The First Rule by Nicole S. Goodin

27

Darcy

I’m toofat for this crap.

I’m eight months pregnant, trying to be stealth and failing miserably. I can’t hide behind anything without my stomach sticking a mile out. It’s ridiculous.

I should just go home.

I don’t know what I was hoping to achieve by coming here, but I knew it was worth a shot.

If Jacob catches me here, I can just pretend I’m picking up my game as the doting little wife, and I’ve come to visit my man at work.

If he doesn’t catch me, well, then I don’t have to make myself sick by pretending I don’t hate everything about him. It’s a win-win.

I slip into one of the boardrooms, and take a relaxing breath.

I can’t hear a sound. It’s empty, but the temporary partition wall prevents me from seeing the room, so I stay quiet, just in case. Jacob’s schedule says he has a meeting in here in half an hour, so I should be able to make a safe escape from the building once he’s settled in here and not potentially out roaming the halls.

I sit down to rest. This seems like as good of a spot as any to wait him out, and I shouldn’t be bothered by anyone here. I used the lesser-known, back entrance to this large room; everyone else uses the door on the other side.

I lean my head back against the wall and close my eyes. I’m so tired. I’m uncomfortable and sore. Pregnancy isn’t all that great after thirty weeks, but at least I’m not still spewing.

I hear the door open on the far side of the room and I freeze, listening for voices.

I can hear Lindsey, a woman who reports back to Jacob, she’s droning on and on about some supplier and a bunch of other stuff I don’t understand and don’t care to try to.

“Tell them we want another five percent or we walk.”

That’s Jacob’s voice.

I hear the sound of heels clicking against the hard floor and then the door opens and shuts again.

The room is quiet once more, except for the sound of fingers tapping on a keyboard. Jacob must have come in early.

I could try and sneak out now, but given the airy silence in the room, and my newly acquired heavy footsteps, he’d likely hear me. Hell, someone a town over could hear me, I sound like an elephant.

I close my eyes again, deciding to wait him out when I hear the door open again.

I get up as quietly as I can with a belly this size and creep towards the door nearest me, waiting for some type of noise or chatter that will cover for me as I escape.

My hand is on the door handle when I hear Jacob say, “What the fuck are you doing here?”

His voice is like venom.

I pause, intrigued. He never speaks like that within these walls. I’m overwhelmed with curiosity of who he’s directed it at.

“I wanted to see the look on your face when I tell you that it’s over… that you lose.”

My heart speeds up to a gallop. It’s Ryan. Ryan is here.

I haven’t heard his voice in far too long, but it still affects me the same way, all the way down to my toes. I know it’s almost identical to Jacob’s, but the two men couldn’t sound more different to me now. I’d be able to tell them apart underwater.

Jacob chuckles, menacingly. “What the fuck are you going on about? I’ve got a meeting in half an hour, go and tell your bullshit to someone who cares.”

It’s Ryan’s turn to laugh now and it’s mocking. “I really don’t think you’ll want me to do that.”

There’s silence for a moment, and I take an unconscious step in the direction of the partition.

I want to hear more. I need to know why Ryan is here, speaking to a man he can’t stand. I want to know what he’s taunting Jacob with. Maybe I can use it to get myself out of this situation.

My brain tells me that Ryan’s here for me, but I shut that thought down as quickly as it comes. I can’t afford to be thinking like that. I need to keep my cool until I get more information.

“Why don’t you just tell me what the fuck you’re here to tell me. Some of us have work to do,” Jacob sneers.

“I tracked her down, Jake.” Ryan’s reply makes no sense to me, but his tone is triumphant, as though he knows he’s already won.

“Who?”

“Your baby mama.”

I feel my jaw drop open. A baby mama? Jacob has a baby?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Jacob’s arrogance is back.

“You sure about that? Because she’s got a kid that looks just like us, and a pocket full of cash that she’s burning through at a rapid rate of knots.”

More silence. My heart is pounding like a jackhammer inside my ribcage. Jacob has a child.

Tears spring to my eyes. I couldn’t be more grateful that I never got my wish of having a baby with Jacob, but still, knowing that we spent a year trying and failing, only for him to have a child with someone else, hurts – as stupid as that might be.

It’s just another kick in the guts.

“I’ve met her, she told me everything.”

More silence.

“I’ve met him too… he’s one hell of a little boy.”

A son. Jacob has a son.

“Keep your fucking nose out of my business,” Jacob growls, his earlier arrogance gone and slight panic taking its place.

Ryan chuckles. “It’s a bit late for that. You took something from me. You forced my hand, Jake, and now I’m gonna be calling the shots. Darcy is with me. End of story. You leave us alone, and I won’t go to the media with the story of the city’s CEO wannabe billionaire, knocking up a stripper.”

A stripper?

What the actual fuck is going on here… I feel like I’ve been transported into an alternative dimension.

