Chapter 36

Rhett

 

There was a moment, when Danica gave me a meaningful look, that I very nearly leant in to kiss her. I even felt my entire body gravitate towards her, but I bottled it at the very last second and I fixed my eyes upon my shoes.

Danica might not have known what I was about to do, but my body did, and it was freaking out accordingly. My heart was pounding, my mind was racing, and I was tingling all over.

“Erm, yeah, thanks,” I replied awkwardly instead, trying to cover up my humiliation. “That means a lot.” I was glad that she was back on my side, and I didn’t want to screw that up already. Not when we had so much to lose.

“Why did you leave?” I suddenly heard her ask quietly. My eyes flicked back up at her, and when I saw her again, all of the boldness that she’d been embracing before was gone, and it was like she was a shell of a former self. The shell that I’d left behind when I ran away.

Guilt washed over me as I realized that after everything, I’d probably made the wrong decision after all. I should have stayed, I should have explained, I never should have cut communication. That was stupid, and I couldn’t help but regret it.

“I… I’m sorry,” I replied sadly. “I wish that I hadn't gone. I should have stayed, but Dad threatened me. He threatened you…”

“So why didn’t you just tell me that?” she snapped angrily. “Why did you just ignore me when I messaged you?” Her face flushed red, which proved just how upset she was. Embarrassed, too, which made me feel even worse.

“He said that he was monitoring our communications, and that-”

“Wait,” she jumped in quickly, a panicked look spread across our face. “Does he know about us?”

“I don’t think so,” I shook my head, hoping that I was telling the truth. “I think he might suspect, but he doesn’t know for sure.”

“Oh God.” Even that was enough to panic her. “So he has that hanging over our heads.” Her breaths were coming out laboured and stressed now, which had me worrying, too.

“It’ll be fine, though,” I tried my best to reassure her. “I have far more on him than he does us.”

“Mmmm,” she replied, seemingly unconvinced. I wished that I had the words to let her know that everything would be all right, but I didn’t. I couldn’t lie and tell her that we were all going to get out of things fine, because I honestly wasn’t sure that we would. “Okay, well, I better be getting back.”

As she stood up, the awkward atmosphere took over the room once more, and we remembered that we didn’t know how to relate to one another anymore.

“I’ll see you tomorrow?” I stuffed my hands in my pockets as I spoke, not knowing what else to do with myself.

“Yes,” she nodded sharply. “And we’ll tell Mom everything; she needs to know now. It’s only fair.”

“Of course.” We stood there in silence for a few moments, before I felt forced to put an end to this. “Well, I’ll see you then.” And I turned on my heels, walking away.

As I made my way back to the hotel, the oddness of our encounter went from my mind, and instead I was left with a glad feeling that at least things had gone well. Okay, there was still a lot of danger around us all, but at least she and Lyla were safe in that dorm room. At least I knew where they both were, and Danica was talking to me once again–however strained that had been, I had to see a positive in there somewhere. Now we just needed to form some sort of plan that we all agreed upon.

Now all I needed to worry about was the location of my father. It was so weird that he’d run away and was nowhere to be seen. It made me very suspicious about what the hell he was up to. When he’d left my mom, we didn’t see him again for years, but I had the feeling that we weren’t going to get quite so lucky this time.

But there was nothing that I could do about that, so what I needed to do was to head back to my hotel room for a good night’s sleep, then I would meet with Lyla and Danica in the morning. I would feel much better once we had an idea about what we were going to do, and I was certain that as a lawyer, Lyla would have some good input. She would understand these documents much better than I ever could, and I had a feeling that her expertise was going to come in handy.

A fatigue overcame me as I wandered up the hotel stairs, and I couldn’t wait to be able to switch off and sleep for a while. But of course, as was typical of my life, that was never going to happen. As I swung the door open, happy to be alone once more, I found a shadow in my room. One that was attached to the very last person in the world that I wanted to see.

“Dad?” I gasped, desperately needing rest, not this. “What the hell are you doing here?” At least I knew where he was now. But very quickly, the fear that he incited in me was replaced with anger. “You can’t be here, you know? I’ll call the police!” I snapped, wanting him to see that I wouldn’t bow down to him this time. I’d made that mistake once before, and that felt like one time too many.

“That would be a mistake,” he replied simply, standing up to tower over me, using his intimidation method he liked best. “I know you think that you have me in a corner, but you don’t. You’re playing with the big boys here, Rhett,” he warned.

