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  Gigi turned around, wiping her hands on a dish towel. “Can you even believe it?” she asked, smiling. “What a beautiful surprise, right? Congrat-“

  “A surprise, yes. Beautiful, no.”

  “You’re not happy?” she asked, her face falling.

  Nathan’s derisive laugh answered her question.

  “Oh…” Gigi looked as stunned by Nathan’s asshole behavior as Stella had been.

  Which just proves they didn’t know you at all.

  Kat, Nina, Carla, and Fi came in laughing. But their smiles faded when they saw Gigi’s expression.

  “Fuck this.” Nathan stalked through her living room and out the front door. He slammed it so hard he was positive he’d broken the frame. Again.

  “Wait…” Danny grabbed the chair Nathan had thrown and replaced it on Stella’s deck. He sat down as Stella sank back into hers. “Your cancer isn’t back?”

  Stella shook her head. “No. They did an ultrasound and the mass I felt is benign.” She gave him a watery smile. “No cancer, but I am pregnant.”

  Danny’s eyes widened. “Pregnant?” Stella nodded. “Oh, shit.”

  Yep. Nicely put.

  “I thought it was happy news, but…” Stella tried to swallow down her sorrow and blink back her tears. “…apparently not.”

  “Oh, shit,” Danny repeated, rubbing at his chin. He looked at the door wall and back to Stella. “Shit.”

  Stella’s sisters came charging through the open door wall and swarmed.

  “What happened, Stell?” Nina said, not caring that she had stepped in front of Danny, hands on her hips.

  “He seemed really upset, Stella. What did he say?” Carla asked, her face full of concern.

  “I can’t believe it…” Gigi cried into a dish towel. “I just don’t understand…”

  “Asshole,” Fi muttered. She crouched next to Stella and rubbed her back. “Well, you don’t need him, Stella. You’ve got us.”

  “Can we please let Stella tell us what happened before we get all nuts?” Kat said loudly, cutting through the cacophony of Ciaramitaro curses, declarations of love, and plans for Nathan’s utter destruction. She leaned against the back of the house, waving off Danny’s offer of the chair. He stood anyway. “Stella, cara, what happened? What did Nathan say?”

  Stella swiped at her eyes with the Kleenex Carla had pulled out of god-knew-where and took a deep, shuddering breath. “He was very angry. I couldn’t believe how angry. He accused me of knowing I could get pregnant and not being careful.”

  A litany of “what the hells” and “gimme a breaks” filled the air.

  The next part really hurt to repeat. And she bawled through the whole thing.

  “He asked me to get an abortion. He said he doesn’t want ‘it’ and I couldn’t possibly be so ridiculous as to keep ‘it.” The shudders wracking her body made it hard to continue, but Stella forced the words out. Because she needed to come to terms with them as quickly as possible. “I told him I love our baby and that I wasn’t ever going to get an abortion.”

  “Of course, not, cara,” Gigi said, her voice cracking. She threw her arms around Stella’s shoulders, almost smacking Fi in the face. “Of course not. This is a miracle. Babies are always miracles, but this baby?” Gigi leaned back and gently grabbed Stella’s chin; smiling through her tears. “This baby is special. A gift. A miracle we never thought could happen.” She stood up straight and composed herself. True to Gigi form, she went into action. “I’m gonna call Marco. He’s gonna get an ice cream cake, like you like, Stell. The chocolate cake with the chocolate chip ice cream, okay?” And there Gigi went, still muttering to herself. Nefarious plans about more carb band-aids, no doubt.

  Nina, no good at emotional displays, but plenty good at getting pissed and exacting revenge, shook her head furiously. “Goddamn coward. Do you see why I told you to stay away from cops, Stella? They are big and bad behind that badge, but they’re all little fucking pussies deep down. Real tough guys when it comes to stuff that doesn’t matter, but ask them to deal with something serious and-”

  “Nina,” Carla interrupted gently. “Do you think you could grab Stella a cool washcloth, please?”

  Nina huffed, but she turned to get it.

