More likely, he just wants confirmation that I’m going to stay pregnant long enough for him to get his inheritance, because he doesn’t know that there isn’t any baby.
And there never will be, at least not for us.
Fighting back sudden tears, I urge myself to focus on the anger and not the sadness. It actually would be nice to tell Vin Cortland precisely what I think of him before I make it clear that I don’t ever want to lay eyes on him again.
“Fine, send him in.”
The nurse pats me gently on the shoulder before whirling out of the room to deliver the good news.
But it isn’t Vin that peers around the doorway of my hospital room.
Iain watches me carefully, as if he isn’t quite sure I won’t try to jump out the nearby window.
Or throw something at him.
The first option isn’t possible, but I’m strongly considering the second.
“What the hell do you want?”
His expression remains placid. “Can I come in?”
I have a feeling that Iain could skin a cat alive and have that same blank look never leave his face for a minute. “It’s a free country.”
“Debatable. None of us is really free, even if we try to convince ourselves we are.” He pushes off the wall and comes to the edge of the bed, staying just out of reach. “But I think you already know that.”
“Did he send you?”
We both know who I’m talking about.
“Nope. He’d probably try to hurt me if he found out.” Iain tips over an empty blister package on the table with one finger. “They giving you anything good?”
“Magnesium to keep my heart from stopping again and diuretics so my kidney’s don’t have to work so hard,” I bite out. “That sound good?”
“Not really. It does sound like running into the ocean after dark is a pretty stupid idea. Do they think you still might die?”
“I’m getting discharged this afternoon, so probably not.” I roll my eyes as I shift uncomfortably in the bed. They did give me something for the pain in my chest where I got shocked by the defibrillators a few hours ago, and it makes my whole body itch. “Thanks for stopping by, Iain. Send my regards to whatever vampires gave birth to you.”
But he doesn’t move so much as an inch.
“I heard about the pregnancy.” At the look on my face, he quickly adds. “Vin tells me everything. The Deception gossip network hasn’t gotten ahold of that juicy bit of news yet.”
My hands clench into fists, imagining that I’m squeezing them around Vin’s neck. “You’re not going to congratulate me?”
He shakes his head. “It was my idea, you know.”
“What was?” I ask with an annoyed sigh.
“The whole poking holes in condoms thing.” He actually has the grace to look ever so slightly abashed. “I figured by the time the truth came out, you guys would have been together long enough that it wouldn’t matter.”
“You’re a dick.”
“Tell me something I don’t know.”
I glare at him, wishing the nurses had left something heavy in reach for me to bash across his skull. “I’m not pregnant. False positive, apparently.”
“Too bad.”
“Excuse me?”
“You and Vin are good for each other when one or both of you has your head out of your ass long enough to realize it.”
I just stare at him, too shocked for anger. “Vin has been torturing me for years.”
“To be fair, you did try to kill him when you guys were kids.”
Clearly, Vin doesn’t tell him everything. If what my mother did isn’t common knowledge yet, I’m not about to change that. “That isn’t an excuse for everything he’s done since.”
“Vin Cortland has been obsessed with you for years. You should have seen his face when he realized that the pretty girl from the Gulch that all the guys were talking about freshman year was Zaya Milbourne. He almost knocked my teeth out once when I mentioned you have a nice ass.” Iain’s voice is matter-of-fact, like I can take the compliment or shove it up my ass and it wouldn’t matter to him either way. “Why do you think any guy who gets within five feet of you is putting his life on the line? Vin made you off-limits for anyone but him.”
“So what? You’re saying Vin Cortland has secretly been in love with me since freshman year?”
“He’s been in love with you since elementary school. You don’t get this obsessed over a girl that you don’t care about. Vin isn’t the type to work out his keen sense of betrayal in a healthy way. He was raised by an absentee father and a narcissistic social climber. For him, love has always been the same as suffering. Feelings aren’t his forte.”
I let out a humorless laugh. “But they’re yours?”
He shrugs. “Just because I don’t have the capacity to feel something doesn’t mean I don’t know the name for it, or how to recognize it when I see it. Vin has it bad, he always has, which explains the vast majority of his behavior over the years.”
I get that hollow feeling in my chest again, like a hole waiting to be filled with something besides pain. “That isn’t an excuse for anything he did.”
“I’m not excusing him. Walk away from him and never look back if that’s what you want to do. But do it with some honesty.” Iain starts backing out of the room. This is more words than I’ve ever heard him string together before, which explains the exhaustion written across his face. “Both of you walk around like open wounds, bleeding your shit all over the place. Either let the injuries you inflicted heal, or get the fuck away from each other.”
I take a cab to Cortland Manor, arguing with myself the entire way there.
It’s crazy
