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“She’s pregnant.”
He blinked his eyes a few times at me, but his expression didn’t change—like, at all. Owen wasn’t exploding like I expected him to…
“Your sister is pregnant.”
His jaw tensed and then he finally spoke. “I know.”
I could’ve fucking punched him right in the face in that moment. “You have to be fucking kidding me! How long have you known? Why didn’t you think to tell me about it?” The volume of my voice was raising, though my throat felt strained and tight as I tried not to lose it entirely. “You’re my best fucking friend and you couldn’t tell me?”
Owen was the opposite of Olivia, completely unmoved by my outburst. “Um, let’s talk about hiding things, shall we? My sister is twelve weeks pregnant, and so according to my calculations, that means that the two of you had sex twelve weeks ago. If you think about that—” He paused, tilting his head at me. “That would mean that you were keeping the fact that you were sleeping with her a secret for nearly…well, about eleven weeks.”
Fuck. He was right.
“Being pregnant is way more serious than sleeping with someone,” I argued, unsurprised by his eye roll in response.
“Sleeping with someone leads to pregnancy,” Owen retorted. “And sleeping with someone’s sister is a big deal. You might have gotten a much shittier version of me, had Olivia not already told me about it.”
“And I guess she just blabbed about the baby too? Because the only reason I found out today, was this.” I pulled out the picture and showed it to him.
He gave me a sympathetic look. “Listen, Eli, I didn’t find out that long ago. I wanted her to tell you, but to be honest, I think she was scared.”
“Scared of what?” My brow furrowed. “I wouldn’t have freaked out on her or something. I know this shit happens. I mean, yeah, it’s never happened to me until now, but I’ve heard plenty of stories.”
“Yeah, but she thought that you hated her for the longest time. I saw how big of an asshole you were to her. She didn’t want to try and raise a baby with someone like that. Besides, we didn’t exactly have the best upbringing… Our dad was a piece of shit, man. Olivia’s only ever known guys like that.”
“But it’s still the principle of the matter,” I countered, though the thought of my own actions and actions of the men in her past did have me feeling a little softer…
But not too soft.
“I get that,” Owen snapped. “I’m not trying to say what she did was right—just like me keeping the pregnancy from Katie wasn’t right. Yeah, it’s a lesser offense, but it still hurt her that I didn’t tell her all my secrets. Not to mention, Katie loves Olivia, so she wants us to be there for her.”
“Gonna be hard to do that when she’s in LA.” My tone was sharp, filled with anger. “She was gonna just dart off to the other side of the country and never fucking tell me that I had a kid, man!”
Owen nodded, though he remained just as calm as ever. “I know, that would piss me off too.”
“Then why aren’t you pissed?” I demanded, ignoring my phone which was continuing to ring over and over in my pocket. I knew that it was more than likely Olivia, but I couldn’t face her yet.
“Why should I be pissed? Finding out you’re pregnant by some guy who tells you over and over that it’s just a fling is overwhelming. She took the job in LA not just because she was pregnant but because you didn’t exactly make her life easy there at work. You didn’t want her there.”
“That’s not true,” I instantly shot back, but then stopped myself, guilt funneling into my mind. “I might have been harder on her than I should’ve. I just…I didn’t want people thinking that I was playing favorites—and then on top of that, fuck, I was so attracted to her. I think the whole office knows that there was something going on between us.”
Owen shrugged. “It doesn’t matter now.”
“It does matter,” I said through gritted teeth. “That’s my reputation on the line.”
“Then I guess you should’ve thought about that before you went and knocked up my sister,” he dared me with the same blue eyes as Olivia’s, though there was no mercy in them whatsoever. “I would’ve fucking punched your lights out if I would’ve found out sooner, but my sister was so torn up about it that I couldn’t bring myself to do that to you. She didn’t need any more drama in her life.”
I considered what he was saying, recalling all the fear that I’d had about Owen finding out that I was sleeping with her. “I shouldn’t have gone behind your back, and I’m sorry for that—but this has nothing to do with us and our friendship. It’s solely about the fact that I went off, proclaiming my fucking love for a woman who was hiding a pregnancy from me.”
“She had no idea that you loved her.”
“Why are you on her side?” I demanded, throwing my hands into the air. “Like, if this were any other girl, you’d be just as pissed off as I am right now. Instead, you’re coming to her defense about everything!”
Owen shrugged. “I just think that you’re being really narrow-minded about the situation. She found out she was pregnant at my birthday party, Eli. Can you imagine how terrified she probably was? I don’t know. I guess I’m just the kind of guy that puts myself in the other person’s shoes. I get why she did what she did. Self-preservation is a real thing.”
I didn’t agree with him, but maybe he had a point—and I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep arguing with him. “I was supposed to take her as my date to the premiere tonight.”
“And let me guess, now you’re not going to?” Owen rubbed the stubble on his jaw. “I get that she fucked up, but she’s leaving Monday, bro. She’ll be thousands of miles away.”
