Baby for My Stepbrother

Chapter 8

My bag slid from my shoulder, throwing me off balance enough that Jack had no problem pinning me against a car. His face was awash of anger, flaming red with his eyes narrowed down at me.

I didn’t understand his anger. I’d been a girlfriend once, but breaking up should never bring this type of reaction out of any person. It was frightening to realize that what had once been love could turn into an obsession.

“Jack,” I said through tears, “You’re hurting me.”

“ Good,” he answered, his voice as dark as his emotions. “Maybe I can kill that little bastard inside of you so that things can go back to the way they were. What did Dane do to make you leave me?”

My body trembled against the warm metal of the car’s hood, but I kept a level head despite my terror. “He didn’t do anything, he …”

Jack jerked me up just to slam me back down, pain shooting along my spine when the bones of my back felt like they crunched together.

I was doing everything I could to protect Bean, but I feared that Jack’s violence would hurt her no matter what I did to protect her.

Slipping down the stinging hot surface of the car, I closed my eyes, crumbling over myself in hopes that I could shield my body from Jack. He wasn’t punching me or hurting me in any other way except for the death grip his hands had on my arms.

I wish I could say I was stronger in that moment – that I hadn’t cried and begged him to let me go in the most pathetic voice I’d ever heard flow over my lips. But I can’t say that. With my belly swollen with my child, I’d immediately given in to Jack surrendering to his anger in hopes that it would keep him from harming Bean.

They say that in a moment like that one, things move slowly, that you can take in every detail because time begins to stand still. However, in my case, time sped up - Jack was holding on to me between one second, and his limp body was lying on the ground in front of me in the next.

Dane had appeared from out of nowhere, one strike of his fist against Jack’s jaw ending the nightmare that felt like it had lasted forever. In truth, his attack had lasted only a few minutes – but those were a few minutes too long.

“Are you okay?”

Dane was running his hands over my arms and body, desperately looking for any injuries. “Did you piss yourself, Luna?”

I glared up at him with all the indignation I could muster. Sure, I might have surrendered to the fight, but asking me if I pissed

myself? That was a step too far.

“I couldn’t exactly fight back, being pregnant …”

“Look at your pants,” he said, barely able to control his own anger. I knew it wasn’t directed at me. It was directed at the lump of a person now broken and bleeding on the concrete parking lot.

Glancing down, I noticed that my pants were wet, that the moisture flowed down from my crotch, dripping to the cement beneath me. “Holy shit …”

“I’m taking you to the hospital,” he said, picking me up and holding me close to his chest as he weaved his way through the parked cars.

My eyes remained glued to where Jack lay unconscious in between two cars. “We need to call the police or something. I don’t want you to get in trouble for hitting him.”

“I’ll call them when I know you’re safe. You and Bean are my only concern at the moment. If I get in trouble for looking out for a pregnant woman that was attacked, then so be it. I’ll stand in front of a jury any day and explain that it was my job to protect you. I doubt one of those people will claim that I did anything wrong.”

We made it to the hospital in record time, the entire ride giving me white knuckles as I held onto the ‘oh shit ’ strap above the passenger door. Even buckled in, I was tossed around when Dane took corners a little too quickly for my liking.

I felt cramping in my abdomen, but brushed it off as fear until the kind nurse at the hospital confirmed that I hadn’t pissed myself in the parking lot …my water had broken.

Dane and I were then led to a delivery room where I would wait out the labor, my small contractions not helping my cervix to dilate as fast as it should.

“We have pills that we’ll use to open your cervix. That way you’ll be able to give birth naturally. Otherwise, you can opt for a cesarean.”

“I want to deliver naturally,” I answered the black haired doctor who was filling in until my regular obstetrician could arrive to deliver Bean.

His smile was genuine when he nodded his head. “Excellent. Then we’ll wait until your doctor arrives and determine what to do from there. Most likely, your contractions will begin to increase in the coming hours and we’ll meet your new child soon.”