Chapter 7: A Grape

“Do not look at it again,” Kade said, taking the phone gently out of my hand and turning it face down on his desk.

“Someone stood outside that pharmacy, Kade, someone watched me buy those tests and I never saw them,” I said, and I could hear my voice trembling.

“Sit, please, before you fall down,” he said, steering me to the leather couch by the window.

“I am not going to fall down,” I said, and then my knees folded, and I sat so hard the cushions sighed.

“You are shaking,” Kade said.

“I am cold, it is the air conditioning,” I said.

“Mina,” he said, and he knelt on the carpet in front of me, in his thousand dollar suit, and looked up at my face. “Nobody here is going to laugh at you for being scared.”

“I am not scared, I am furious, and a little scared,” I said, and my eyes filled before I could stop them.

“That is allowed,” Kade said.

“I spent two years with someone who laughed at me behind a door, and now someone is taking pictures of me in the street, and I cannot tell which one hurts worse,” I said, and the tears finally fell.

“Neither one gets to hurt you again, I mean that,” Kade said, and he pulled the tissue box across the table with a hand that was not quite steady.

“You do not even know me,” I said, laughing through the tears.

“I know you stood in my boardroom with a baby in your stomach and a man blackmailing you, and you still showed me page four of an invoice, I know that much,” he said.

I laughed again, and it turned into a hiccup, and he handed me a tissue and then another, and he never said one word about the black mascara running down my cheeks.

The door opened without a knock, and a broad man with a gray beard walked in.

“Brandt, finally,” Kade said, standing.

“Sir, I ran the number, it is a prepaid phone, bought with cash at a gas station on Fifth, switched on two hours ago and switched off again,” Brandt said.

“Camera footage?” Kade asked.

“The gas station camera is broken, sir, the shop owner says a man in a cap paid, and that is all he remembers,” Brandt said.

“A man in a cap,” Kade said, in a voice so soft it frightened me more than shouting. “Where was Dean this afternoon?”

“He came back from lunch at one, sir, but he has been out of sight for two hours,” Brandt said.

“Find him, do not touch him, I want to know who he talks to,” Kade said.

“And the other matter?” Brandt asked, glancing at me.

“Twenty four hour guard on Miss Hale starting now, one man at the door, one in the car, nobody gets within ten feet of her without my name,” Kade said.

“Kade, that is too much,” I said.

“It is not nearly enough, go,” Kade said, and Brandt left.

“I cannot live with bodyguards, I cannot even eat a sandwich with a man watching,” I said.

“Then you will live with me, my building has its own security and nobody gets past the lobby, east wing, balcony, rule one,” Kade said.

“Tonight?” I asked.

“Tonight, I am not asking, Red, I am telling you as the man who will have to explain this to a child someday,” Kade said, and he sat beside me, close enough that his arm touched mine.

“A child,” I said, and my hand found my stomach again, and this time he looked at it.

“May I?” he asked, so quietly I almost missed it.

I nodded, and he laid his palm over mine, careful, as if I were made of glass, and the whole room went still.

“I cannot feel anything,” Kade whispered.

“It is too early, it is the size of a grape, Zola read it on her phone,” I said.

“A grape,” Kade said, and his voice broke on the word. “I have three companies, and I am scared of a grape.”

I started to laugh and cry at the same time, and he laughed too, and for a moment we sat there like two people who were not under contract.

“Rule three,” I said softly, though neither of us moved.

“I know,” Kade said, and he did not take his hand away.

~~~

“Miss Hale, thank goodness, you have a package,” Gus said, standing up the moment I walked into the lobby with a tall guard behind me.

“A package?” I asked.

“A man delivered it this afternoon, he said you had to sign for it in person, I did not like his face,” Gus said, handing me a thick white envelope.

“Thank you, Gus,” I said, and my stomach turned over, because the corner of the envelope carried a law firm’s name in silver letters.

Upstairs, Zola was waiting inside my apartment with three suitcases and a glass of orange juice, and she handed me the juice without a word.

“I packed everything, the gray sweaters too, I know they are your emotional support clothing,” Zola said.

“You are the best friend in the world,” I said.

“I know, now what is that in your hand?” Zola asked.

I sat on the arm of the sofa and tore open the envelope, and a stack of pages slid into my lap, and the first page was stamped with a court seal.

“Petition for Determination of Paternity,” I read out loud, and my voice went very thin. “Plaintiff, Dean Cross, requests a court order declaring that the child carried by the defendant, Mina Hale, is his.”

“What?” Zola said. “It is not his, you have not touched him in two months!”

“I know, Zola, I know, but he is going to say it is, he is going to drag me through a court and demand a test and tell the whole world,” I said, and the pages shook so hard in my hands that they rattled.

“Wait, how does he even know you are pregnant, you told nobody except me, and Kade,” Zola said slowly.

I looked at her, and she looked at me, and the same cold thought crossed both our faces.

“Somebody told him,” I whispered.

My phone buzzed on the cushion, and I knew before I turned it over that it was the unknown number again.

Now do you want to pay me, Mina, or do you want everyone to know whose baby it really is?