“Why?”
“Because Vinnie is a Wind Dragon, Shay. You’re his, and they always come for what’s theirs.”
I lay my head back and close my eyes. “How did things turn out like this?”
Talon’s eyes gentle. “It’s all temporary. Things will work out for you, Shayla. I promise.”
I’m glad he’s so confident, because me?
I’m not so sure.
FORTY
Vinnie
I STALK through the clubhouse, phone in my hand, waiting for Talon to call me back. He said that she’s fine, and that he will get her to call me ASAP. I got no fuckin’ sleep last night, instead I kept calling her and Talon’s phones, wanting some damn explanations. We were meant to talk everything out, she said we would, but then she just leaves?
When Faye rang me and asked where Shay was, I felt it in my gut that something wasn’t right. And it wasn’t. She was gone. Without a word. Fuck, how she played me yesterday morning in the kitchen, letting me think everything was going to be okay between the two of us, when really she knew she was going to leave without giving me any kind of explanation as to why, or without giving us a chance.
Faye leans against the wall, hand on her protruding stomach, watching me as I pace.
“Vinnie, why don’t you let me make you something to eat? You haven’t eaten or slept.”
“I’m fine,” I tell her, waving off her concern. I won’t sleep until I get to talk to Shay. I’m so angry at how she’s handled this whole thing, yet at the same time I’m worried and just want her home.
“Vinnie,” Faye says quietly, looking unsure. “Shay confided something in me, and I think it has to do with this whole thing.”
I stop, turn to her, and approach. “What are you talking about?”
“Fuck!” she snaps. “This isn’t my place to say, it should come from her. I just don’t want you to find out that I knew, and then lose your shit at me. She spoke to me, woman-to-woman, and it doesn’t feel right telling you when it isn’t my thing to tell.”
I study her for a moment, and then yell out one word, “Sin!”
Faye mutters something under her breath, I’m pretty sure she called me a snitch, but I’ll have to deal with her ass later, because right now all I want to know about is what Shay confided in her.
Sin walks in from outside, shirtless. “What the fuck is going on now?”
I look at his wife. “Faye knows.”
“Knows what?” he asks, wiping his forehead with the back of his hand.
“Everything.”
“For fuck’s sake, someone give me more than that,” he growls, losing his patience. “I’m trying to build a higher fence. I don’t have time for this shit.”
“I think I know why Shay left,” Faye tells her husband. “She confided something in me, and after Vinnie told me what their last conversation was about, it all makes sense.”
“Faye,” Sin says in warning.
She turns to me, her hazel eyes narrowed. She doesn’t look very happy with me all of a sudden, and I’d like to know why. “You said that you told her you never want kids, or marriage, and that you’d be a terrible father, and that you never plan on moving out of the clubhouse. Basically, in a way, you gave her an ultimatum. You set the rules, leaving nothing open for compromise. That’s not how a relationship works, Vinnie. You gave her nothing to work with, no hope for the future, except for a life staying exactly how it is now. What about what she wants? Did you even ask her that?”
“You said all that to her?” Sin asks, blue eyes going double their size. “Ice-cold, Vinnie. Ice-cold.”
“I was honest,” I say, defending myself.
“Yeah, well,” Faye says, hands now on her hips. “You gave that asshole of a speech to a woman who’s already pregnant with your child and was going to tell you that day.”
“What?” I ask. I can’t have heard correctly.
There is no way.
No.
Pregnant?
But she’s on the pill. I know no contraception is 100 percent, but what the fuck?
“So you told a pregnant woman, who is unsure and probably scared, not to mention hormonal, that you don’t ever want children?” Sin asks, cringing. “Fucking hell, you’re so screwed.”
“Thanks for that, prez,” I reply, still in a daze.
Shay is pregnant.
I don’t really know how to process this, to be honest. I fucked things up with Shay, she’s probably really hurt right now, and hating me, but I don’t know how to accept that I’m going to have a child, when like I said, I never planned on having one.
Ever.
Under no circumstance.
I run my hand over my head, and turn to walk away from these two, because I need to be alone right now.
“Are you going after her?” Faye asks, hope lacing her tone.
Hope that I soon dash. “No.”
How fucked-up is that? My first instinct after hearing this news isn’t even to go after her, to tell her everything will be okay, because I don’t know if it will be. I’ve never trusted another woman when she said she was on the pill, I always wore condoms anyway, but with Shay, I trusted her completely. I guess that’s not exactly fair, because shit does happen and nothing is foolproof, but fuck, I only just heard the news and my head is fuckin’ spinning.
This can’t be happening.