreakable stare. He took two long strides toward me and melded his lips with mine. His lips were soft and warm. He felt like home.

I was completely lost in him for several long moments before I remembered his beautiful girlfriend waiting for him at home.

I pushed away from him and took a step back. “This isn’t right. Alex—”

“Alex isn’t my girlfriend,” he said as he tried to catch his breath.

“But you said—”

“I lied. You hurt me, and I wanted to hurt you back. It wasn’t my finest moment.” His eyes were focused on my lips.

“I don’t understand. If she’s not your girlfriend, then who is she?”

“She’s my sister. She came here to hide out for a while.”

“I still don’t understand.” I probably wouldn’t understand my own name if he said it at that particular moment.

“She’s an actress and needed a break from the paparazzi.” He moved a step closer to me and ran his fingers down my cheeks.

“W-what do you want from me?” I stuttered.

“I want to go back to the way things were before. I’m not going to let you run away from me again. We’re going to be together, whether you like it or not.” His bedroom voice made the demands sound more appealing than they should have been.

“How about this? I’ll keep an open mind about the possibility of a future if you will accept that this probably won’t be forever. As I said before, I will never get married. We’ll be discreet around Peyton.”

“It’s not that simple. I lied to you, too.”

“What about?”

“I didn’t really leave you because of your commitment issues; it just seemed like the most believable excuse.”

“Then why the fuck did you leave me?”

“Hailey, the social worker doing my home study, found out about Peyton’s basketball accident. She said she’d take Peyton away and charge me with child endangerment if I didn’t cut off all contact with you. She also said she’d have you arrested for child abuse. I told her the whole thing was an accident, but she didn’t believe me.” I focused my eyes on his chest as I spoke. “She said she’d forget the whole thing if I walked away from you. She also said she’d be forced to proceed with filing charges if I told you about it because it would interfere with any future investigations. I wasn’t supposed to meet you that night, but I couldn’t just leave without any explanation, even if I couldn’t tell you the truth.”

“You should have told me anyway.”

“It would have put you at risk.” I licked my suddenly dry lips and looked up into his stunning blue eyes. “I asked you how you felt about me, and you more or less said you just liked fucking me. Based on that, I figured I wasn’t worth the risk to you. You would have lost everything: your job, your reputation—possibly your freedom.”

“There are security cameras on the playground. I can get video evidence that Peyton’s injury was caused by an accident. That bitch of a social worker has absolutely no case. She has to have some sort of ulterior motive.”

I suddenly felt incredibly stupid. “I didn’t even think about that. I was just so scared.”

He pulled me into his arms and held me tightly. “I understand. Since we’re clearing the air, I have another confession. You mean more to me than just a good lay. I do like you. I like spending time with you, both inside and outside of your body.” He hesitated for a moment. “The night of your attack, I told you that you had agreed to be friends with benefits. The truth is… I agreed to try to be more. I got scared and took the easy way out when I realized you didn’t remember.”

“I already knew that. Apparently, I told my coworker Lisa before she left the club that night. She told me about it when she came to visit me the Tuesday after it happened.”

“Why didn’t you call me out on my bullshit?”

“Because you weren’t treating me like a fuck buddy.”

“Can we start over?” he asked.

“There’s one more thing I have to tell you first.” I took a deep breath to gather what little courage I could find. “I’m pregnant.”

“You’re what!” he yelled.

“Please, keep your voice down. Peyton’s upstairs.”

He sat on the couch, his elbows resting on his knees. “Did you do it on purpose? Are you trying to trap me?”

“I could ask you the same thing.” I was totally offended by his accusation.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” he growled.

“I didn’t ask you to fuck me in a janitor’s closet without protection. If I remember correctly, that was all your idea. I tried to walk away.”

He rested his face in his hands and sat quietly for what felt like an eternity. “Are you sure it’s mine?” His angry tone was slightly quieter than before, but his words were a slap in the face.

“The doctor said I would have conceived the first week of August. Considering I hadn’t fucked or been fucked by anyone else since…well, anywhere close to that timeframe, I’d say, yes, I’m sure.”

His face shifted from anger to regret. “I’m sorry. This is entirely my fault.”

“It takes two to tango. You didn’t force me.”

“I manipulated you and forgot to use protection.” He looked at my stomach, and I watched as his eyes filled with awe. “I’m sorry for being an asshole. Again.”

My anger quickly faded away. “I’m sorry, too. I know this isn’t the ideal situation for either of us.”

“No matter what happens between us, I’m always going to love this baby.” His eyes were glued on my flat tummy. “May I?” he gestured toward my waistband.

“Sure. There’s nothing to feel right now. It’s still very early.”

His large hand moved underneath my shirt and rested on my lower abdomen. A familiar fire lit deep in my belly. I had to stop thinking about the way his fingers felt on my bare skin.

I decided to change the subject before I jumped him on the couch. “You were saying something about your sister being famous? I didn’t recognize her.”

He chuckled. “I didn’t either at first. She didn’t tell me she was coming to town. We unintentionally crossed paths at the grocery store the day she arrived, so she decided to try out her disguise on me. Much to my chagrin, it worked a little too well.”

“Eww.” Did he have the hots for his own sister?

“Yeah, I know. In my defense, I was a little distracted that day. She’s also a fantastic actress and was actively trying to fool me. She bleached her hair, wore colored contacts, and she even used a Southern drawl.” His face had gradually turned the shade of a ripe tomato. “How could I be expected to recognize her between all that, a lack of makeup, and seeing her out of context?”

“She’s your sister. I would recognize my brother no matter what he did to change his appearance.”

“You guys grew up together. We just met each other for the first time last year, and it had been a while since I’d seen her in person. I’d never seen her outside of LA and rarely without her boyfriend and a bodyguard around.”

I laughed harder than I had in years. “You’re never going to live this down.”

“I know, I know.” His hands moved to my hips and pulled me into his body. “Now that everything is out in the open and the mood has been lightened, can we get back to discussing more important issues?”

“Like what?” I asked.

“Us,” he said in a husky voice that made my panties spontaneously combust. “You’re having my baby. We should be together.” His hands shifted to my ass, pulling my hips to his. He rubbed his erection against my stomach.

I couldn’t say no; it had nearly killed me to see him with another woman, not to mention the fact that the damned baby was rooting for her daddy again. “I agree, as long as it’s not just because I’m pregnant.”

He pulled me into his arms and fused his lips to mine. I could feel every ounce of his pent-up hunger for me as I showed him just how much I’d missed him.

“Trust me, it’s more than just the baby,” he said when we came up for air.

I nearly knocked him over when I slammed my lips back onto his. He broke away far too soon for my liking. “Has Ethan been coming around?”

“He’s working evenings for the next couple of weeks,” I said, trying to catch my breath once more. I stood to stretch out a leg cramp.

“Good. Do you and Peyton need anything? Do you need anything for the baby?”

“No, we’re doing okay right now.” I rested my hand on my firm belly and then nearly jumped out of my skin at the sound of another voice behind me.

“Are you really gonna have a baby, Mama?” I hadn’t heard Peyton come down the stairs.

I couldn’t deny it, and there was no point in trying. “Yes, sweetie, in the spring.”

“Is Uncle Ethan the baby’s daddy?” She must not have heard the whole conversation, thank God. Sawyer stiffened beside me.

“No, Peyton.” I was at a complete loss for words. There wasn’t time to plan out what I would say to her.

“Then who’s her daddy?” she pressed.

I struggled to think of the right thing to say. Lying wasn’t an option, but how could I tell her that her teacher had knocked me up?