Goodbye

EVIE

“Uh, Evie…,” Sam muttered. “Do you have something to tell me?”

He stood holding one of my pregnancy tests with both hands. He looked just as disturbed, just as off-balance, as he had last night when he’d found out his business was on fire.

“Sam…” I sped toward him, dodging around my mattress that still didn’t have a bed frame yet. Everything in this apartment was barely put together. My life was barely put together.

I wasn’t ready to have this conversation yet! It was supposed to be later, after dinner, when we were both warm and relaxed from good food and good ambiance. “I can explain,” I tried.

“Really? Because, uh…” he paused, his onyx eyes piercing mine. “I think the two lines on this thing are pretty self-explanatory.”

“I was gonna tell you tonight,” I said.

Was it too much for me to hope that he’d smile? Or offer me a hug? Or a reassuring gesture of any kind? I understood he needed time to process like I did, but at this point, I’d settle for a meager touch on the arm.

Trying to predict how he was going to react to this was worse than struggling to decode a damn cipher. Tears surged despite my attempts to hold them back.

“I went to the doctor’s the other day to get a second opinion about my fertility. I wanted to see if it was even remotely possible for me to get pregnant. And as it turns out…” I shrugged. “It is.”

Nothing. He just stood there, occasionally allowing his eyes to droop to the bombshell at his fingertips—as if it had its own gravitational pull.

“I was originally gonna tell you last night, but then you got that phone call about the fire, and I—”

“How could you keep this from me for even a second, Evie?” Sam asked, waving the test between us. “How could you lie to me? About ~this~?”

“I wasn’t keeping it from you or lying to you,” I said, ignoring the endless pit in my stomach. “I was just trying to wrap my head around it myself.

“This is all new to me. Greg and I tried for five years, and as it turns out, all I needed was a one-night stand with some cocky asshole in a bar bathroom to get the job done.”

Sam chuckled at my crude summary of the night we met. His grip on the stick loosened, but he still didn’t let go of it.

I closed the last of the distance between us and affectionately stole the test from his palm, setting it on the kitchen island.

“I love you, Vázquez,” I said, holding his toasty hands. “And if I had to go through the pain, the heartache, and the tears all over again to find my way straight back here, I would. There’s no one on this ~planet~ I’d rather have this baby with.”

And that was it. I’d laid my entire heart on the line. No more secrets. And though it felt good, it was also scary. Mostly because he still couldn’t seem to string enough words together to respond.

“Well?” I furrowed my brows. “Say something.”

“You just…” Sam sucked in a shaky gasp. “Y—you just told me I’m gonna be a dad, and all I got you was a pair of shoes.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “So you’re happy?”

A smile tugged at his lips. “Of course I am.”

We just stood there looking at one another, allowing the news to seep in.

“So…” I shrugged. “Now what?”

“Now”—Sam cocked a brow, encircling my waist in his authoritative arms—“I’m about to make you sing like an angel.”

“Oh?” I hummed, wrapping my own arms around his neck. “Is that right?”

“Damn straight, baby,” he whispered against my lips.

But just as our mouths touched, a knock echoed at the door of my apartment. I frowned, pulling back a little.

“Were you expecting somebody?” Samuel asked.

I shook my head just in time for it to sound once more.

“Evie?” said a muffled voice from outside. “It’s Greg.”

~Jesus, fuck.~

“Listen, I didn’t come here to fight. I just wanna talk.”

~Talk about a buzzkill.~

“I should deal with this,” I groaned.

“Do you want me to go?” Sam asked.

“Absolutely not,” I said.

He smiled, looking grateful. I remembered how less than two weeks ago, I had sent Sam away so I could talk to Greg. So much had changed since then. I trusted Sam to have my back, in a way I would never again trust Greg.

When I opened the door, Greg stood in front of me wearing his usual pout. All through our marriage, he would pout at me just like that any time he screwed up and needed to ask for forgiveness.

Those soft chocolate eyes used to melt my heart every time, convincing me to give Greg a second chance and a third and a fourth. Now, though, I could feel my heart solidifying like black ice on asphalt.

A moment later, Sam’s hand settled at my waist as he stepped up beside me, staking his claim. “I don’t think we were properly introduced,” Sam said.

Greg’s pale cheeks flushed brighter than the red stripes on a candy cane. He clenched his teeth so hard that divots formed on either side of his mouth. “You must be The Suit,” he sneered.

Sam grinned sharply. “And you must be Doctor Dickwad.”

Greg furrowed his brows at the mocking nickname.

“What do you want, Greg?” I snarled, hijacking their battle of testosterone.

“Can we talk?” he asked before peering at Sam. “In private?”

Hell, no. I wasn’t stupid. Maybe the police couldn’t prove that Greg had set that fire, but in my heart, I was sure it had been him. Greg was dangerous. On some level, he always had been.

“Anything you have to say, you can say it in front of Sam,” I said.

“Okay.” He rocked on his heels as if conjuring the nerve to break the silence swirling between us. “You, um. I talked to the cops the other night. It seemed like you maybe told them that I set your office on fire?”

Weirdly, he didn’t sound that mad. Just nervous. Like this wasn’t really what he’d wanted to talk about, and he was just stalling.

“Did you?” I asked flatly.

“Did I—no, of course not. What kind of person do you think I am?” he asked, making a good show of indignation.

“I thought I knew, Greg. Then you showed up in Vermont—with your new girlfriend in tow, by the way—and said a bunch of horrible things to me, supposedly in the name of winning me back.

“How’s Mia doing, by the way?” I added, as if it were just occurring to me. “Is she waiting for you back at the hotel during this little conversation?”

“Mia’s pregnant,” he said quietly.

My first thought was to feel crushed, that after our long years of disappointment and struggle, Greg had gone and knocked up some other woman so quickly. But then my second thought was ~Me too, asswipe.~

There was no way I was telling Greg about my own pregnancy. I wanted him gone. But I held onto the secret of it like a talisman. Greg couldn’t hurt me with this anymore.

“Congratulations,” I said, folding my arms over my chest. “I know how badly you wanted that.”

“I wanted it with you,” Greg said. “But I’ve made my bed.”

“So now you have no choice but to lie in it,” I said with a scowl.

Was it cruel of me to be glad? To enjoy seeing his plans backfire on him? For years, in ways small and large, Greg made sure that my business was compromised, that my self-esteem was compromised, and that I blamed myself for all our problems.

At this point, I just wished he would fuck off my threshold.

He nodded. “I just came to say goodbye.”

When Greg said that word to me the first time, it was like hell was burning me alive. This time, though, it felt more like I was finally being released from my old life—the life that had held me down for too long.

I wondered how long it would take for him to start sabotaging things for Mia and for his kid. For his jealousy, his insecurity, and his resentment to blow up this undeserved second chance he’d been handed.

I considered if I should warn Mia. But I didn’t know her well enough for that. Really, all I knew was that she’d slept with my husband. Whatever was coming next—as I’d told Sam earlier—it was Mia’s problem now.

I let out a sigh and released Greg just like he’d released me. “Goodbye.”

Greg turned to leave like a puppy with its tail between its legs.

“And, Greg?” I called before he made it all the way down the hall.

He twirled, looking surprised that I had anything more to say.

“Don’t try to burn down any more buildings. You probably won’t get away with it a second time.” And with that, I closed the door, sure to rotate the deadbolt and latch the golden chain.