“Nick, what are you talking about?”
“You know damn well what I mean. I go away for five months and come back to find you pregnant!”
Finding courage she questioned, “Did it ever occur to you I was pregnant before you left?”
He rubbed his hand across his face and spat out in disbelief, “What are you saying, Summer? Are you trying to tell me it’s my baby?”
Tears that momentarily dried begin to spill again. Summer could not stand to have Nick look at her with such anger in his eyes so she averted her gaze to the other side of the room focusing on a picture that hung over the mantle. “Yes,” she whispered.
Frustrated, he grabbed Summer by her upper arms and forced her to make eye contact with him. His grip was so tight she winced at his touch. The space between them so oppressive she felt his hot breath on her face.
Through clenched teeth he hissed, “Speak up, Beautiful, I can’t hear you.”
Summer’s lips trembled as she whispered, “Yes, Nick, it’s your baby.”
Feeling like he’d been kicked in the midsection, Nick released his hold on Summer stumbling backwards. Only once had he believed he was going to be a father. He was in love, or so he thought with Veronica Taylor. Nick begged her to marry him; he wanted to make an honest woman out of her. Give their child his name, but Veronica refused his offer of marriage. It became apparent to Nick why she had refused him when an ex-boyfriend showed up demanding a paternity test to prove the baby was his. Test result later confirmed the ex-boyfriend was the child’s father.
Veronica’s scheme had been to use the baby as a means to Nick’s bank account to start a business, which she’d successfully accomplished.
Humiliated and feeling like a complete fool he swore one day he would get revenge.
Five years later, Veronica owned and operated a successful boutique on Fabric Row at 4th and Christian Streets. The very building she had leased to run her boutique out of was the very building Nick would later unbeknownst to her purchased as prime real estate. All Veronica was aware of was that there was a new owner of the building.
Nick raised the rent so high, at the end of each month she was scrambling to pay the bills. Months of juggling finances to pay merchants, employees, back rent, late fees, and legal costs
forced Veronica to close the doors of her business. In the end, Nick’s retaliation financially ruined her.
She’d lost everything. Her business, her home and her new model Volvo she fell in love with the second she spied it on the showroom floor.
To add insult to injury, Veronica’s ex-boyfriend turned out to be a deadbeat dad. The child support he paid, when he paid it, was hardly enough to feed the poor child.
Nick never showed any remorse; it was his money Veronica had swindled as capital to start up her business. Twisting the knife deeper he leased out the building to the local fashion design school on the Avenue of the Arts for a nominal monthly fee.
Several years later here he is again in the same predicament of being played like a fiddle. He had told Summer about Veronica and her conniving ways. How she had stooped so low as to claim a child was his knowing it was a damaging lie. Nick made it clear to Summer that he never wanted to be in such a position again. “I have no intentions of being anyone’s father. . .ever.”
Walking to the other side of the room, putting distance between them, he asked, “How far along are you? When is the baby due?”
“I just turned seven months. The baby is due the end of February.”
Gathering up her courage again, Summer waddled over to Nick. Touching his arm she pleaded, “Nick, please let me explain.”
Snatching away he roared, “Take your hands off me! Explain what? That you’re practically ready to deliver a baby that you claim is mine and you didn’t tell me?”
Summer tried to interrupt. “Nick, I ”
“Shut the hell up! I thought you were different, Summer! But you’re no different than the rest of those skanks! What were you going to do? Hit me with a paternity suit?”
Summer cried, “No! Nick! I wouldn’t do something like that! I never asked you for anything!”
Pacing the small living room back and forth like a caged animal, Nick kept his gaze on Summer, who was too afraid to move.
“Summer, I don’t know what the hell you would do! And you didn’t have to ask me for anything! I pampered you like a spoiled little brat! But that wasn’t enough for you, was it? I can’t believe you would do something so stupid as to get yourself pregnant!”
Summer stared at him in disbelief and sobbed uncontrollably as Nick ejected his venom. He was being so cruel. Did the raging lunatic think she had conceived a baby on her own?