“What do you mean?” My heart raced. How did he seem to know that I had information on him? I’d done that totally in secret! There was just no way. And yet, from the glint in his eye, I could tell that he did know, and that I was an idiot for thinking that I could win even this battle, never mind the war.

He watched me intently as he pulled a picture out of his bag and I snatched it from him, wanting to see what he thought he had over me. He couldn’t do anything to hurt me this time, so I was no longer afraid.

But it wasn’t a photograph directly linking to me. He was using someone else to get at me, and that was agony. Much as I didn’t care what this psychopath did to me, I didn’t want anyone else to get hurt.

I found myself staring at a picture of Danica, completely unaware, on the college campus. My thought that he would have forgotten about her was completely wrong. Clearly he was still very much interested in her whereabouts, and he had someone following her and taking pictures of her to prove that.

“What?” I asked. “Why?”

“I’ve had someone following her ever since she went back to college,” he smirked at me, knowing that this was going to upset me. “I wanted to make sure that you kept your promise and that you didn’t contact her. Which, of course you did.” He shook his head smiling. “Just can’t help yourself. Just like me, you are.”

“You can’t just do that,” I snapped angrily, ignoring the one comment that he’d said just to rile me up. “That’s against every single one of her rights.”

He laughed mirthlessly, which sent a bolt of anger that raced right through me. How fucking dare he? Who did this dickhead think he was? Before I even knew it, a red mist had descended and I was gunning for him. I started racing at him with my fists flying. I needed to hit him, to cause him pain, and there was nothing that would stop me.

But I didn’t get the satisfaction that I wanted, that I so desperately needed. My dad ducked out of the way, and I ended up bashing my hand against the nearest wall, injuring only myself.

“Fuck,” I cried out angrily, growing increasingly frustrated with myself as I showed even more weakness.

“Do you not want to know what I found out?” he asked in a smarmy voice, as if I hadn't just tried to punch him. “It affects you, you know?”

I half wanted to ask him, but I didn’t want him to know that he’d gotten to me, so I stayed silent and stubborn, crossing my arms across my chest to disguise my reddened hand.

“Danica is pregnant,” he announced with pride, to which I shook my head sarcastically. He would try anything to hurt me this man. But then he handed me a photo which showed another angle of Danica, and a very clear baby bump.

“That could just be the way she’s standing,” I said lamely, trying to justify it. But deep down, I already knew that it was the truth. It was totally obvious.

So why the hell hadn't she told me?

Why was I being forced to find out in such a dreadful manner?

My heart thumped painfully, rattling against my rib cage as I thought about everything we’d been through while she was keeping this information inside. I hadn't even noticed what she was wearing when I met her tonight, I’d only been focused on her natural beauty, but thinking back, she had been wearing baggy clothes that weren’t her style at all.

“I also found this.” Dad gave me a positive pregnancy test, which I held delicately between my fingers. “In the garbage at home. She’s known about this baby for months.”

And if he hadn't dug the knife in enough, he continued. “Of course, the baby is yours. As far as I can see anyway, I haven’t seen evidence of her screwing anyone else, except her stepbrother.” There was a disgust on his tone, which I chose to ignore. I knew for a fact that she wouldn’t have been with anyone else; she just wasn’t that sort of girl, which meant only one thing.

The baby was mine. I was about to be a father.

Me, a father. It was almost unbelievable.

I was too shocked to even reply, never mind argue. I just couldn’t wrap my head around it all. Danica was pregnant, carrying my baby, and I’d acted like such a horrible douche bag. I went up and down, then I ran away leaving her all alone. What sort of father did that make me? No wonder she didn’t want to know me; no wonder she was so reluctant to even give me the time of day again. If it hadn't been for this horrible situation, she might never have spoken to me again, and that would have been all that I deserved.

Dad took advantage of my silence. “If you don’t stop this little investigation of yours, things could get really ugly for you and Danica,” he warned.

I glanced up into his eyes, and I could see just how deadly serious he was. I didn’t have to think about it too long; there was only one obvious solution here.

“Of course,” I conceded. “I’ll stop. That’s no issue.”

“Good,” he replied, satisfied with my answer.

With that, he left, leaving me by myself with only my thoughts for company. I slumped down on the bed, feeling terror course through my veins. I was half tempted to phone Danica, to ask her about it, but I decided that would be better as a face-to-face conversation.

I needed to process it first.