Colour Series Box Set (34 page)

“You want to talk about it yet?” He asks softly without letting me go, I think he is afraid I’ll run away right now and the thought has crossed my mind. I shake my head. I still need a minute before I can put any of this into words. “Okay sweetheart, we can wait.” I am balling my fists into his T-shirt and I can feel it is soaked with my tears. “I am going to talk sweetheart. I can’t not say anything.” He says softly into my hair. I just nod. “This is okay. You know that right. You know that I won’t take it from you. I would never hurt you or a baby, our baby.” His words kill a little of the anguish and I pull away enough to look into his blue eyes and see that he means what he says. “I’m going to be dad.” He whispers putting his forehead again mine, a smile pulling on his lips. “That’s fucking awesome.” He lets out the words in a breath before he kisses me. I start to sob again, he just holds me for a long while before I manage to talk at all.

“Rowan, I’m sorry. This wasn’t your plan. I’m sorry. I’m so happy but I’m so worried that I can’t have both of you.” He holds my head between his two strong hands and a smile spreads across his face. I don’t understand. “Lauri, neither of us is going to be going anywhere. Did I ever imagine I would be a father, no? But there are so many other things I never imagined and just look how amazing they have turned out. You have me. I promised I would never hurt you and that promise stands. You don’t get to make me love you then walk away the second you get scared, I won’t let you and I certainly won’t let you take my child away.”

I wonder if he’s real, I know he will never let me go, but I worry that a baby will change everything that we have. Rowan kisses me again, this time a little harder this is a staking my claim, possessive kiss reminding me where I’m meant to be.

He helps me up so we can get ready for Callum, Robin and Amya to join us for my birthday dinner. I’ve already prepared the food and we walk back up to the house as the sun sets over the valley behind us. I feel like the cycle of my past is finally over and this is the way my life should always have been. The years in between seem like a dream now.

It would take a miracle to erase my blotchy face and puffy eyes from crying but I do my best. Not sure how Rowan will handle this with our friends just yet, I’m already at least eleven weeks along if my counting is correct. Yes I am that woman who forgot she missed her period, I was never regular anyway, the green feeling all the time was what tipped me off. I felt like walking sea sickness for a few weeks already, but denial took over for a while before I dared even do a test. If I didn’t do one it wasn’t real was how my head had been working I didn’t want to face this, to face Rowan’s reaction.

We take the moments of quiet before they all arrive to talk about it, we will go see his doctor tomorrow and get a referral to an OB GYN in the area. Rowan seems genuinely at peace and happy about it. His reaction has surprised me and I am not sure how to feel about it, but by the time our friends arrive my panic is well hidden below the surface.

I’m showered with fun gifts and wishes from all three of our friends. We eat our dinner outside in the fresh air and I’m having an amazing time. As soon as I take the main meal out of the oven the smell of the fresh roasted lamb shanks turn my stomach and I have to race for the guest loo to relieve my stomach of its contents. Once the nausea has subsided, I emerge from the bathroom to find Amya in the kitchen dishing up the food. She takes one look at me and smiles from ear to ear raising her eyebrows at me. Rowan obviously told them, he could have waited for me asshole. “So, a baby. Huh. You ready for that?” She asks me a little more seriously now. “No, but I will be.” Amya laughs at my answer. I know she had a baby boy and that he died no one talks about it.
Ever
. The one time I ever asked about him, Rowan and Cal kicked me under the table. “I am happy for you Lauri.” She hugs me before carrying some plates outside. Her voice doesn’t match her expression neither do her words. Somehow I know my friend is not happy about this at all.

They all look at me when I sit causing me to blush bright red. My blush makes them all laugh and we are then showered with congratulations from our family. Rowan and I share a few silent looks and I can see he’s still feeling rather overwhelmed by this. He’s been a little off all night. No I lie, he’s been off for weeks, but tonight he’s acting very peculiar I think the baby news is sinking in a little deeper now that it has been admitted out loud.

The men clear the table and head inside, it has become a ritual when we all together. Me and Amya sit outside for a while and talk before dessert. Tonight I can see she really wants to talk. “Are you ready to bring a child into this world? I mean their world Lauri? You know it’s different for us,” she asks and I can hear an underlying sadness in her voice. I’m not sure why the idea of children is so terrible to her but it very clearly is. “As a
child
of their world myself I really don’t know. But I want this baby more than I fear the world we exist in. So yes I think I’m ready to have a baby.” It’s the truth. I know all too well what can happen to a child in this world Rowan, Callum and I are all testament to what can and does happen. You either join them or you pay the price for them. My child will join them before they ever pay the price I paid.

I see Amya’s body language shift and she leans uncomfortably towards me. “It’s time I tell you
my
truth Lauri. Your scars on your body and your soul. Mine? Mine are in my heart.” She moves her shirt to reveal a black broken dark visibly aching heart tattooed on her chest. It’s the saddest tattoo I’ve ever seen. “We all have something on our heart Lauri, Rowan’s numbers, yours is a reminder of the pain. Mine is a black hole where my child should be, children in our world will leave you with nothing but pain Lauri. A baby in our circles will only land up being a black hole, living or dead, they either become monsters or get taken away by monsters.” The bitterness and anger in her voice alarms me I have never seen her mad or angry or anything other than happy. The venom with which she speaks of children, I know is an attack on all of us. “Lauri, I am Callum’s half-sister. I’m one of those black hole babies. My relation to him is something I go to great lengths to keep a secret now.” I am horrified I would never have even guessed ever, their secret is well kept because I never even considered it as a possibility even now I don’t believe it. “When someone wanted to send Callum a message, they murdered his nephew in front of me and Robin, Lauri. That’s the world we live in. They will always be monsters and there will always be another bigger, badder monster waiting to take their power away and no one cares who lives and dies in between.”

