Part 1My Fiancé's Twin Is My Baby's Father

I came back to two years ago, a baby tucked inside me.

In the dim light of the private booth, the campus charity case was sinking her teeth into Leo Donovan’s belt.

She acted like she didn’t see me, her tongue flicking out playfully. “Big brother,” she cooed, “I’ve left my mark on you now.”

I acted like I didn’t hear her.

I walked straight past them, heading for Leo’s twin brother.

Someone tried to stop me. “Audrey, Leo’s over there.”

Leo’s face darkened. “Audrey, get over here.”

I didn’t break my stride. I stopped in front of Liam Donovan.

The man, all lazy grace and coiled energy, lifted his eyes. There was a spark of something dangerous under the polished, gentlemanly surface, a magnetism that pulled you in.

“Looking for me?” he asked, one eyebrow arching.

I nodded, holding out a folded paper. A sonogram report.

“I’m pregnant,” I said, my voice steady. “It’s yours. Want to raise it with me?”

Liam: “?”

The air in the room evaporated. Every breath was held captive.

Leo slammed his glass on the table, shooting to his feet. “Audrey,” he snarled, “say that again. Whose baby is it?”

* * *

The silence was a vacuum.

Everyone in that room knew Leo and I were a couple.

What none of them knew was that two hours ago, I was done with him.

Liam’s long, pale fingers took the report from me. He studied it for a moment, his expression unreadable, then lifted his gaze to mine. His eyes, long and dangerously beautiful, were a swirl of shadow and light.

A single syllable escaped his throat. “Hm?”

“It’s yours,” I repeated. “Are you going to take responsibility?”

He didn’t answer, just kept looking at me, his stare so intense it felt like it could see right through me.

“Or,” I added, “we could discuss this somewhere else.”

I held his gaze, my own completely serious. He seemed to be trying to decide if this was some elaborate, cruel joke.

Finally, a strained voice broke the silence. “Audrey… you’re kidding, right?”

A chorus of nervous agreement followed.

“Yeah, this isn’t funny at all.”

“We were just playing a game. Daisy just bit his belt, that’s it. We all saw. Leo didn’t do anything, he didn’t even touch her.”

“Audrey, you can’t be doing this just because you’re scared he’ll dump you, right? Trying to scare him into line?”

“We all know how crazy he is about you. You can’t mess with him like this.”

“Daisy, come on, you gotta help him out here. Explain it to her.”

The girl they called “Daisy” was the arts department’s star sob story, a girl named Daisy Miller. She stood beside Leo, her voice a fragile whisper. “But… the look on her face… she doesn’t seem like she’s joking, does she?”

Her words plunged the room back into a frozen stillness.

Leo’s jaw was tight as he strode toward us, snatching the sonogram from Liam’s hand. He scanned it, and a bitter, incredulous laugh escaped him.

“Audrey, is this seriously it?” he said, his voice dripping with disbelief. “Just because I took pity on Daisy, because I’m helping her out, you pull my brother into this insane little drama?”

Drama?

Oh, this was no drama. This was a reckoning.