Page 75 of Beautiful Killer

She was pregnant? Sunny was having a baby. My baby.

“Did you know?” Ruby asked gently, tearing me from my thoughts.

I looked down at her and shook my head.

She grabbed my forearm and gave it a squeeze.

I looked down at her, still struggling to process it, all of it, then looked to Van. “What else do we know?”

Van stared at me for several long seconds, and I knew he wanted to ask more, dig deeper, but instead said, “Not a fucking thing.”

Jude crossed his massive arms over his chest. “I’ve got Connor on it. He’s going through CCTV footage, trying to get a number plate, maybe a clear shot of the guy’s face. The direction he was headed. Anything that could give us a location.”

Jude had worked with Connor before he left the force. Connor was still a detective, but they’d stayed close. The guy helped us out a lot at the agency. I nodded, not really there, not in that room anymore. All I could hear was Sunny’s voice in my head saying those words over and over again. “My baby. What if I hurt the baby when I fell?”

I headed for the door and Van grabbed my shoulder, stopping me. “What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

He let me go and I walked out the door, down the hall, then down the stairs to the lower level. Neco’s office was down here, a gym, as well as the holding room. I stopped outside the door and stared at it. What the hell am I going to say? This wasn’t supposed to happen. This wasn’t in the cards for me, not anymore. It’d been taken out of the deck and burnt to ash when Diane did what she did. It’d been for the best. Punishment for what I did in Afghanistan.

That’s what I always believed. The universe righting itself, Karma or whatever.

If that was the case, how could this be? How could Sunny be having my baby?

How the fuck could I be what she needed? What a kid needed?

“Oh . . . hi.”

I turned at the sound of Julia’s voice. Lulu was beside her and they were carrying coffee cups.

“Where’s Sunny?” I asked them, not recognizing my own damn voice.

“She’s resting,” Lulu said, motioning to the holding room. “I was just going to show Julia around. You can give Sunny this if you’re going in.” She handed me a cup and ushered a frowning Julia back the way they’d come.

I gripped the door handle, pushed it open, and—stopped dead.

Sunny was lying on her side, hands curled up by her face, eyes closed, fast asleep. Her hair was pushed back from her face, spread over the pillow. There were dark circles under her eyes. She looked exhausted. The sight warmed a spot behind my ribs. I wanted to lift her into my arms and take care of her, never let her out of my sight. She was wearing jeans and she’d kicked off her boots. The shirt she was wearing was green, loose, that drapey kind of fabric. It clung to her breasts and hung off one shoulder, the skin there smooth and pale. It took everything in me not to sit beside her and run my lips over that delicate skin, taste her, soak in her warmth, breathe in her scent.

Her eyelids quivered then fluttered open, and she glanced over at me.

“Zeke . . .” She shifted, pulling herself into a sitting position, eyes still heavy from sleep. “I . . . um . . .”

I handed her the drink Lulu had given me and she accepted it and put it on the bedside table.

“Thank you.” I hated how pale she looked.

“So it wasn’t the stomach flu?” I said into the silence, not able to make myself say the words.

Her full lips parted and she drew in a quick breath, then she let it out, shoulders losing some of their tension and she shook her head. “No.”

“That’s what you wanted to tell me tonight?”

“Yes.” She bit her lip and started twisting that ring on her thumb. “I didn’t plan this . . . I hope you believe that. I didn’t think . . . I didn’t think I could get pregnant . . .”

“How long have you known?” I said.

She started chewing on her bottom lip. “I found out the day Bobby came to my house . . .”