  Carla crouched down and took Stella’s hands into her own. Her hazel eyes were soft and brimming with. “I love you, Stella. You are a strong, beautiful woman who has nothing but good things in your future. You will be an excellent mother and we will all be here to help you through it. But I’m going to get my lovely wife out of your hair for a while, okay? I’ll come back later when she goes to work and my mom can sit with the kids. Cause Nina’s not going to do anything but drive you nuts.”

  Stella nodded. “Thanks, Car. I’ll be okay. Kat and Fi will stay with me. But come back later if you can.” She gave Carla a hug and sat back down.

  She held herself tightly. Herself and her baby.

  More tears welled and fell.

  Fi continued rubbing her back as Stella sobbed.

  “Maybe it’s best if you go check on him,” Stella heard Kat say softly.

  She looked up and was surprised to still see Danny standing there. He’d been in clear view the whole time, but Stella was far from clear-headed right now.

  “Does she need anything?” Danny asked and Stella had the wherewithal to be touched by his concern.

  “No, but thank you. We’ve got her,” Kat replied.

  “If you change your mind, please don’t hesitate to call.” Danny paused, pulling out a little notebook and pen. He scribbled something and handed to Kat with a half-smile. “In case you lost the last one I gave you.”

  Danny turned back to Stella. “I’m gonna go see what the hell he’s up to. I’ll check on you later, okay?”

  “Thanks, Danny,” Stella managed to get out.

  With a brief head nod and another glance at Kat, Danny left.

  Fi followed him to grab Stella a glass of water and Kat sat back in the chair. She didn’t say anything, which was part of the comfort of Kat. You felt better when she was around whether she said a word or not. Thankfully, she didn’t mind if you talked her ear off.

  “Maybe he’s right,” Stella said, playing with the wadded up ball of Kleenex in her hands. “I never did confirm I couldn’t get pregnant. I didn’t mean to trick him, but maybe I did. A sin of omission, you know? I let him think it was fine when it obviously wasn’t.”

  “Was there a way for a doctor could have confirmed your fertility?” Kat asked. “Because I can’t think of how they could have. They thought your ovaries had been irreparably damaged by the chemo, radiation, and drugs. How could they have known otherwise until your body proved them wrong?”

  “I guess,” Stella conceded. Another sob rose up as she recalled Nathan’s anger and the awful things he’d said. “I never in a million year thought he’d react that way. I knew he’d be worried because he told me he never wanted to be a dad because of all of his issues.” Stella choked on another sob. “But I thought he’d be happy. Because we love each other. And this baby is us.” More sobs wracked her body. “But instead he asked me to get rid of it. Oh, God…” Stella leaned forward, sobbing into her hands.

  Kat leaned over and stroked Stella’s head. “Shhh…” she cooed in a very un-Kat like way. “It’s not good for the baby, Stell. You’ve got to think of that now. The doctor already said this is considered a high risk pregnancy because of your past medical history. We’ve got to keep you as stress free as possible, all right?”

  When Stella showed no signs of slowing down, Kat sighed, still stroking Stella’s hair. “I’m so sorry, Stella.”

  What more could she say? Stella had made yet another egregious miscalculation vis-à-vis men…only this time, she wasn’t the only one who would be hurt by her foolishness.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Nathan stormed out of Stella’s house without giving nearly enough thought to where in the hell he was going to go. He was on duty and his partner
was no where to be found.

  Nathan considered leaving Danny there, but they were still on the clock and, as angry as Nathan was, dereliction of duty wasn’t something he needed on his record. And so he sent Danny a text saying he’d be parked down the street when he came out.

  It was a pussy move, but the only one available to Nathan at the moment. Because there was no way he was going anywhere close to Stella’s house again. Ever.

  A few minutes after Nathan sent the text, Danny walked out of Stella’s front door and down her steps. But instead of climbing into the passenger side, he walked around to Nathan’s window and pounded on it with the side of his fist.

  Here we go.

  Nathan rolled down his window. “If you bust out my window, the captain isn’t gonna be happy, Danny.”

