Only After I Lost Her

Chapter 8 Two Pink Lines

The moment those two pink lines appeared on the pregnancy test, tears nearly spilled from her eyes.

The thought pulsed through her like a lifeline, steady and strong. Seth would not die.

Without even stopping to grab breakfast, Nina bolted straight to the hospital for confirmation.

She clutched the ultrasound report in shaking hands, her head spinning with the reality of it. After swearing she would cut Xavier out of her life forever, here she was, carrying his child. The universe had a crueler sense of humor than she had ever imagined.

Just outside the doctor's office, her heart stuttered to a stop. There they stood, Xavier and Kelsey, their fingers tightly interlaced as they clutched the results from their pre-marital medical checkup.

They were getting married.

A cold sweat broke across her palms. She tried to slip away quietly, but their gazes snapped toward her at the same moment.

Kelsey's sweet smile melted into a frosty glare the instant their eyes met across the hallway.

Xavier's eyes darted past her face, locking onto the Obstetrics and Gynecology sign mounted on the wall behind her. His gaze lingered there a beat too long, and the weight of it made her skin prickle with unease.

Nina instinctively crumpled the ultrasound report tighter behind her back, hiding it from view.

"What a coincidence," Kelsey hissed, her voice dripping with venom. "If this is fate, it is a sick joke."

Nina could not care less about trading insults with her right now. Now that the baby was confirmed safe, the city could burn to the ground for all she cared. If Kelsey wanted her gone, she would vanish soon enough on her own terms.

She strode past them without saying a single word. The past did not matter anymore, none of it, who was right and who was wrong. Only Seth's survival mattered now.

Her son. Xavier's son. A secret she would carry to her grave, literally if she had to.

As she brushed past them, fingers clamped around her wrist like a vice. Xavier's grip tightened for one terrifying moment, and then he suddenly released her. The crinkled ultrasound sheet slipped free from her grasp and hit the tiles with a soft whisper.

Her heart jackhammered against her ribs so hard she thought it might break through.

The man crouched down immediately, reaching for the fallen report.

Just as his fingertips grazed the paper's edge.

"Xavier." Kelsey doubled over, gasping dramatically. "My stomach hurts so much." Her face twisted in exaggerated agony, a performance worthy of an award.

Xavier abandoned the report instantly, his attention snapping back to her. "What is wrong? Was it something you ate?" he fretted, already steering her away from Nina.

For the first time in her life, Nina felt genuinely grateful for Xavier's obsessive devotion to Kelsey.

She snatched up the ultrasound report from the floor and made a beeline for the elevator without looking back.

Behind her, Xavier's voice carried that familiar mix of concern and gentle reproach. "Have you been skipping meals again? How many times do I have to tell you, you are perfect exactly as you are. Even if you gained fifty pounds, you would still be the most beautiful woman in my eyes."

Those honeyed words could make any woman weak in the knees. Back when they had been together, his whispers used to send her heart racing with joy.

He had murmured those same sweet nothings to her countless times before, in what felt like another lifetime.

Back then, he had hounded her constantly about eating three proper meals every single day, terrified that she would ruin her health by skipping them. Yet four years after leaving him, she had been diagnosed with stomach cancer anyway.

She had steeled herself for the inevitable long ago. Death held no fear for her now, not really.

But as she walked away from them both, a growing dread coiled tight in her gut like a living thing.

Her fingers trembled as she pulled out her phone. Xavier would rob her of any chance to keep this child if he ever found out about it.

Her fingers flew across the screen as she searched for one-way tickets out of the country. Three in the afternoon, the earliest departure available. Without any hesitation, she secured the booking and pocketed her phone.

Every moment she remained here was dangerous now. One wrong move and her entire world could come crashing down around her.

The stakes were too high for both her and Seth to take any chances.