I stared at the computer screen, feeling like absolute shit, and clicked the save button.

It uploaded to my Dropbox and I took a deep breath.

It was finished. The article was finished.

Three weeks of my life were poured into this thing. I showed Coop an early draft only two days ago, and he put researchers at my disposal, real, serious researchers.

But I didn’t write the article he thought I was writing. I didn’t write the article I refused to write, because I knew I wasn’t going to betray Bull like that.

Nobody had seen it, not yet. It was just saved to my personal Dropbox, and nobody else had access to that.

I felt horrible. I felt drained and exhausted and bloated and bad. That wasn’t entirely from writing the article, and as I sat there staring at the computer, I couldn’t help but reflect on the fact that my period was exactly two weeks late. I was incredibly regular, and I’d been counting the days since it should have happened.

It hit me like a lightning bolt. The article, Bull, my period. I stood up and got a glass of water, feeling dizzy. I glanced at the clock, and it was only six o’clock on a Tuesday evening.

The article was done at least. I didn’t know what I’d do with it, or what would happen if I showed Coop, but I couldn’t let myself care. He’d probably be pretty pissed, considering I wrote something completely unlike what he wanted me to write.

I even kept him off the scent by asking the researchers for a bunch of useless information. He probably thought I was hard at work on the original hit piece, but he would be very, very wrong.

I walked back to my desk and shut the laptop lid and then walked into the bathroom. My heart was hammering in my chest as I got the pregnancy test out of the cabinet and read the instructions.

“Great,” I mumbled to myself. “Pee on a stick and find out if you’re screwed or not. Pretty simple.”

I took the test out of the box, sat down on the toilet, and tried to make myself pee.

But I was too nervous. I just kept thinking, over and over, about what the hell I would do if I really was pregnant.

I hadn’t spoken a word to Bull since the day Marta caught me and he threw me out of his apartment. I couldn’t stop thinking about how he knew that I was a journalist the whole time. He knew that I might be playing him, and yet he stuck around anyway.

He didn’t need to do that. He told me things, knowing full well what I might do with them.

I shook my head. I had made the right decision. I didn’t write the article I had set out to write, just like I promised myself I wouldn’t.

I sighed and peed. I held the test under the stream, finished up, and then placed it on the sink.

I leaned against the wall to ponder my fate for one minute.

I stared down at my feet. The memory of Bull’s body came back to me. He wore a condom, I was sure he wore a condom, but they weren’t perfect, especially when it came to a man like Bull.

He wasn’t gentle. He could easily tear one of those flimsy, thin things into shreds. Of course he broke the condom. How could I have expected anything different?

I picked up the test a minute later.

It was positive.

I stood there, staring at the test.

Little blue plus sign.

I checked the directions.

Yep, definitely pregnant.

I dropped the test into the trash and got out another one. I sat down, peed, and waited.

I picked it up. I was definitely pregnant.

I groaned and wished I had a third test, but I had only been paranoid enough to buy two. I had never really believed I was pregnant, but I was, I really was.

I was pregnant with Bull’s baby.

I sat down there on the bathroom floor and stared at the second test in my hands. I didn’t know if I wanted to laugh or cry or scream or run away. How could I be pregnant by a man who didn’t even want to talk to me?

But I was, and there was no changing that. I didn’t know a thing about having babies and raising kids, and yet I was expected to have one in nine months. There was no way I could give it up for adoption or have an abortion; those options were just against my morals. I understood why people made those decisions, but I just couldn’t bring myself to do it.

I felt so incredibly stuck and alone. I knew the world was still happening all around me, but sitting there on the cold tile with my hands squeezing a plastic pregnancy test that just kept screaming in my face, you’re pregnant, you’re pregnant, I felt like everything came to a screeching halt. I felt like the air in my lungs was on fire and nothing was going to continue.

But I took another breath. And another one. And eventually I threw away the test, stood up, and left the bathroom. I got another drink of water and was glad that I hadn’t been drinking any alcohol. I’d been too busy to go out with friends and coworkers for the last few weeks, and I’d been too nervous to drink when I was around Bull before that.

At least I was probably going to have a nice, healthy baby.

Not that it mattered, since I was so totally screwed.