None of this makes sense. Illegitimate children and pregnant strippers… what the hell have I been blind to?

“Darcy is with me because she wants to be,” Jacob retorts.

I want to scream about what bullshit that is, I want to kick and yell and make the biggest scene of all time until Ryan takes me away from here, but I need to hear the rest of this. I need to know what the fuck is going on before I make my presence known.

“Bullshit. I know everything, Jacob, I know you hired a private investigator to stalk her – us – I know you don’t give a shit about that woman. I’m starting to think you never did.”

“Is that what this is really all about?” Jacob chuckles, his laughter a mocking sound. “Are you seriously still cut up about the fact that I got her way back then instead of you?”

Ryan doesn’t reply.

Jacob laughs again. “What? You think I didn’t know you were in love with her? I saw that pathetic longing in your eye when you looked at her. You’re like a puppy dog. Then there were the flowers you sent every year that I got credit for. Thank you for that, by the way, scored me major points, and I don’t even understand what the fuck they symbolise.”

I gasp. The flowers… they weren’t from Jacob, they were from Ryan… all this time…

Four years ago:

I open the door to the apartment and am greeted by a huge bunch of flowers.

“Miss Shearer?” the voice from behind the arrangement asks.

“That’s me,” I reply, confused. I never get flowers.

“Here you go.” He thrusts them towards me, and I take them, struggling to hold them up.

“Who are they from?”

“There’s a card on the top.”

I thank him and shut the door behind me. I sit them on the bench and pull the card off. They’re beautiful.

I have no idea who they’re from – Jacob has never bought me flowers before – I don’t know why I’m receiving them now. It’s not my birthday, it’s not our anniversary yet.

I slip the soft pink card out of the envelope and read the words written in scrawled handwriting.

“I couldn’t send you the moon, but here are all of the stars.”

I flip it over and find a note from the florist about the flowers. I hear my sharp intake of breath when I read that these are starflowers.

He remembered.

I grab my phone and check the date. It’s been exactly one year since the day I met Jacob – the day I told him about my parents saying ‘to the moon and all of the stars’.

I can’t believe he remembered.

I smile to myself. Jacob might be closed off and hard to read at times, but things like this prove to me that he’s a good man, that he’s the man for me.

I can’t believeit was Ryan. Year after year. But I still don’t understand. Why would Ryan be sending me flowers? I didn’t meet Ryan until I’d been dating Jacob for a few weeks. None of this makes any sense. I have so many questions and, right now, I can’t ask any of them.

“Why’d you do it?” Ryan demands. “We’re brothers, and you screwed me.”

“I saw something I wanted. I saw an opportunity and I reached out and took it. It’s not my fault you were too chicken shit to do anything about it.”

I creep to the edge of the partition wall and peer around it.

They’re standing toe to toe, both of their chests heaving. They’re both so angry. I’ve never seen Ryan look so terrifying.

“She’s mine,” Ryan growls. “Has been since that night in the bar.”

That night in the bar… Ryan was there?

“I don’t give a fuck,” Jacob spits. “She left with me. She always chooses me. You mess with me, Ryan, and I’ll fuck you both. I can take that kid she’s growing, and you know it.”

Ryan’s chin lifts in defiance. I don’t know what it is about him right now, but his stance, his energy tells me that he’s got this.

“I think you’d have a pretty hard time proving that you fathered her baby, when your swimmers don’t even work… don’t you think?”

They’re on the other side of the room, but I can see Jacob’s face pale from here.

The silence stretches between them.

“Yeah… I know about the vasectomy you had done two years ago. You’re a real piece of shit, you know that?”

A vasectomy.

Jacob had a vasectomy. Two years ago. That fucking prick. All that time I spent peeing on sticks… all those moments of disappointment.

“You and I both know that baby is mine, Jake, and it wouldn’t take more than five minutes to prove it. I don’t care how many judges you bribe, you can’t argue with science.”

Game, set, match.

I was right. Ryan has him right where he wants him.

“You know what, I was starting to think you didn’t have any Steele in you, but I see that ruthlessness now.” Jacob almost sounds impressed.

“I’m nothing like you,” Ryan sneers. “This isn’t about money or power. It’s about the woman I love and the child who I want to grow up as far away as possible from men like you.”

“Everything is about power,” Jacob argues.

“I guess that’s where we’re different. Game over, Jake, you lose. You might have taken her from me then, but you’re not taking her from me now.”

It all happens so fast. Jacob lunges for Ryan, but he’s too quick, anticipating his move and shifting his weight so Jacob misses. Ryan swings, connecting with Jacob’s jaw before Jacob retaliates and lands a punch to Ryan’s mid-section.

I don’t know where I find the strength, it must be the adrenaline kicking in, because I stride forward, towards the two of them.

“Stop!” I scream.

Punches keep flying.

“I SAID FUCKING STOP!”

They freeze, and ironically, the identical twins turn their heads towards me in a perfectly synchronized motion.