TROUBLE, A New Adult Romance Novel (The Rebel Series) (8 page)

Retreat.
 
It’s all I can focus on.
 
The looks on their faces … stunned.
 
I have to get out of here.

Once more, I run from the apartment.

I run and run and run.

It feels like I’m running a lot, but I guess I’m not. I’m only halfway across the floor of the garage when a slicing pain goes through my side and stops me short.

“Ohhh … ahhhh!” I gasp, unable to keep the sounds to myself.

A big bang sounds off to my right and I look up, moaning through the pain, to see Colin coming out from under a car’s hood.
 
He’s rubbing the top of his head as he takes in what he’s seeing.
 
Then his expression goes from confused to starkly fearful.
 
He’s back to being scared doo-doo-less of me.

I want to explain, but I can’t.
 
The pain.
 
It hurts. I’m dying.

“Ohhhh, shhiiiippp,” I moan. I pant a few times to work through the pain. “Shiiipp, ship, ship, ship, ship…”
 
Breathe in.
 
Breathe out.
 
You can do this.
 
Is the baby coming?
 
Am I going to give birth on the floor of this dirty place?
 
Please, God, I know you don’t want to talk to me right now, but could you please at least not let me have a baby in Rebel Wheels? I don’t want that on her birth certificate.

Colin is suddenly at my side.
 
“What’s going on? Is the baby coming?”

“No, stupid.”
 
I can barely say the words.
 
I’m huffing and puffing.
 
It feels like someone stuck a knife in my left side.

“How do you know?”
 
His hands are hovering all around my body, but not actually touching me, like he’s afraid to get too close.

“I don’t,” I growl out.

“Come on,” he says.

The floor switches places with the ceiling and I yelp in fright.
 
“What are you doing?!”

Suddenly we’re flying through the garage, the office, and then out the door.
 
Colin only puts me down on my feet again when we’re at the side of his car.

“What are you doing?!” I scream again, battering his chest.
 
I don’t know why I’m doing it, but it does help me forget the pain a little, so I keep it up. I even nub him a little for good measure.

“I’m taking you to the hospital, what do you think I’m doing?!” he yells back, ducking a little to avoid me but not really doing anything to stop my abuse.
 
He’s not mad at me.
 
The panic in his voice is unmistakable; our tones match perfectly.

“No, you can’t do that!” I stop beating on him and grab his arm, squeezing it tightly.
 
“Don’t bring me there!”

He takes me by the upper arms and gets two inches from my face. “Then where should I bring you?!” He’s still yelling.

I have to close my eyes to protect them from the spittle that’s coming out at me in a jet stream along with eighty thousand decibels of freaking-out man-volume.

“To the clinic,” I whisper.
 
“Take me to the clinic.”
 
The pain is leeching my strength.
 
I just want to lie down and wait for it to be over.

I hear a door open and I’m airborne again.
 
Colin deposits me onto the front seat with surprising gentleness and buckles me in.
 
And then before I know it, he’s getting in the other side of the car and starting the engine.

“You know where it is?” I ask.

“Yes.”

I don’t know how he knows, but I don’t really care right now.
 
I just want all of this to go away.
 
I want to be twenty again and getting ready to celebrate my twenty-first birthday.
 
I want to be innocent to the ways of guys and the things they’ll do to stupid girls who don’t know any better.
 
I want to start my life over.

But something tells me God is not listening to me anymore now than he did back then, on the day my life changed forever.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE TRIP TO THE CLINIC is a blur.
 
Good thing I’m buckled in, since Colin drives like it’s a life or death situation.
 
Red lights?
 
Optional, apparently.
 
Stop signs?
 
Ha! What stop signs?
 
We arrive in record time, and he picks me up to carry me in, despite my protests that I can manage on my own.

“Thank you for the ride, Colin, but you need to let me go in by myself,” I protest as he hauls me up the sidewalk.

“Like hell.
 
I’m not leaving you here by yourself.
 
What kind of asshole do you think I am?”

“Manners!” I screech.
 
Everything is falling apart, and now I have to listen to that language too.

“Sorry.
 
Like heck.
 
What kind of guy do you think I am?”

“The kind who doesn’t want people looking at him thinking he’s the father of this baby,” I say, dropping my hand onto my belly.
 
The pain has lessened, making it easier to speak.
 
I’m sure this explanation will scare him off.

“Who cares what they think? We know the truth.”

My face twists up in bitterness as his words sink in.
 
I know he didn’t mean it the way it feels, but I can’t help feeling angry and sad and powerless, and it’s awful.
 
No one knows the truth but me.
 
I’m the only one in the whole wide world who knows.
 
And I will be keeping that dirty little secret to myself forever and ever, amen.
 
I stop trying to resist his help.
 
We’re almost to the door anyway.

As soon as the nurses at the clinic see him carrying me in, they rush over.
 
“Is she in labor?” the first one asks. “Because if she is, she needs to go to the hospital.”

“She said to bring her here,” Colin explains, not letting me go.

“Come with me,” another nurse says, leading us into an exam room.

I open my mouth to speak, but everyone just talks over us.

“What are her symptoms?” the first nurse asks.

“Pain, I think.
 
In her stomach or the place where the baby is,” Colin says, placing me on the exam table on my back.

I struggle to sit up a little.
 
I have a hard time breathing with the baby lying on my diaphragm.

“Contractions?” a nurse asks.
 
“How far apart? Have you been timing them?”

“Hello!” I yell.
 
“I’m right here!
 
How about asking me?!”

Everyone stops moving and talking and stares at me.
 
Colin’s hand freezes just as it’s about to go to my shoulder.

