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"I'm a comfort-first kind of friend."
I pick up the tea. The smell alone—chamomile and something floral—hits wrong. Too sweet. Too warm. I set it back down.
Cammy notices my reaction and then glances down at my untouched sandwich. I already can see her mind spinning. Her eyes narrow.
"Okay," she says slowly. "Now I'm concerned."
"About what?"
"You look pale, you're not eating, and if you stare at that sandwich any harder it's going to file a complaint." She leans in. "What are you, pregnant?"
I let out a short, humorless laugh.
"I was on birth control."
Cammy shrugs. "Yeah, and one out of a hundred isn't exactly impossible odds. You wouldn't be the first."
And just like that, everything inside me stops. The noise from the street. The music from inside the café. Cammy still talking, I think, though I can't hear the words.
Tired.
Nauseous.
No appetite.
The dizziness.
My hand tightens around the edge of the table hard enough that my knuckles go white.
No, no, no.
I couldn’t be pregnant with Everett’s baby. that’s…That's impossible. Isn't it?
Cammy's voice cuts through. "Aria?"
I look up. She's staring at me, no longer teasing anymore.
Penelope is too. And Penelope's face has gone very, very still.
"Aria," Penelope says quietly. "When was your last period?"
I open my mouth but nothing comes out. Because I'm trying to count.
And the numbers aren't adding up the way I need them to.
The café is too loud. My hands are too cold. And somewhere between the toast I couldn't eat this morning and the tea I can't drink right now, the math just stopped working.
Chapter Thirty-Four
EVERETT
I keep my hand low at Sienna's back as I guide her toward the black town car waiting at the curb.
She says something under her breath that might be a joke. I don't catch it. Or maybe I do and my brain tosses it before it registers, because I've been running on too little sleep and too much damage for three straight days.
I open the rear door for her.
She slides inside first, gathering the hem of her coat as she shifts across the leather seat.