  “You asshole! How could you do that to her?” Danny pointed back towards Stella’s house. “You just walked in there and destroyed her, you know that right? Or are you too big of a selfish prick to care?”

  “Yes, I am too selfish to care,” Nathan said evenly. “I told her I never wanted a child, she got pregnant, and now I’m walking away. Guys do it every day.” He swallowed down whatever was trying to come back up his esophagus and shrugged. “I’ll send her money. She’ll be fine.”

  Nathan thought he might actually get sick. He inhaled a deep breath through his nose and exhaled slowly out of his mouth. “Now get in. We were lucky not to get a call during that nonsense, but one will be coming in any minute.”

  “Nonsense?” Danny stepped back from the cruiser shaking his head.

  The disgusted, disappointed look on his face didn’t come close to the self-directed loathing Nathan was experiencing.

  “The woman you love – who miraculously loves you despite all of your fuckedupness - tells you she is pregnant with your baby and you call that ‘nonsense?’” Danny’s expression was full of nothing but revulsion. “You really are sick, you know that, Drazek? All those years you told me how fucked up and twisted and black-hearted you were…I never believed you. Until now.”

  He braced his hands on the door frame and met Nathan’s eyes straight on. “I am warning you, if you don’t go back in there right now and beg her forgiveness, you will lose her forever. The only woman you’ve ever loved and will ever love. The only woman who has ever ‘gotten’ you. Who loves all of you. Unconditionally. You walk away now and you will never get her back. You know that, right?”

  For a split second, Nathan considered doing exactly what Danny said. He could walk back into Stella’s house, drop to his knees, and beg her forgiveness. He could tell her that he’s not really angry…just very, very scared…and that he has no mechanism for being honest about that fear to her or himself.

  He could hold her and touch her and feel right about his place in the world. He could make love to her tonight and show her with his body everything she was to him and offer her the very little he could be to her.

  But then Nathan thought about the pregnancy.

  The…baby.

  Our baby.

  Stella’s words – and that look on her face as she spoke them – would haunt him forever.

  But there was darkness inside of him. Always had been, always would be. He’d allowed Stella to con him into allowing her in, but he couldn’t do that to a child. There was too much at risk.

  And so Nathan did the only thing he could.

  He shot Danny a glance and started up the cruiser. “I’m leaving. You coming or staying?”

  Danny scoffed, head shaking. “For real?” When Nathan didn’t respond, Danny walked around and got in.

  They finished their shift in silence; only speaking to one another when absolutely necessary.

  Nathan had never felt so alone. He’d been friends with Danny for as long as he could remember and now he’d fucked that up. He’d just lost the new family he’d gained in the Ciaramitaro clan and he had no other real friends or family of his own.

  And worst of all he’d lost Stella.

  And the little family they’d created inside of her.

  At the end of their shift, Danny and Nathan walked out to the back lot in silence.

  Before getting his car, he faced Nathan. “You know, I really thought you loved her, D. Sure seemed like you did. I’ve never seen you so happy…and I don’t know…peaceful. But now I know it’s not possible that you loved her because this isn’t the way to treat someone you hate, let alone someone you love.”

  “And you know so much about love, how? Because you’ve fucked half of Cleveland and most of the suburbs? Don’t fool yourself, brother. Sex doesn’t equal love, no matter how much you wish it did. And there’s no such thing as love anyway,” Nathan lied – to himself more than Danny. “There’s lust and there’s indifference. Anything in between in wishful thinking.”

  “I might fuck a lot of strangers and do a lot of stupid, dangerous stuff, but at least I would never purposefully hurt anyone – especially not someone I cared for. And someone who cared for me back.” Danny shook his head. “And you with all your false self-deprecation and fake morality. Nope, no strip clubs or drinking or sleeping around for you. You won’t steal a pen from work, but you’ll get a woman pregnant and then abandon her? That’s some fucked up set of rules you live by, Nathan, I’ll give you that.”

  “And, what, you think I should stick around? To do what? Scream at it? Beat it? Punch holes in the walls in front of it? Break things when it pisses me off?” Nathan sneered. “Yeah, that’s sounds like a great life for a kid. Oh, wait, it sounds like my life as a kid – only minus the cigarette burns and starvation.”