I brush my stringy hair out of my face and take a breath to collect myself.
 
“It’s a sharp pain on my left side that feels like someone is stabbing me. It’s better now, but not completely gone.”
 
A dull ache remains where before I thought I was being torn apart.

A person I know to be a midwife comes in the room and stops the conversation from going further.

“Sounds like round ligament issues,” says one of the nurses, looking at the newcomer.

“It’s not a
ligament
,” I say, annoyed that she’s acting like it’s no big deal. “Something is wrong.
 
Ruptured or ripped or something.” The pain was too much to be a minor issue, and I can tell by the nurse’s tone that she considers this a false alarm.
 
I don’t do false alarms.

The midwife comes over and smiles at me.
 
“Just lie back and let’s see what we see, okay?”

I suddenly feel a lot less tense. This woman is a master at what she does, I can tell by looking in her eyes.

I nod.
 
“Okay.”
 
Lying back, I stare at her, putting all my faith in her diagnosis.
 
She’s probably going to say I need surgery.
 
The pain was bad.
 
I have no idea how I’ll pay for any kind of treatment, let alone a trip to the operating room.

She presses near the center of my belly with both hands.
 
“How does this feel?”

“Fine.”
 
No pain.
 
Maybe I won’t be dying today.

“And here?” she asks, going over to my right side.

“Nothing.”

She moves over to the left side.
 
“How about … here?”

Pain slashes though me like a thousand volts of burning electricity, all focused on my side.
 
I slap her hands away while simultaneously screaming, “Get the fuck off me!”

The midwife slowly draws her hands away and the nurses turn their backs to us.

Colin starts laughing and talking at the same time.
 
“Holy shit … that was awesome.
 
Guess you found the spot, doc.”

I’m furious at both him and the midwife.
 
“Shut up, Colin!”
 
I want to tear his face off, but he’s too far away now and my nubs can’t do that much damage anyway.
 
I turn my ire on the midwife.
 
“What did you do that for?!
 
You made me swear!”

She steps back, smiling, unfazed by my tirade. “You have round ligament pain, typical in this stage of pregnancy.
 
We’re almost to the end, so you should expect more of it.”

“More?”
 
This does not compute.
 
Nobody told me this was going to happen.
 
How is this fair? “Are you kidding me?!”
 
I feel like I’m going to lose my mind.
 
I’m so tired of being pregnant and uncomfortable and now I’m going to be in pain too?
 
I didn’t sign up for this.
 
I didn’t sign up for
any
of this.

She pats me on the hand before walking out.
 
“Give her the info sheet on it so she can treat at home.”
 
As she’s walking out the door she says, “Rest.
 
Keep your feet up.
 
Use heat to ease the pain.
 
Let your boyfriend do all the work. Orgasms are great pain relievers, by the way.”

I’m left with my mouth hanging open as she shuts the door behind both herself and one of the nurses who follows her out; the stupid wench is still giggling out in the hallway.
 
The other one who stayed in the room is fishing around in a drawer, flipping through papers with her back to me.
 
I can’t look at Colin, so I stare at the wall that has a poster of a woman’s vagina on it.

My alleged
boyfriend
clears his throat.

“Don’t say a word,” I growl.
 
I’m biting the inside of my cheeks now, trying to keep from saying anything else.
 
I’m pretty certain I’ve said enough for one day.

“Who me?” Colin asks.
 
“Oh, believe me.
 
I’m not saying anything.
 
Not one word.
 
I’m afraid.”

I look at him.
 
It’s impossible not to.
 
He’s barely holding in a laugh.

“I don’t see what’s so funny.”
 
I’m trying to hold onto my anger, but his stupid beet-red face is making it very difficult.
 
He’s way cuter when he’s not trying to be.

Then he starts laughing hysterically, and I change my mind.
 
He’s not cute at all.

He has to bend over and hold his stomach, he’s so out of control.
 
The nurse hands him the paper she was searching for and leaves the room, but he keeps right on laughing, the paper flapping around as he waves his arm.

“What?
 
What
is so funny?”
 
I really wish he’d step closer to the table. I seriously want to slap him now.
 
I’m pretty sure he’s laughing at me and that just makes me mad all over again.

He finally gets control of himself and then stands up straight.
 
After taking a big breath and letting it out, he stares me right in the face and tells me what got him so worked up.

“Have you ever seen an angry penguin before? Because I have.”

He runs out of the room before I can get off the table.

CHAPTER EIGHT

COLIN BRINGS ME HOME, THE mood in the car significantly subdued from what it was on our trip over.
 
My head is spinning with the events of the day.
 
I go for weeks without doing anything, sitting on that couch and trying to forget my life, and then in less then twenty-four hours I have doo hitting the fan, a new friend, and Colin.
 
Colin no longer acting weird around me.
 
Colin being my hero.
 
Colin making me feel like I’m on a roller coaster I can’t get off of.
 
Colin calling me an angry penguin.
 
Right now, all I want to do is sleep.

Luckily, Rebel jumps on his butt as soon as we get in. “I need you to get on that GTO.”

“I know,” Colin says, “I just need to …”

“Now.”
 
Rebel disappears behind a big old truck that’s getting worked on.

The jaw muscle twitches in Colin’s cheek, so I know he’s mad, but he doesn’t argue.
 
“You going to be okay?” he asks me.

“Yes, of course.”
 
I start to walk away.

“Here,” he says, catching up to me.
 
“Do what this says.”

I take the white paper from him - instructions about how to care for round ligament pain.
 
I feel like balling it up and throwing it on the floor, but I don’t.