“Mara, bring your ID and our marriage papers.”
Nolan’s voice came through the phone, warm and casual, as though he were asking me to run an errand.
“You know how stubborn Brielle gets when she has her mind set on something. If I don’t humor her, she’ll make a scene outside the courthouse all day.”
“Just go along with me on this, okay?”
The hallway seemed to freeze around me.
The women who had been teasing me moments earlier exchanged uncomfortable looks. The envy on their faces was gone, replaced by open pity and awkwardness.
I folded the ultrasound report in my hands and tucked it into an inner pocket of my bag.
“Okay,” I said again.
“I knew you’d understand.”
Nolan sounded pleased.
“I’m waiting at the corner across from the hospital. It’s windy out, so grab a coat.”
That was Nolan. He could make the cruelest decisions in the gentlest voice.
I hung up and ignored the curious looks around me as I headed for the elevator.
Every step sent a fine, needling pain through the soles of my feet. It was the price merfolk paid for living on land, every step like walking barefoot over blades.
Outside the hospital, a black Maybach was parked beneath the trees.
Nolan sat behind the wheel with one hand resting on it. When he saw me coming, he lowered the window, leaned across, and pushed open the passenger door.
“Get in. We’re right on time.”
He checked his watch.
I stayed where I was.
Pain spread upward from the soles of my feet, but I forced myself not to react.
“Nolan, I’m pregnant.”
I looked him straight in the eye, my voice as calm as if I were commenting on the weather.
He went still for a second.
Then he smiled, as though I’d just said something ridiculous.
“Mara, just to keep me from winning this stupid little game, you’re really willing to lie about being pregnant?”
“You weren’t like this before.”
He sighed, sounding more indulgent than annoyed.
“I know this isn’t fair to you. But you know how insecure Brielle has always been.”
“She just wants proof that there’s still someone in this world who’ll choose her no matter what.”
“Once this is over, I’ll come get you and we’ll get married again. After that, I’ll take some time off and take you to Iceland to see the Northern Lights. How does that sound?”
I looked at the tenderness in his eyes and felt a familiar ache settle deep in my stomach.
I’d heard this speech too many times before.
Three years ago, on our anniversary, Nolan had booked out an entire rooftop restaurant for us.
We had barely been served when Brielle called and said she was drunk at a bar, daring him to show up within ten minutes.
That night, I sat alone before a table full of French food, staring out at the city lights.
Later, the pain in my feet got so bad that I spent two days at home in bed with a high fever.
When Nolan came back, he used that same gentle voice. Brielle was immature, he’d said. I should be more understanding.
I should have realized it then.
When it came to the people Nolan cared about, Brielle would always come first.
“Get in. Don’t keep Brielle waiting.”
I looked away, opened the rear door instead, and climbed into the back seat.
Nolan glanced at me in the rearview mirror, the faintest crease appearing between his brows. He said nothing and pulled away from the curb.
Soft instrumental music played through the speakers.
He kept one hand on the wheel while typing rapidly on his phone with the other.
The glow from the screen lit his face, and his delight was impossible to miss.
I turned toward the window and watched the trees blur past.
The ultrasound report lay quietly inside my bag.
It showed a life barely six weeks old.
It was also the child he’d talked about countless times, whispering in my ear that he wanted a daughter who looked just like me.
He’d traveled all over with me, trying every spell and ritual we could find, desperate for me to conceive.
And now, to him, that life was nothing more than a lie I’d invented to keep him from winning a game.
I closed my eyes and rested a hand over my stomach.
Fine.
If he thought it was a lie, then he would never learn the truth.