  “You would never do those things to a kid, Nathan, come on!”

  “I’d try not to, but you and I know better than most things about cycles of abuse. They are very hard to break. Oh, and by the way, other than beating her, I’ve subjected Stella to all of that shit. Which isn’t fair to her, but at least she’s a grown woman with a choice. If I stick around, that kid won’t have a choice and Stella will all but lose hers. Because it’s a lot harder to walk away from someone you share a kid with.” Nathan shook his head. “I’m not doing it to them. I can’t. I won’t.”

  Danny eyed him. “You’re gonna bump into her, you know? Her and eventually the baby. You gonna be okay with that? You gonna be able to see her and walk away? You gonna be able to look at that baby’s face and walk away? That would be pure fucking torture. You think about that?”

  Nathan hadn’t thought about that. But there was always the lonely days, weeks, months, and years ahead to think about that and everything else he’d lost and would continue to lose.

  He left without another word, drove home, and took a quick shower. Nathan walked out of the bathroom and stood in his living room, absorbing the silence.

  There would be no more laughing or joking or half-naked chases around the house. Stella would never mess up his kitchen, hang her stethoscope on his fridge handle, or leave Starbucks water rings on his wooden end tables again.

  Nathan wandered into the darkened bedroom and stared at his huge, empty bed. The sheets were still rumpled from the last time he and Stella had spent the night here. From the last time they’d made love here, slept here, and talked here.

  Well, Stella had done most of the talking, but Nathan had loved every fucking second of it all. Because, as much as he’d pretended not to, he’d loved listening to her talk. Loved the sound of her voice, especially when it had been husky right when she’d woken up or high-pitched and fast when she’d been all worked up over something. And the soft, sexy sound of it in his ear when they’d been making love…

  Suddenly, Nathan was suffocating on the silence. On the stillness . On the emptiness. On the absence of her.

  He went downstairs and hurt himself badly. Nathan hadn’t done it since he’d begun a relationship with Stella, so he was long overdue. By the time he dragged his ass upstairs, he was sweaty, bloody, and no closer to forgetting about her.

  He showered – again – and grabbe
d the pillow from Stella’s side of the bed. He threw it on the spare bedroom floor because it was one of the only spots in Nathan’s house where they hadn’t had screwed around. The living room floor and couch were out. So were the shower and hallway. Of course his bedroom was out. He couldn’t sleep on the kitchen floor or on the stairs, so the spare bedroom floor it was.

  Nathan stretched out on the floor and buried his face in the pillow; inhaling as deeply as he could. Stella’s coconut/vanilla scent mixed with the heady perfume she sometimes wore fucked with his mind and wound up his body.

  Nathan closed his eyes and tried to let the exhaustion take him under.

  Our baby.

  His eyelids popped open again.

  I love this baby. Our baby.

  Nathan was not a crying man, but he came perilously close in that moment.

  Because in that horrendous, appalling, awful moment, Nathan realized he already loved their baby too.

  ***

  Stella wanted to chase down Nathan’s squad car and tell him he’d better stick to patrol. Because the man had zero future in stakeouts or private investigation.

  He’d been following her all week. It wasn’t constant, but it was enough to notice. Nathan had driven by her house the night of their big fight, he’d been skulking around during her walk around the block the next day, and he’d just happen to be patrolling the hospital parking lot when she’d gotten off of work last night.

  And he’d – of all God-blessed things – put an envelope with a $500 check in her mailbox a few days ago. Oh, and he’d mowed her lawn and patched her cracked concrete front step while she’d been at work yesterday.

  If this was Nathan’s idea of walking away, he had a lot to learn about the art of abandonment.

  Stella hadn’t been able to stifle her laugh when she’d opened that check. What pregnancy-related expenses would she have accrued in a week to warrant that huge chunk of change? It was so bizarre and, like most things Nathan-related, oddly endearing. She’d put it into a different envelope and mailed it back, but he’d simply added another $100 to it and mailed it back to her.