Page 74 of Dash

I tap my card on the reader and stuff the test into my bag.

Then I head to the nearest shop with toilets.

I don’t need to take the test. Deep down, I know I’m pregnant.

The list of symptoms I’ve attributed to other things, for other reasons, plays through my mind like it’s trying to torture me.

Dash is the first man I’ve ever trusted and who made me feel safe. And now, I may have destroyed everything.

Not because I’m pregnant, but because it’s going to read like a lie no matter how I spin it. He’s never going to believe I forgot to get my injection. No one would. It’s stupid. I’m fucking stupid.

The moment I tell him I’m pregnant, it’s over.

I take the test with shaking hands then cap it and slide it onto the back of the toilet. The cubicle feels claustrophobic, but it’s not the walls that are closing in. It’s my life. My mistakes.

My inability to manage my own responsibilities.

Why would you rely on some stupid automated system for one of the most important things in your life?

I close my eyes and try to breathe through the crushing fear.

He’ll think I trapped him because I told him I was covered.

My stomach lurches, and I drop to my knees in front of the dirty toilet. Everything I’ve eaten this morning comes back up with a vengeance. I can do nothing but endure it, my stomach contracting so violently it leaves me shaking on the floor.

I sink back against the cubicle wall, my hair sticking to my forehead, my throat and mouth burning.

The test mocks me from the back of the toilet. I don’t want to look. I don’t want to make this real.

I force myself to stand and reach for the test. Two pink lines look back at me. Two small little lines.

I don’t breathe. I don’t cry.

I just exist quietly as the world tilts and disappears.

I’m pregnant and completely fucked.

EIGHTEEN

DASH

Walking backinto the clubhouse feels like I have a target on my back. This is the first time I’ve stepped foot in the building since the attack Diesel and I got caught up in. I don’t know what I’m expecting, but what transpires is not it.

Crank is sitting at his usual table, completely unfazed. I expected the club to be in fight mode, not calm. Not breathing easy.

Diesel is standing in his usual spot, leaning against the wall, watching. Waiting. He’s hard to read at the best of times, but every time Crank laughs, Diesel’s eyes twitch.

I don’t see Riot or Mace, but Nic is leaning against the bar, his shoulders taut like a bow. He looks up as I approach, his eyes saying a thousand things his mouth isn’t.

“How’s the head?” he asks.

“Fine. I was expecting a little more… action when I got back.”

He snorts. “I ain’t sure he even knows you were in the hospital.”

I see red. This isn’t even about the fact that someone tried to fucking kill me. It’s about the club’s reputation. It’s about what it means if we don’t fight back.

Our enemies already think we’re weak. That puts not only the club at risk but the people around it.

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