I Loved You Through Seven Losses Chapter 04
The next day, Asher and Garrett came back with a stack of fresh mating ceremony invitations.
The date printed on them was two days out.
Asher took one look at me and frowned.
“Why do you look like that? Is the baby making you sick again?”
I raised my head slowly, looked him in the eye, and said it one word at a time.
“Asher. June fifth, two years ago. Where were you?”
He understood instantly, and every bit of color left his face.
Garrett’s pen stopped above an invitation, and when he looked up, his eyes were full of fear.
Seeing the two of them like that, I knew Sienna hadn’t lied to me.
I swept the whole stack of invitations off the table.
“Why didn’t you pick up the phone!”
“Why did you lie to me!”
“Why!”
Garrett shut his eyes, and pain crossed his face.
“Roxie, it already happened!”
“You can cry and scream all you want, and it won’t bring Mom and Dad back!”
Asher dropped to one knee and started coaxing me.
“Roxie, it’s my fault. All of it.”
“After the ceremony, let me take you overseas for a while. Okay?”
I threw his hand off and slapped him across the face. “Get out!”
Asher’s head snapped to the side, and the last of his patience burned out.
“Roxie, how long are you going to keep this up?”
He stood up slowly and looked down at me.
“Show up at the ceremony and play along, and I’ll let you keep the pup.”
He thought he had put an offer on the table that I couldn’t refuse.
What he didn’t know was that the womb he was trying to control had already been emptied out.
After they left, I stared at the invitations all over the floor, and they looked like a hundred twisted mouths laughing at me.
Two days later, right before my flight to the western territories took off, I sent Asher a little gift.
*****
At the same moment, out at the open-air ceremony grounds.
Dozens of drones rose over the clearing and pulled every guest’s eyes upward.
Then the flyers came down like snow.
When the guests read the headline, a single gasp went through the crowd.
One flyer landed square on Asher’s face, and he pulled it off with his brows drawn together.
His pupils shrank, and his whole body locked up.