Page 17 of Silver Linings

“Don’t be a brat, Lily. James has some issues, that’s true, but where else are you going to go? Your own parents want nothing to do with you since you refuse to get married before the baby comes. Honestly, you’d think you wouldn’t want your baby to be born a bastard, but I’ve given up on trying to convince you to put this baby first. All that matters is that the baby is a Callahan, and it will be raised in our family.”

“You’re wrong,” Gunner growled, causing Lily to jump.

“Gunner, you don’t need to?—”

“I’m the father of Lily’s baby.”

Time stood still as her breath stuck in her lungs. Corrine, much to Lily’s surprise, smiled. Her eyes betrayed her true feelings though, and as they landed on Lily, she wanted nothing more than to shrink back into the hospital bed and disappear.

The sick, squeezing feeling in her belly returned with a vengeance. Lily knew she needed to get Corrine to leave so that she could work on relaxing. Stress was causing the pains, and James’s mother was one of the ultimate stressors for her.

“You little lying whore. You think you can try to fool me into believing this man, who I’ve never seen before, is the father of your child and for the last nine months you’ve just been working to trap my son? I don’t buy it. I don’t buy it for a single second, Lily.”

“Corrine, I?—”

“No. This is the last straw. I’ve tried to make sure that baby would be raised right while staying in my lane. I pushed James to propose to you, even though he’d rather continue fucking every bar bunny in this town. But I guess he got the best of both worlds for a while, didn’t he?”

Tears stung Lily’s eyes. She’d known about his drinking, but not once had she thought he was sleeping with other women behind her back. Lily shifted her hips in the bed, trying to find relief from the squeezing.

“Gunner,” Lily cried as the pain wrapped around her belly again. She tried to hide it as best she could, but the sharpness at the bottom of her bump took her breath away as she curled around her baby.

“Lil? What’s going on?” She watched as his eyes snapped to the monitor, a scowl growing across his already cold face.

“C-can you call the doctor back, please?”

“Get out,” he growled at Corrine, and Lily had never been so happy to have someone in her corner.

“This isn’t the end, Lily. I don’t believe for one second the baby is this overgrown Neanderthal’s child. I’ll take you to court if I have to! You know the Captain is friends with every judge in this county!”

Her eyes squeezed closed as she registered both another contraction and the threat that Corrine left hanging in the room over her. She could faintly hear the door open and close again through her panicked thoughts, but the surrounding air was thick and hard to pull into her lungs.

Until a warm hand found its way to her arm. “Breathe, Lil. I pressed the call button for a nurse, but you just need to breathe until they can come in and figure out what’s going on.”

“You didn’t need to say you’re the baby’s father, Gunner. S-she knows the truth. S-she won’t just let me live in peace. Ow.” The monitor wrapped around her belly showed the contraction continuing to build.

“It doesn’t matter what that woman will or won’t do, Lil, because I’m not letting anyone take Sprout from you. Just breathe. I’m going to take care of everything.”

Seven

“What the fuck?”

Gunner jolted as Gia punched him in the arm. His coffee sloshed onto the table, and he tried to rein in his anger. It had been a long night, and an early morning trying to let Lily sleep in. He needed that coffee.

“Gia, don’t talk like that.”

“I’m a grown-ass woman, Gunner. I’ll talk to my dumb shit brother any way I please.” She sat down next to him, taking a toast off his plate. “What are you thinking?”

“Want to clue me in on whatever gave you a death wish this morning?”

“I know I didn’t ask questions when you came into Mom’s room at five in the morning telling me Lily was going to sleep in my bed, but I want an explanation about what happened last night, and I want it now.”

“I’m going to marry her.”

The toast dropped from Gia’s hand as her mouth gaped open at him.

“What the fuck is happening right now?”

“Someone close to us needs my help. And this is how I can help.”