Her tears are mirrored as they flow down my cheeks. She takes a breath before she speaks again. “I know you want this Lauri but go in with your eyes open. I closed my eyes to who Callum and Robin were, to who I was. I brought a baby into this world blinded to what would happen no matter what I did. You will have to choose if that baby is a monster or a victim of a monster Lauri, you will make the choice and it will kill you either way.”

“You forget who your father was. He was just as big a monster as they all are. He chose and you became the victim.” Amya doesn’t say another word she gets up and goes to the bathroom to dry her cruel angry tears. I can’t move yet, her words have burst my perfect baby bubble. All I feel is sad and afraid and really hurt by the one friend I thought I had in my corner.

I’ll have to choose whether to raise the next generation of murderers or the next victim. Everything goes cloudy and I know what is happening. Before I can stand up all the way, before I can move the panic rips me from the world and I collapse on the patio floor with a thud. It’s black again. Only I don’t wish for death anymore I wish for Rowan to wake me from this nightmare to wake me in a normal world.

I HAD A PLAN FOR
tonight for Lauri’s birthday. Not a very well thought out plan, but a plan none the less. It’s all shot to shit now, I thought she was in the shower when I got home, I was going to slip in with her. Instead I found an empty bathroom and a pregnancy test dropped in the middle of the floor like she had run away from it screaming. I waited before I went to find her; I just sat there holding it in my hand trying to understand how this could be happening. I’m not sad, I’m not angry, I’m not even happy. I’m scared. I’ve tried so hard to stop, to be someone better for her but its breaking me down, now a baby. How do I be me and be a dad? How the fuck did Mick do this, be everything?

Amya has just come inside she has definitely been crying. I think she finally told Lauri her story. It was bound to come up after I broke the baby news to them all. I look out of the patio doors in time to see Lauri try to stand and then collapse with a loud thud on the floor. It’s like a punch in my gut. A panic attack, I thought we had left these behind. My body flies out of my chair up and over Callum to get her before I can even think. I dive onto the patio floor next to her, I check her breathing and pulse first then I lift her limp body up and carry her inside. Fuck. I know she will be out for a while now; I should’ve been paying more attention. What the hell did Amya tell her? My heart plummets in my chest and I hope she is alright; I don’t know anything about pregnant woman. She has always been fine after an attack before, but now I don’t know what to do.

I carry her to the room with a now panicked Callum, Robin and Amya following me asking stupid questions like is she okay?
Does she look okay you fuckers
? Their being here is irritating me, I settle her on the bed and check her pulse it is steady so I shove them all out and leave her to rest. She normally takes a while to come too after one of these I believe it was a defence mechanism in the past her body just goes into shut down until she is ready to deal.

The four of us return to the lounge and Amya dishes up the dessert. The mood in the room is tense and my friends are all a little icy. I slump in my chair, how did my plan for tonight go so horribly fucking wrong. I’m angry and disappointed and desperately want to be alone so I can just process all the things that have happened in the last few hours.

Callum puts a hand on my back and I know he is trying to say everything will be fine without words, but nothing is fine! None of us eat the dessert. We all just sit there, not saying anything at all; every movement and breath in the room can be heard through our silence. I rest my head in my hands and try to escape the storm of chaotic thoughts in my mind. I’m going to be a dad; there is a little piece of me inside her now. How did Mick do this? Seriously, I feel fucking ill just thinking of everything that could go wrong. I want to kill someone, a totally inappropriate reaction to becoming a father, but that exactly how I feel.

Eventually I think out loud my brain is imploding with disappointment. “I bought her a ring for her birthday I was going to ask her ... Now I didn’t get the chance. Now it’s all wrong.” All three sets of eyes snap up and look at me like I just went completely mad, then their eyes move up behind me and I feel it, I feel her, I always can, Lauri is up and standing there and she no doubt heard me. Amya’s slack jaw and I just saw a ghost eyes are all I can see. I’m too afraid to turn around right now; this was not how I had this planned out in my head. Lauri moves behind the couch and puts her hands on my shoulders pulling back into the suede couch she leans down I can smell her sweet vanilla smell. She whispers in my ear, “Ask me Rowan.” No one else heard her but their eyes are all boring into us. “But not now, later when it’s just us.” I breathe sigh of relief and she comes to sit in my lap, I cannot help the smile on my face now. Her eyes are still heavy after passing out she snuggles herself into my chest. This woman keeps my heart beating.

Robin gives a fake yawn and says they need to leave; Callum catches his hint and follows them. They let themselves out tonight I stay right where I am holding my whole world in my arms. All I ever need is right here.

After of sitting alone in the silence, I lift her off my lap and I do this right. I’m not good at doing the right thing, but I’ll be damned if I fuck this up. Lauri wears a sweet smile on her lips and there’s a sparkle in her eyes. I kneel between her legs and hold her soft hands in mine, they’re so small. I look into her hazel eyes that tell the story of hurt and pain and heartbreak and happiness and most of all the strength that has allowed her to survive to be here with me. I know we belong together no matter what, we may be all kinds of fucked up, but we work together. I want her to know that I love her and this the only way I can think to show her. I pull the ring out of my back pocket, it’s not traditional at all in fact it’s the opposite, I chose black gold with a deep red ruby the colour of the roses tattooed on her arms. It just seemed right when I saw it; I only decided to ask her when I saw this ring in the window of a shop. It was just like her beautiful, dark and light pulled together perfectly.