CHAPTER 121- BUMP

CHAPTER 121- BUMP
It's been months now, and the past weeks have been nothing short of terrible. True to her word, Claudia didn't take the bait and confess what happened to the other girls, even when offered some privileges to her sentence if she did. She rejected the offer. Unlike other instances where money could have been a great factor in helping get away with murder, it didn't help in this case, mainly because the NBI pulled every string they had to ensure justice. Now, Claudia had been in jail for just one week, and life has not been the same for Asher since.

"Bro, you've got to get back to life as it was sooner rather than later," Camilla said as she walked up to her brother. "You can't blame yourself for any of these. Mum made her choices, and she is now serving the consequences of said choices. It's not on you, okay?"

"How are you doing better than I am with all these?" Asher said, looking at his little sister and admiring how she had been so strong these past weeks, considering she discovered her boyfriend was just with her to investigate their mum, just as Kiya did too. One thing had led to another, and Camilla had somehow found out and made him confess everything.

"I'm not doing better than you are, trust me," she replied. "I've just decided to move on from everything, to start afresh and live my life for myself, without Mum's constant control or any man's manipulation or pretence. If these past few weeks have taught me anything, it's that life is actually too short and it can take a complete turn in seconds."

"You're right, you know. How did you get so smart?" Asher teased.

"Anyways, I just stopped by to check on you. I have some errands to run," Camilla said, giving her brother a kiss on the cheek and heading out.
Asher got up from the seat he had been on all day and headed into the shower and got dressed in his gym wear. He decided it might be a good idea to take a run since the paparazzi has now calmed down since his mother's sentencing.

After running for an hour, he decided to stop by the coffee shop to get a smoothie. It's been a while since he went into the shop, but he had no problem going since he was sure Kiya no longer works there and the shop still belonged to him, even though he has completely handed over the management to the manager.

As he grabbed his smoothie and stepped out into the street, he bumped into someone, and he instinctively wrapped his arms around the person to steady them and prevent them from falling. As he looked up, he froze. Standing in front of him was Kiya. Still as beautiful as ever, even more beautiful considering she had this glow to her. But the most shocking thing was her belly; it was big, and it looked like a bump.

When she saw the look on his face, her face took up multiple emotions at once: fear, guilt and shock. She quickly pulled away and apologised, and before Asher could recover from his shock, she quickly got into a Mercedes-Benz and drove off.
Asher stood there confused. He pinched himself to make sure he wasn't dreaming or imagining things, and his mind started reeling with questions. So many questions for which he felt as though he knew the answer to and also didn't know the answer to.

What just happened? Was that really Kiya or someone else? Is that a baby bump, or is there another explanation for that? And if that's a baby bump, is that baby his, or does it belong to another man? These questions kept playing in his mind, but the one question that bugged him the most was that after all these months, why does his heart still beat for her the way it always had, and why does he still love her as much as he had always done?
Instead of heading back home, he took a detour and headed to the office of his private investigator. He needed real answers to all his questions, and since he is not particularly still in Kiya's life, these are questions he had to find out the answer to by himself by any means necessary.

By the time he got home, he couldn't do anything but keep thinking about the whole situation of things. He kept thinking about Kiya, her belly and what that means for him. If truly she is pregnant, a part of him wants it to be his, but a part of him couldn't help but think it's not. She lied about their whole relationship. Who's to say she didn't have a real boyfriend outside the whole undercover charade? Heck, who's to say she wasn't married or at least had a fiancé?

Just then, Suzan walked into his house. He and Suzan's relationship has surprisingly gotten better over the past few months. After he discovered how she came into his life and how she wanted to know what happened with her friend, but through it all, she really got to know him and really loved him, he appreciated her more. She had absolutely moved on from having any feeling for him, but she still chose to be a friend to him despite knowing the truth about how her friend died.

He told Suzan about how his day went and gave her the brief on what he found out, and Suzan was equally as shocked. "Damn, man, you're so going to be a daddy," she said, her voice holding a teasing hint to it.

Asher laughed as he responded, "We don't know that for sure, Suzan; it might not be mine."

"Well, from the calculations, it looks like it's yours," Suzan retorted. "If it were yours though, what would you do about it?" she asked.

"Hmm," Asher said, his face now deep in thought. "I will love that baby with everything in me, and I will be present in their life, even if that means coming to an agreement with Kiya."

"Okay then, I don't see a problem with it; why not just confront her and ask her instead of going through the PI?" Suzan said.

"Hearing the truth from her will hurt more if it's not the truth I'm hoping for," Asher simply responded, and Suzan nodded.