Chapter 5: Kit & Danny—Trapped!

She woke up with a start. Danny sat up as straight as her six-month pregnancy would allow her. Her heart racing, she begged the rushing of blood in her ears to quieten so she could concentrate. Her phone buzzed on the nightstand, but before she could grab it, another scream rang out.

“HELP!”

There it was again. The blood-chilling scream of a grown man in fear. It didn’t sound like Christian: it was the terror in his voice that convinced her it couldn’t be him. But who else could it be? As far as she knew they were the only two people in the apartment. She fisted her fingers, digging them into her palms in a bid to stop them from trembling.

What now? Should I go check, or should I pretend I didn’t hear it?

Her feet now on the plush carpet in her room, she sincerely pondered about the right she had to go check up on him. They were technically, well, legally married, but Danny didn’t really consider herself his wife.

What do I do?

“I should go check on him, like a friend would. At least a good Samaritan.” Danny decided to do it, out of the good feeling that she had had for him before he dragged her to New York against her will. At the time, she’d kind of liked it, was attracted to him and still was. So as a person she once liked, and loved in a different lifetime, she decided to check on his well-being.

Danny quietly pushed herself off the bed and to her feet and began to tiptoe across her room. It was when she got to the door that she realized how ridiculous she was being. Yes, she was a guest in his home and afraid, but her steps wouldn’t be any more silent against the thick carpet unless she levitated.

Taking one final, deep breath, she curled her fingers around the doorknob, and gave herself a chance to change her mind. However, she didn’t. She opened the door and walked across the hall to where Kit’s room was.

“Help!”

Another scream, one filled with more fear than the last, almost sent her soul floating out of her body. She placed her hand over her racing heart, hoping to calm it down. She looked back to her room. The door was still wide open and inviting her back in. But she didn’t accept the tempting invitation; instead, she came up with another reason why she should continue. Actually, both reasons kicked her from within. As a responsible co-parent, she had to make sure the father of her children was all right.

Danny slowly opened the door to Kit’s room, and immediately their gazes met. “Oh God!” she gasped under her breath. Danny was startled. She didn’t know what to expect to find inside, but it wasn’t seeing him sitting up in his bed staring at her. Upon further inspection, Danny saw beads of sweat rolling down his forehead. In the little light that snaked into his room through the gap in the curtains, Danny could see the slight glisten of his body. His chest heaved steadily; his breaths were silent.

“Are you okay?” she asked distractedly as she noticed the scar on his cheek wasn’t the only one. Curiosity made her take a step into the room, her eyes glued to the destruction across his chest. “Are you—” the question got caught in her throat when her gaze met his once again.

Cold wasn’t how she would exactly describe it, but it was similar. His blue-grey irises darkened, and his nostrils flared. And the deeper she looked into his eyes, the more she noticed that she was staring into a void. Then she heard it, a click. She wasn’t into guns or anything like that, however she had watched enough movies to know that sound. Her first thought: someone had broken into their apartment and was probably hiding behind the door. That would have been a far better explanation that what was actually happening. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a different glint that had nothing to do with the sweat on his body. His hand cuddled a firearm on the bed.

She stood there and stared at it, waiting for something to happen. She couldn’t bring her eyes to leave the gun. Danny felt as if she made one false move, it would be over for her. So, she stood there, eyes on the gun as she felt his cold glare on her. It’s okay, it’s okay, she repeated in her head, over and over for both herself and her babies.

Danny wasn’t sure how long she would be able to keep this statue position, but she was determined to do it for as long as it as possible.

***

Duke & Rhyne—The Morning After:

Rhyne’s gaze was fixed on the ceiling. She didn’t dare move: at this point, she was trying not to breathe. She was determined not to make any sudden movements that would wake Duke up. His arm rested across her belly, curving into her side as if he was cuddling her. There was no way she was about to ruin the first tender moment they’d had since she’d run away from him all those months ago.

