The familiar warmth spread through me as I snuggled closer. When Grant held me, it was the one time I truly felt safe and not alone. I wanted to bask in the sensation forever. “You’re forgiven.”
He reached into his pocket, pulling out a small jewelry box and placing it in my hand. “This should make up for it.”
The velvet of the case tickled my palm as excitement lit through me. I opened the box and gasped. The heart-shaped diamond necklace caught the fading sun in a glittering dance. “Grant, this is too much.”
He cupped my face, tilting my head back. “You deserve the best. Happy Anniversary.”
“Happy Anniversary,” I echoed.
His lips met mine in a slow kiss that sent sparks through me. But as I pulled away, an overly sweet smell filled my senses. My nose wrinkled. “You smell like you rolled around in a florist shop.”
Grant stiffened. “I hugged my mom before they left. I think she was wearing a new perfume.” He chuckled. “I don’t think it’s a winner.”
It didn’t smell like something Annabelle would wear. But then again, my tastes were never up to her standards. I pushed the thoughts out of my mind and focused on the boy in front of me. The lock of golden blond hair that always swooped across his face, and the green flecks in his hazel eyes. He was beautiful. And he was mine. “I missed you.”
Grant planted one more peck on my lips. “Missed you, too, babe.” His hand squeezed my butt. “You’ve been working too hard.”
I forced my smile to stay in place. Grant never understood my need to work, to save. How could he when he’d never wanted for a single thing in his entire life. But I needed the sense of security, the knowledge that I could provide for myself in some small way.
“I have the next two days off. But Harriet said you’re headed to Seattle with your parents?” I said it as a question, hoping he’d tell me that he’d only be gone for the day.
Grant’s body seemed to string tight at my words. “Yeah, they want me to fly to Boston with them next week.”
“Another business trip?” Clark often had his family accompany him to various conferences and events.
Grant’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed, a sure sign that I wasn’t going to like whatever he had to say. “Not exactly,” he muttered.
“Then what are you going for?” Dread crept through my stomach. I hadn’t sensed anything amiss over the past few weeks, but I read it loud and clear now.
“I’ve been trying to figure out the right time to tell you.” He toyed with the hem of his button-down shirt that hung casually untucked, and my stomach twisted into a painful knot. “I got into Harvard. Dad really wanted me to go. Said he’d get me a sick apartment if I agreed.”
“Acceptance letters come out in April.” It was the only thing I could think of to say. It was the end of July now. Four months. A third of a year. And that whole time, we’d been planning a life together, one that was supposed to start in a matter of weeks. “I didn’t apply to any schools in Boston.”
The wince he gave me was all I needed to know. Grant wasn’t planning on me coming with him. Tears burned the backs of my eyes. “How long have you known?”
He reached out for me, but I retreated, and his hands fell back to his sides. “Not long, I swear.”
The way his eyes shifted to the left told me that he was lying. That lie broke something in me. “Just a couple of nights ago, we were looking at apartments in Seattle online.” My breaths started coming quicker. “Was that some kind of sick joke to you?”
“No, Kenna. Never. I just didn’t know how to tell you. I love you, but…”
His words trailed off as he stepped closer. The scent of the perfume clinging to him had my stomach roiling. “But what?” My voice cracked on the question.
“But I need some time to be free. We’re so young. I love you, but I’m not ready to settle down. We should spend some time apart before we do that. I think we’ll both feel better about it in the end.” He cupped my face, but I couldn’t even feel his hands. I’d gone completely numb. “You’re still my forever, I just need to have college on my own first.”
My breathing picked up speed again as if no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t get my lungs to fully inflate. My fingers began to tingle as I stepped out of Grant’s hold. Air, I needed air.
“Kenna? Shit, are you okay? Just breathe.”
Grant ran a hand down my back, and I didn’t have the strength to shy away from it. I was too consumed with the effort of trying to catch my breath. “I’m. Pregnant.”
He recoiled as if I told him I had a flesh-eating disease. “Y-you’re what?”
“Pregnant. I’m pregnant.” Just saying the words out loud made my breathing even out, as if they were a call to arms. My baby needed me. I couldn’t lose it now.
“But you said you’re on the pill. Did you lie?”
My head snapped up. “No, I didn’t lie. No form of birth control is one hundred percent effective.”
Grant’s gaze narrowed on me. “But we used condoms most of the time, too.”
Most of the time. My mind circled around the words. “Every time. You had one every time.”
His eyes shifted—that same tell. But this time, it cut deep. “Once or twice, I didn’t actually put it on.”
I stared unblinking at the face of the boy I loved. The one who’d been my first everything. From holding his hand in a darkened movie theater to letting him have the piece of myself I’d held onto for eighteen years. He’d made me feel special, cherished, wanted. And for a girl who’d spent so much of her life feeling like a castoff, being wanted was everything.
“You knew how scared I was of this. Of being like my mother. Of people thinking I’m like her.” I didn’t regret my little bean, not one bit. I was going to love him or her with everything I had in me. But that didn’t change the betrayal of Grant’s actions. Apparently, he didn’t care enough about my fears to protect us both.
He straightened. “If you were truly on the pill, it wouldn’t have mattered if I didn’t use a condom a few times. Hell, maybe you cheated on me. This baby probably isn’t even mine.”
“How can you say something like that? You know me. You know that I would never do anything to betray you.” My heart was cracking. As if the organ had been submerged in subzero temperatures.
The boy I thought I knew better than myself suddenly seemed like a stranger. I’d always known that Grant had a short temper. He was used to getting things the exact way he wanted. But I never expected that he’d turn on me. I was the one who listened when his parents were too busy with work and charity galas. I was the one who explained where he was coming from when Harriet lost her patience with him. I made sure he stayed on top of his schoolwork. I cheered him on at every football game. I’d held him as he’d cried when his grandfather died. How could he forget all of that in the blink of an eye?
Grant began pacing back and forth. “You heard about Lacey, didn’t you? The parties? You think you can trap me?”
I blanched, my mouth falling open, but I couldn’t seem to form words, and my mind rapidly spun. The sickly-sweet scent tickled the back of my brain. Lacey. It was the perfume of the girl who had made my growing up years on the island torture. Throwing my mom’s drunkenness and abandonment in my face more times than I could count. Tripping me in the hallway. Writing nasty things on my locker. The boy who was the love of my life, the father of my baby, smelled like…Lacey.