Baller’s Baby(20)

I’ve never felt so helpless in my life. Watching her lie there motionless, once again, except this time, she is swollen with child, and the way she hit . . . fuck. Camryn stays by her side while I call an ambulance. They won’t be long. It never takes them long to show up when someone with money calls, but if I had been calling them when I was kid, ha. I'd be happy if they came at all.

Camryn and I had just sat down in the kitchen when I heard the door. I had hoped she would go upstairs first so I could at least brace him for what he was about to see.

She didn’t.

I could see the betrayal in his eyes, and it cut me like a knife. I’d do just about anything to erase that look from his face. To wash it away and go back to the relief and joy he showed when I first opened the front door.

“Were you going to tell me?” Camryn asks, looking down at Skila like she’s the most beautiful thing in the world. She is, but I don’t want him looking at her like that, even if she was his first.

“Yeah, of course. It just happened, man.” He laughs at that. It's not a good laugh. It sounds choked and forced.

“And the baby?” he asks, and I freeze. I hadn’t thought about the baby. Shit.

“Yeah,” I say. I don’t know what else to say.

“I might be back from the dead, bro, but I still know how to count. It's mine, unless you were fucking her while I was gone.”

“Fuck you.”

It takes everything inside of me not to step forward and take a swing at him for that comment. I don’t care if my shoulder is fucked and I'd risk never playing another game again. If he knew her at all, he would know she wasn’t that type of girl. He glances back at me and notes my balled fist at my sides, clenching and unclenching.

“I see,” he says, and by the way he hangs his head, I think maybe he does. It can't be easy for him, I know that. Hell, he thought he was in love with her before he was sent away. Maybe he still does, I don’t know. It doesn’t feel right to ask. Growing up, my brother was my best friend. We shared everything. There wasn’t a secret between us, and yet, at the moment, he could very well still be dead, and I'd be able to talk to him more freely than I can right now.

The paramedics knock on the door, and I rush to let them in. One of them comes straight to Skila’s side.

“How long has she been out?” he asks. I have no clue. I didn’t think to look at the clock. I was more worried about the fact she hit ground and Camryn’s reaction than I was to the time.

“Five minutes, thirty-eight seconds,” Camryn states flatly.

“How far along is she?”

“Twenty-seven weeks,” I say smugly.

Another paramedic enters the house with a gurney, and together, they lift her and lay her on it. “Ok, Dad, you can ride with if you want.”

“Ok,” we both reply at the same time, and the paramedic looks at us sharply. I can guess what he must be thinking. I glance at Camryn and see his hardened scowl, ready to fight me on this. He looks up at me then, and I can easily read his look. It screams, ‘You owe me this’, and I may. I know he needs to talk to Skila, and he would want to hear from her how things between us occurred.

“You go ahead, bro. I'll catch up.” He nods as he jumps in the back of the ambulance. The doors close and the lights switch on. I run back inside, tossing on some shoes and a shirt, and then I’m back out the door, jumping in Chris’s car and speeding toward the hospital.





Chapter Twenty-Nine

Skila



I wake slowly, the fog lifting at its own leisurely rate. Bits and pieces of the ordeal come back to me as I come to. Kiptyn and I had a fight. I left. Camryn was home.

Camryn.

I remember the look in his eyes when he saw me in the doorway. I don’t think I'll ever be able to erase it from my mind.

A throat clears across the room, and my eyes fly open. Camryn sits in a chair, his chin propped on his fist, leaning forward on spread legs. He’s staring straight at me. I wonder what he sees. Does he know the child in my womb is his? Is he angry? Should I say something? I don’t have the slightest clue what to say to him.

He looks like hell, and I mean quite literally. I’d bet he’s lost at least fifty pounds. His face is sunken in, causing his jaw and cheekbones to jut out sharply. There’s a fresh scar across his right eyebrow, and judging from the way it looks, I don’t think it was treated at a hospital.

His clothes are clean, but even they look to be at least three sizes too big on him. Physical attributes aside, there is something else different about him. He feels darker. His aura or presence is haunting, and if I didn’t know him, I'd be afraid to be alone with him right now. As it is, I’m mildly curious and a little uncomfortable. I have questions I want to ask, and yet I know he does too. What is the correct protocol here?