She loved the warmth that flowed from his body into hers. That, and the unconscious show of care his body was currently doing. Obviously, only because his brain wasn’t awake to remind him of the anger, and dare she say hate, he felt toward her. Rhyne was determined to lie still and enjoy the comfort his body offered hers, even when she was anything but comfortable. Her little girl had now begun to drop, and Rhyne was sure that it was her head pushing against her bladder as her legs kicked into her ribs. A jolt of pain, a sharp intake of breath, and her bladder begging for release were just some of the signs that showed her baby girl was stretching.

Rhyne, like she had done so many times before, tried to stretch her own body. For some reason, she always thought she was creating a little more room for the little one inside her. Just a few more weeks in that cramped space then you’ll be out her in the world, she said to her baby. Rhyne tried to lengthen her body once more when Duke stirred. Oh no! She held still, but Duke continued to shift around, just until his head lay on her chest. The hairs at the top of his head tickled her chin. Her right hand was trapped under the weight of his body, so she used her left to comb her fingers cautiously through his thick, black hair.

RD got his daddy’s hair. Rhyne’s hair was on the auburn side, but RD had jet black thick hair, that he obviously got from his father. This was one of those moments when she felt proud of the similarities that Duke and RD shared. For some reason, the more her son looked like his father, the closer to being a family she felt. She’d always wanted to be that family that went to the store together and have people point at them and say, “he has his daddy’s eyes,” then another say “no, I think he looks more like his mother.” The dreams she had for them were so simple she at times felt they were ridiculous. The top of her wish list was to have a family picture. She patiently and eagerly waited for that day. Somehow, after their little girl was born, Duke’s anger would subside, and he would grant her that one wish.

“I wish,” she mumbled under her breath.

“What?”

She heard the low rumble of his voice, and her heart kicked up the speed. He was awake and listening to her thoughts. Well, not her thoughts, just the one said out loud.

“What do you wish for? As long as you don’t ask for the sun, moon, and stars, I can give you anything.”

“Wha-at?” The word fumbled out of her mouth. Was he really saying this to her? What does that mean?

“I heard that a pregnant woman’s heart beats twice as much to support two. But yours is racing.” His head lifted off her chest and he stared at her. The morning shadow darkening his chin, his eyelids half open, and his voice sounded heavy with sleep, and yet she found him to be the most handsome man she had ever seen.

“Sun, stars, and moon,” she whispered. She was simultaneously terrified of holding on to that moment, and desperate to grab it.

“It’s something my sister’s husband said.” Duke sat up as Rhyne’s heart plunged into her stomach. “It’s such a ridiculous thing to say, don’t you think? To offer the woman you love, someone you thought loved you back just as much, everything except the heavens.” He grunted, his jaw clenching, and she knew what that sound and expression meant.

The tightness in her chest eased when she dropped the hope, and a tear rolled down her cheek. Rhyne turned her head away and quickly brushed it away. This was it, her fairy tale. This was as happily-ever-after as it was going to get. At least she was with him, and RD. She wasn’t hiding behind some character she wasn’t, and Nola wasn’t there to make her life miserable. Duke had taken up that duty.

Determined not to add on to her humiliation, she tried to get up from the bed. She needed to use the bathroom. Pissing the bed was not how she wanted to continue the conversation she was having with Duke.

One, two, three—heave!

No dice.

It was getting harder and harder to do simple things like sitting up on a bed. There were times she convinced herself that sitting down on a low chair wasn’t worth the effort and energy she would spend trying to get up.

One, two, three—heave!

“Why do you do that?”

“I’m just trying—”

In a clipped tone he cut her off. “No, why don’t you ever ask for help? You do realize if you had told me everything from the beginning, we would be in a different place right now.”

“Probably not pregnant the second time. More than likely, you would have asked me to have an abortion. I was a drunk one-night stand that you couldn’t even remember. I’m not Nola, I’m not forceful. You never would have married me,” she mumbled, as hot tears filled her eyes.

“It didn’t take that much convincing. I wanted to be a husband and a father. I just wasn’t bothered about going through the process of dating.”

“What are you saying?”

