Page 16 of Afterglow

Considering his tone when he said he likes me was much gentler, I’m going to go with the second option. He’s pissed.

“Leanne?” he asks, voice moderately calmer.

“Yeah?” I respond, exhaustion stripping back the snark.

His exhale is shaky, and I squeeze my eyes shut, afraid of what he’ll say next.

“Where are you right now?”

I open then close my mouth. That’s not what I was expecting. “What?”

“Where. Are. You?” he asks again, emphasizing each word in a way that instantly puts me on alert.

“Home,” I say, the word wrapped in tension… anticipation.

“Good, I’m coming to see you. We need to talk. Text me the address.”

And before I can more than splutter an attempt at protest, the line goes dead.

Fuck.

CHAPTER NINE

Bryce

Holy shit.

Holy fucking shit.

My hands shake as I shove my phone into my pocket and wrench open the door of my dusty truck. When I slide in, I feel a vibration against my ass. Pulling my phone back out, I see Leanne’s name on the screen.

Nope.

I toss it into the cup holder and crank the key in the ignition.

We need to talk. In person. And I need the half-hour drive to get my head on straight.

In the course of the last fifteen minutes, my entire world tilted on its axis and I’m not sure what’s up and what’s down.

My phone stops and starts up again, ringing through the sound system. It grates on my nerves, whereas the rumble of my tires against the gravel is oddly soothing as I roll down the driveway of Monarch Ranch and onto the main road that will carry me toward Bozeman.

The word pregnant keeps popping off in my brain like a firework show. With the tick tick tick of my blinker, it repeats over and over: pregnant pregnant pregnant. When the engine whirs louder as I accelerate, it’s a rumbling purr: ppprrrrreeeegggggnnnnnaaannnnnnttttttttttttt… Somehow it has lost all meaning in the repetition despite it being the only word in my head.

And I, of all people, should know the meaning of that particular word. This isn’t the first time I’ve been on the receiving end of this news, but it was different last time. Last time it was Sarah, and last time I lost everything.

I jolt away from those thoughts as my phone rumbles in the cupholder beside me, followed by a single trilling sound through my speakers. I glance at it to see a text from Leanne.

Leanne

12847 E. Harmon Junction, Bozeman, MT

An odd sense of relief hits me. She could’ve refused to give me her address.

And she did call to tell me… That’s more than she had to do. We don’t exactly run in the same circles, and we’ve gone almost two months without a random run-in. It’s possible I never would’ve seen her again, never would’ve known.

The urge to call her, however, to see if the inexplicable connection I felt was reciprocated, was growing stronger—even if the very idea of feeling that way about someone terrified me.

The day of the wedding, I’d watched her. I saw the way she was with her family, the way she was with me, and the way she was when she thought no one was looking. I could see the hurt she was trying to hide. Hurt I understood too well, having grieved my own losses. I felt almost bonded to her because of it. When I saw her name on my phone this morning, I thought maybe she felt it too.