“Are you happy?” he asks first, and I let the breath I’ve been holding escape in a rush. It's a start, and I'll take it.

“Yes. What happened to you?” I ask, because it's the only question I can think of at the moment and I need the answer.

“Nothing, everything, too much to ever talk about, so please don’t ask me to. I can't.” I see him fighting to not close down, so I nod my head vigorously and change questions.

“When did you get back?”

“Yesterday. I went to Atlanta . . . to find you, believe it or not, and then I came here to Kip’s.” He laughs like he has told some amazing joke that only he gets.

“I’m sorry,” I say, and I am. I’m sorry he didn’t trust me with me his real identity, and he didn’t tell me what he did for a living. I’m sorry he didn’t call me when he found out he was getting shipped out, and that he had to find out all of this like he did. He nods his head in acceptance.

“Do you love him?” His body is taut, waiting for my answer. I don’t know what he expects, but I'll only tell him the truth.

“Yes.” His entire body relaxes, and I wonder if maybe that was the answer he was searching for.

“Good. Good. He deserves someone like you, Sky. Take care of him. Take care of both of them,” he says, gesturing toward my stomach. He stands to leave the room, but before he goes, he walks to the side of my bed and leans in, kissing me softly on the forehead and laying a packet of papers in my lap. I don’t know what to make of his statement.

What did he mean by ‘take care of them’? Is he leaving? Where is he going? Is he coming back? What about Kip? This will destroy him. He cannot lose his brother again.

“I'll be back for those in a little while. Get some rest. Your son needs it,” Camryn says, walking out the door. My hand flies to my stomach. My son? I’m having a baby boy? Kiptyn is going to be so happy. I can't wait to tell him.

I don’t know how much time passes before I remember the pack of papers in my lap. Lifting them, I pull the stack out and skim over the form on the top.

TERMINATION OF PARENTAL RIGHTS

Big, bold letters stare me in the face. I feel all the blood leave my face as ice floods my veins before I read through the rest of the papers. He is signing over all of his rights to the baby so that Kiptyn can legally sign the birth certificate. Tears well in my eyes. I can't decide if I'm happy or sad. Does he not want my baby? I don’t understand it. Who would not want him?

Strong arms wrap around me, and I know right away it’s Kip. I smell his masculine scent of pine and fresh cotton. He strokes the hair from my face and whispers sweet nothings in my ear.

“Have you seen this?” I ask him on a sob, thrusting the papers toward his chest. He takes them from me and sets them in a chair by the bed.

“Yeah, baby. He told me he was doing it. As soon as he knew for sure the baby was his, he contacted a lawyer and had the papers delivered straight to the hospital. I tried to tell him to wait, but . . .”

“Why is he doing this? I don’t understand, Kip.” I can’t calm down. I grab onto Kiptyn and pull him to me. I cry uncontrollably into his shirt. My heart hurts so much that I’m about to be sick.

“I don’t know, baby. I think he was trying to make you happy. He’s not in a good place right now, and he wants the baby to have the best chance it can have.”

“He,” I say. Kiptyn looks at me with lost eyes before I realize what I’ve said. Every time we’ve gone for a sonogram, he’s been hiding his junk between his legs so we weren’t sure if it was a boy or a girl yet.

“He? It’s a boy?” he asks, and I nod into his chest. “That’s great, Sky. Are you happy?” I pull back and look at the man sitting on the bed next to me. He is asking me the same question Camryn asked me not even ten minutes ago, and while the answer is the still the same, we still have a lot of things we need to talk about.

“I was very happy, Kip,” I say, starting a conversation neither of us wants to have.

He sighs and turns away from me. “I know, Sky. A lot of shit has happened, hasn’t it?”

I get the feeling he is headed in a totally different direction than I am. I grab his hand and pull it into my lap, careful to not hurt his other arm. I can’t believe he’s up and moving around with his injury. I’d be lying in the bed whining like a little girl if it was mine.

“I fucked up last night. I should have taken a cab home, but you should know better than to think I’d bring some bitch home with me.”