“All she said was, ‘I’m pregnant.’”

Stunned wasn’t a word enough to describe the shock she was in. Before she could absorb the feeling, Duke’s fingers wrapped around her arm as he placed the other firmly under her back. Gently but sturdily, he pushed her into a sitting position. He climbed over the bed to her side and pulled her to her feet.

“Do you want me to help you to the bathroom or can you make it on your own?”

“What?” Rhyne’s mind was still a fuzz of confusion.

“It’s either your water broke, or you wet the bed. You don’t seem to be in any discomfort, so I’ll go with option two.”

Mortified, Rhyne recognized the feeling immediately. She felt the wetness run down her leg as her shirt clung to her bottom. Cautiously, she chanced a glance up at Duke. His face was just as blank as it tended to be. She couldn’t even gauge what his reaction to her wetting the bed was. But after a few seconds of examination, Rhyne realized that he didn’t seem to care at all. Silently, he pulled the covers off the bed and tossed them on the ground, nonchalantly as if it was a chore he did every morning.

“Hurry up. We have an appointment with the OB/GYN this morning.”

“Why?”

His eyebrow rose as his stare told her that she had asked one of the obviously dumbest questions ever.

“Why do you think?”

“Can Danny come, too?”

“Sure, give her a call. We’ll pick her and Kit up.”

Rhyne watched as he turned his attention back to the bedding on the floor. He pushed them with his feet all the way to the door, opened it, and kicked them out into the corridor. Duke followed them out, closing the door behind him. She had a few guesses of where he was headed to. RD was on the top of that list, surely with doing laundry at the very bottom. What was she going to do with this man? She wasn’t sure how long he planned to keep her around. However long that would be, she was sure that it was going to be the most tiring and difficult period. At that moment, she didn’t mind slipping back into the role of the mommy who posed as the nanny. She was sure that at some point, her fairy-tale notions would be suffocated out of her in this claustrophobic room.

***

He held the door closed and rested his head against it. He didn’t have a plan. He wasn’t even sure what he was doing. The only thing Duke knew was that he wanted to hurt Rhyne just as much as she had hurt him. And if that meant treating her with indifference, he was going to do it even if his heart begged against it. Duke only trusted the organ to pump blood through his body at this point. Following his heart had led his to the worst hurt a human being could endure. His mother’s death, he’d grown to understand that as a natural thing, but having the woman you love betray you? That was human evil.

“Let go,” he whispered to himself.

Duke walked down the hall to where his son slept. Slowly he entered the room, and chuckled the moment he caught sight of RD. His hand was flung over his face, his right foot hung off the bed, while the left made a mini tent with his duvet. His son was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, and he was sad that it had taken him a while to realize the true meaning and value of being a father.

He heard a click from behind him and he turned toward it. Rhyne stood there in a robe and his phone in her hand. She had this awestruck look that perfectly mirrored what he felt inside.

“This is what we call a picture-perfect moment,” she said.

“He is perfect.” Duke tucked RD back in his bed properly before ushering Rhyne out of the room. “You should be getting ready for the doctors. I only have an hour to spare this morning.”

“Who could ever forget your tight schedule,” Rhyne muttered as she walked away from him.

Duke did hear the sarcasm buried shallow in her statement. It didn’t bother him, though. Having a system, a schedule, was what kept him sane and on top. Deviating from the plan only got him into trouble and Rhyne was the perfect example of that. It took more than a long while for Rhyne to get ready. Duke did realize that she was slower, and he adjusted his patience to that. She was pregnant with his baby, and he did owe her whatever she needed from him. That included sitting on the couch going through reports he had meant to sign off at the office an hour ago.

“I don’t know why you had me come here when we own a perfectly good building in New York,” Jessica grumbled as she handed him a heap of files.

Duke smiled, amused at how she had become an expert at complaining, when he knew she didn’t mind coming to his home. One by one, he flipped the files open and skimmed through them and signed.

“You won’t read them first?” Jessica kicked her heels off and curled on the sofa next to him.

