Trouble: No, I’m sick.
Santino: Really? Are you hungover?
Trouble: No personal questions, remember? Rule number four.
Santino: How could I forget?
When Tilly doesn’t reply after my last text, I pause and debate what to do next. It’s been three months of us hooking up casually, and while I know we have our hard and fast rules like no personal questions, the fact that I haven’t heard from her in three weeks makes me worry that she really could be feeling poorly.
I wouldn’t worry about her if I didn’t know her mates to all be selfish fucking twats who only care about themselves. And she’s so damn stubborn, I bet she hasn’t even told her brother who lives here in London now. The club’s been travelling a lot the past few weeks, so knowing Tilly, she wouldn’t want to bother him while he’s in the middle of his first season here.
“Fuck it,” I growl, standing up from my desk. “Rules were made to be broken.”
In a flash, I’m at Tilly’s building in Soho with soup and sweets in hand. My nonna always said that food heals the soul, and since I didn’t want to waste more time making homemade pasta, store-bought chicken noodle and Cadburys are the best I could come up with.
As I knock on the door and wait for her to answer, I can’t help but feel nervous. This is the first time I’ve ever done something like this for a woman. As the lawyer for a football club, I’ve adapted to the footballer way of life. Casual sex, partying, zero strings. I know at thirty-one that probably makes me pathetic, but being in a relationship is just not something I want out of life. Not after knowing my past and where I come from.
Tilly Logan didn’t want commitment either, so we’ve been each other’s booty call for the past few months now. We even came up with our own set of rules to keep things completely casual. I know I’m breaking some rules by allowing myself to care about her right now, but it doesn’t mean anything. It just means I want her to get well.
“Hiya, Trouble,” I say as the door opens, and my face falls instantly when I see her appearance.
Don’t get me wrong, she’s still beautiful. She’s always beautiful.
But she does not look okay.
She’s dressed in grey sweats, and her strawberry blond hair is tied up into a knot on top of her head. She’s wearing glasses that I didn’t even know she had, and her face is blotchy, eyes swollen.
“Have you been crying?” I ask, my voice uncertain as the shock of her appearance settles over me.
“What are you doing here, Sonny?” Her voice is hoarse as she swipes at her damp cheeks, her adorable nose twitching.
“Christ, you have been crying. What’s wrong?” I force my way in the door and drop the food on the floor so I can take her in my arms.
Cuddling breaks our rules too, but I’ve never seen Tilly cry, and a crying woman doesn’t sit well with me.
Pressing her face into my chest, she shakes her head. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“Why?” I inquire, noticing all the packed boxes around us.
“We have rules for a reason.”
“I know but…fuck…what’s going on?” Cupping her face, I force her to look at me, hating the troubled look in her eyes. “You don’t look like you have a cold.”
Her chin wobbles as I slide a tear off her face. “That’s because I don’t.”
“Then what is it?” An ominous feeling overcomes me that it could be some sort of serious health ailment. “Christ, are you dying? Is it cancer or something?”
“No,” she scoffs, shoving me away from her. “God, Sonny!”
“What?” I snap. “Just tell me what the bloody hell is the matter then!”
“I’m pregnant, you cunt!”
Pins and needles erupt over my scalp as that reality hits me at full speed. “But we—” I begin to say that we always use condoms, but she cuts me off.
“It’s not yours.”
That reply is like a fist to the gut. It’s not mine. Tilly is pregnant, but it’s not mine. We’re not exclusive…this I know…but fuck, I guess I just thought if she was with me nearly every weekend, who the hell else would she have time to shag? Clearly someone! Someone with stronger sperm than me. Someone who probably didn’t wear a condom like I did every single fucking time without fail.
“We had rules,” I growl, my anger coming from some dark and scary place. “We weren’t exclusive, but we promised to be safe.”
“I know,” she cries, her voice garbled as she presses her jumper-covered hands to her cheeks. “I didn’t—”
“Didn’t what? Didn’t care if the arsehole wore a condom? You always cared with me. And if you didn’t care, I sure as bloody hell did!” I boom, my voice rising in anger and causing her to full-on cry.
“Santino, stop.”
“Why?”
“Because you don’t know everything.”
“What don’t I know?” I roar, uncertain where this anger is coming from but struggling to fight it.
“I don’t…I can’t…” She exhales heavily and crumples to the floor in front of me.
Christ, I’m a fucking monster. Rushing over, I lower myself down beside her, wrapping my arms around her balled-up figure. “Tilly, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it. I’m just…I don’t know what I am. I’m an arsehole. This isn’t what you need right now.”
She looks up at me, her blue eyes red-rimmed and swimming with something more than just horror. “I don’t remember it.”
“Don’t remember what?” I rub her back soothingly.
“That night…with that man…when I slept with him. I don’t remember any of it.”
My body stiffens with her admission as a thousand horrid scenarios play through my mind. Scenarios that would involve me fucking murdering the bastard who did this to her. “What are you saying exactly?” I ask slowly, trying to control my rage.
Tilly trembles in my arms, and I reach over to grab a blanket off the sofa. Wrapping it around her, I rub my hands up and down her arms over and over to calm her down. She needs to tell me what happened. I need to know. I have to know.
Finally, she says, “I was out with Honey and Valerie. We were at a pub. It was late…I was drinking a lot. And well, Honey had Molly.”
“Who’s Molly?”
“A drug, you idiot.”
“Oh.”
“Anyways, I wasn’t going to take it, but I don’t know…peer pressure sounds so stupid to blame it on. I’m twenty-seven years old. I’m not a teenager. But fuck, they made me feel ridiculous for not taking it, and so I just took it to shut them up. I didn’t think it would be that strong. But then, Jesus, then everything got blurry. And I remember talking to a guy. I remember snogging him in the loo. Then it all just…goes black. Next thing I know, I’m waking up at three in the morning in some stranger’s flat, and well…there was evidence we shagged…between my legs. I looked everywhere for a condom. I dug through that fucker’s disgusting bins and everything. No sign. It’s his, I know it is.”
She begins sobbing, and I shush her, pulling her into my arms and rocking her back and forth. “So, who is he?”