CHAPTER 2
879 Words
Savannah hadn’t slept. Not really. She lay on her side most of the night, wide-eyed, staring at the tiny red numbers on her alarm clock like they owed her answers.
She kept hearing him. The sound of his breath, the way his hands moved, the stupid pause in his voice before he asked her if she was sure, the way he kissed her neck and her body.
God.
What was she thinking?
By the time she stumbled into the back of a cab that morning, she hadn’t eaten. Her head was pounding, her stomach twisting—not enough to call it nausea, but not normal either.
“You okay, miss?” the driver asked, watching her through the rearview mirror.
She forced a nod. “Yeah. Fine.”
She wasn’t.
The streets blurred by, just buildings and noise and way too much light. She hugged her coat tighter. Her thighs still ached from the night with the stranger.
It's been days now, and she is supposed to have gotten over it, but no.
Every bump in the road made her chest squeeze harder.
Was she going to be sick? No. Probably just... nerves. Lack of food. Or sleep.
She pressed a hand to her stomach, then yanked it away. Nope. Not going there.
When she got inside her apartment, she didn’t even bother with the lights. Dropped her purse on the floor, kicked off her heels, and went straight to the bathroom.
She looked like hell. She had just gone to the park to calm her nerves, but that didn't seem to have helped
. She pulled her hair out of the bun it had lived in all week and let it fall.
This wasn’t her. Or it wasn’t supposed to be.
The next day wasn’t better.
Her appetite was gone. Her thoughts were scrambled. She opened her calendar, counted backward, then forward again.
Four days late.
That wasn’t unheard of... right? Stress messed with things. Her cycle had shifted once in college.
But still. Her gut was saying something else.
Her phone buzzed with a message from Tasha:
“Tell me you’re not ghosting brunch again,How are you?”
Savannah stared at it, thumb hovering, before typing:
“I’m fine. Just... off.”
She deleted it. Rewrote it.
Then, finally, sent:
“I need to talk to you.
Hey, girl, you said you had an explosive night the other day, and you didn't even tell me all about it. Give me the full gist, my ears are itching. "Tasha wrote.
Yes, babe, it was a night I can never forget. Savannah replied, smiling faintly at her phone as she typed.
What's the charming dude's name? Tasha asked happily, but curiously.
…………Ahh, I don't know his name. Savannah wrote almost in tears.
Okay, but you used protection, right? "Tasha asked.
… No. Savannah muttered nervously, already panicking, just realizing what she did; I think I'm in trouble, Tasha.
Calm down, I will see you at the brunch.
“We will talk about it when you get here.”
Tasha texted
That evening was the Blake Foundation charity dinner. The exact kind of pretentious nightmare Savannah usually avoided like the plague.
But her dad made it clear that if she didn’t show up, she might as well pack her bags and change her last name.
So she showed.
Late.
“Savannah,” her father said, barely glancing at her. “You’re nearly half an hour behind.”
She shrugged. “Blame the cab.”
He looked her over. “You look pale. Are you sick?”
“Not sick. Just not interested.”
He sighed. “Tonight matters.”
“It always does with you,” Savannah muttered.
The room was packed with people she didn’t care about. Politicians, donors, men in suits who had never once spoken to her as if she had a brain. She weaved through it all like a ghost, smiling when she had to.
Tasha waved from the bar. Savannah gave a half-hearted wave back, then grabbed a glass of water just to have something to do.
She heard the voice before she saw him.
Low. Smooth. Too familiar.
Her body froze before her brain did.
No. No way.
She turned slowly, praying her instincts were wrong.
And there he was.
Standing beside her father. Talking to a gray-haired investor. Drink in one hand. Wore a perfect suit, Calm, unreadable.
Grayson Hart.
Her father’s best friend.
The man she’d slept with.
She couldn’t breathe.
Her throat felt tight. Her legs went weird. She backed up a step, gripping her glass like it might anchor her to the floor.
He didn’t see her. Not at first.
Then he did.
Their eyes locked.
One second. Two.
He didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink. But something in his gaze shifted, the barest flicker of awareness.
He knew.
So did she.
Richard, oblivious, waved her over. “Savannah! Come say hello to Grayson. You remember him.”
She couldn’t move. Couldn’t speak.
Her mind screamed, You’ve got to be kidding me.
Grayson turned toward her now, cool as ever, giving her a nod like they’d met at a golf tournament, not tangled in sheets.
She managed to say, “Hi.”
That was it.
Nothing more.
Inside, she was falling apart.
- Writer