“I trust you,” he said as he glanced at her.

“That smile is going to get you into trouble one day,” she said seductively.

“It did. I got a pretend wife, and a woman who is now the mother of my two children.” Gently but firmly, he used his pen to push away her arm, which had already found a resting place on his shoulder.

“My kind of trouble is exciting.”

Duke paused his pen mid-air just as he was about to sign the last document. He was familiar with this tone of voice. It had that ‘I’m hiding my sincerity in my jokes’ kind of tone. Jessica always used it before trying to sleep with him. Before, it was a matter of not wanting to ruin their friendship, then their working relationship. Now it just came down to the fact that his life was already a messy web and adding a third woman to the mix would only make it catastrophic.

“Don’t,” he warned, before his wrist made the last stroke. He picked up the files and placed them on her lap. Duke stood up without another word and walked toward his room.

There wasn’t much to say. He’d learned that there would be no way to stop Jessica’s advances unless he allowed what she wanted to happen. So, for now he had a roll of bandages he readily used to cover up the issue. He sat at the foot of the bed and laughed at his once-young, naïve self. There was a moment he wanted to be part of the fathers and husbands club. At that moment, only one of those was working out while the other was just a mess. His children were his saving grace, his connection to the normal life, what kept him from becoming a career-driven machine like his father. Before, he’d thought limiting his interactions with RD would make him less like his father, but after his son disappeared, he realized all he wanted was to spend time with him. His children were also the only reason Rhyne was still in his life.

And as if on cue, Rhyne walked in, barely dressed to go out. Her face scrunched up into a frown as she rubbed the top of her belly. Duke did know that he could ask what was wrong but thought it better not to. Honestly, he didn’t see a reason to.

“Do you mind if I go out in your sweats?”

Duke looked her over and didn’t recognize the clothes she was wearing. It wasn’t normal for him to be in casual wear, but that didn’t mean he didn’t own such things. He shrugged his response.

“Let’s just go,” Rhyne said, a little miffed.

When they walked back into the living room, Jessica was still there. She watched them for a while before pointing at Rhyne’s stomach. “Who knew that all you needed to net Harry Henry was one of those. And all I had to do was wait for you to get wasted. Unfortunately, there are only few of those, but you were lucky enough to get two of them.”

“One,” Duke clarified. “The other time, I was conscious the multiple times it took to get her pregnant the second time. The only similarity is that she disappeared the morning after, both times.”

“She might be a magician,” Jessica mocked.

“Let’s go, Houdini.” Duke took Rhyne’s hand and pulled her past Jessica. He didn’t risk looking back and meeting the two women’s gazes. One was bound to be furious rage, and the other…he wasn’t quite sure with Rhyne.

They had a quiet car ride to Kit’s house, a block away. It was eerie and very uncomfortable. Rhyne looked out the window the whole time while he absentmindedly flipped through his papers. There wasn’t much to say between them since she’d run away. Duke didn’t know if she had anything to talk about, but as for him, he didn’t want to say anything to her. He was terrified that he would tell her more than he should, once more. The last thing he wanted was to let his guard down, open his heart, only to have her rip out what was left of it.

“Have you tried calling Daniela again?”

“She isn’t picking up.”

The car drew to a halt in front of Kit’s building. The driver was just about to step out when Duke volunteered to go get his little brother and sister-in-law himself. He was ready to do just about anything to get out of that suffocating, uncomfortable car.

When Duke walked up to the door, he could hear muffled voices coming from inside. At first, he was glad that he wouldn’t have to wait for another pregnant woman to get ready that morning. However, when he rang the bell, it took ten seconds before the door flew open and a frightened Danny rushed into him.

“Help me!”

Duke looked over her dark hair to see his brother standing there. Kit’s body glistened with sweat, his chest heaving up and down as if he was quickly running out of breath. His arm trembled and, in his hand, a Glock shook. Quickly reacting, Duke shoved Danny out of the way, stepped into the apartment, and locked the door behind him.

“Kit, give that to me.”