Chapter 4: Pregnant?

Chapter 4 

 Joye

I woke up on a couch in an unfamiliar living room, a blanket draped over me that I didn't remember pulling on myself. My head throbbed. My mouth tasted like the champagne toast I never got to drink.

"You're awake."

I sat up too fast, and the room tilted. Xavier stood by the window, jacket already off, sleeves rolled to his elbows, watching me with the same unreadable expression he'd worn through the entire ceremony.

Again, those eyes. Strangely, they somehow brought memory of the steamy night I had with that stranger at the club. But that was impossible, right?

I shook the thought off instantly.

"What happened?" I asked, clearing my throat.

"You fainted. The doctor at the courthouse said it was probably stress and low blood sugar. He said to let you rest and get you checked properly if it happens again."

He was watching me now, that sense of family still resting in his gaze.

"Oh." I pressed a hand to my temple. "Where am I?"

"My house." He said it like it should have been obvious. "Our house, I suppose, now."

Right. Our house. I looked around… clean lines, expensive furniture, nothing personal anywhere, like a hotel suite pretending to be a home.

"Let me show you to your room," he said, already turning to walk.

I followed him up a wide staircase, down a hallway, until he stopped at a door and pushed it open. A large bedroom, tastefully done, a bed big enough for four people.

"This is yours," he said.

I looked past him toward the hallway. "And yours?"

"Down the hall."

"So we're not…" I gestured vaguely between the two rooms. "Sharing?"

"No." His answer came fast, almost defensive. "Let's be clear about something, Joye, this marriage isn't real, it is a marriage of convenience, and nothing more."

"I'm aware," I said, folding my arms. "You made that very clear at the introduction."

"Good. Then we understand each other." He glanced at me, something flickering behind his eyes again for just a second before it disappeared. For a moment, I wondered if I was imagining everything. "I only agreed to this because my parents want an heir before my grandfather's health gets any worse. Once that happens, you and I can live however we want. Separately, if that's what you prefer."

"An heir," I repeated slowly. "So this really is just business to you."

"Isn't it business to you too?" His tone was sharp now. "Don't act wounded, Joye. We both walked into this with our eyes open."

He was right, and that was almost the worst part. I had no argument for that, so I said nothing at all.

He gave me a long look, like he was waiting for me to say something else, some kind of protest, some kind of plea. When I didn't, he simply nodded and walked out, leaving me alone in a room that didn't feel like mine at all.

Dinner that night was silent except for the clink of cutlery against plates. Xavier sat across from me, eyes on his plate, answering my questions in clipped, minimal sentences whenever I tried to make conversation.

"So what do you do?" I asked, cutting into food I barely tasted.

"I run my father's shipping company."

"Do you like it?"

"It's a job."

"Do you have hobbies? Interests? Things you like outside of work?"

He looked up at me then, something almost tired in his expression. "Joye, we don't have to pretend to get to know each other. This isn't that kind of marriage."

"I was just trying to have a conversation."

"Don't bother." He went back to his food. "It'll be easier for both of us if we don't get too comfortable with each other."

The words stung more than I wanted to admit, especially after everything I'd already survived in the past few weeks. I opened my mouth to snap something back, then thought better of it and simply stood, pushing my chair back.

"I'm going to bed," I said.

I made it three steps from the table before the room started spinning again, faster this time, the floor tilting beneath me like the deck of a ship. I heard Xavier's chair scrape back, heard him call my name, and then everything went dark.

When I opened my eyes again, the lights were too bright and the smell of antiseptic hung thick in the air. I was in a hospital room, an IV drip in my arm. Xavier sat in a chair beside the bed, elbows on his knees, watching me with an expression I couldn't quite place—that same expression again.

"You're awake," he said, echoing his own words from earlier that day, though this time his voice sounded different. Less cold.

"What happened?" My throat felt raw.

"You collapsed again. I brought you straight here." He hesitated. "The doctor wants to talk to you. She said she'd come back once you woke up."

As if summoned, the door opened, and a woman in a white coat stepped inside, glancing between the chart in her hands and my face.

"Mrs. Anderson," she said, and it took me a second to realize she meant me. "How are you feeling?"

"Dizzy. Tired. What's wrong with me?"

While I waited for her reply, my heart thought about one million reasons why this was happening to me, but nothing prepared me for the reply she was about to give me. My eyes were fixated on her lips with all keenness. 

She smiled gently, the kind of smile doctors give when they're about to say something big. "Nothing is wrong with you, Mrs. Anderson. Congratulations, you're pregnant."

The words hit the room like a dropped glass, shattering the silence into a thousand pieces.

"I'm sorry… what?" I stared at her, certain I'd misheard.

Of course, I had. There was no way I was pregnant… I mean, I knew Stephen and I didn’t plan to have babies any time soon, so we always used protection. 

"About three weeks along, based on your hormone levels. That explains the dizziness, the fainting, the fatigue." She smiled again, oblivious to the storm she'd just set off. "Congratulations."

I turned slowly to look at Xavier.

His face had gone completely pale, his jaw tight, his eyes locked on mine with a question neither of us dared to say out loud.

Three weeks.

Three weeks ago, I wasn't married to Xavier at all.