Twice Kissed - Lisa Jackson [85]
“Just listen to me, Maggie.”
“No, leave me alone—”
“You heard her, Walker! That’s it; Bernice, call the police!”
“No,” Mary Theresa whispered. “Mom, don’t.”
Their mother’s face slackened in painful realization. “Would someone please tell me what’s going on here?”
“Mary Theresa and I are getting married,” Thane said.
“What?” Bernice demanded, her voice low and aching.
“You’ll have to kill me first!” Frank advanced, only to be stopped dead in his tracks by a look from Thane that would halt an advancing army.
Married? Maggie shook her head. Had she heard wrong? Married? All her own silly fantasies of loving Thane, of sleeping with him, of marrying him and bearing his children shattered as surely as fragile china on stone. Her throat was hot, tears filled her eyes, and with more strength than she thought was in her body, she yanked and pulled, trying to wrest free from his grip. “I—I don’t want to hear this. I don’t believe it.”
“Believe it.”
“I—I can’t.”
The fingers on her arm grasped harder, inflicting the same amount of pain reflected in Thane’s eyes.
“Leave me alone.”
“You heard her,” Frank said, but some of the starch had left his spine, his shoulders slumped as if he realized for the first time the weight of what was happening.
“There’s a baby, Maggie,” Thane admitted. “My baby.”
A squeal of pure, animal agony ripped through the house, and only when Maggie’s legs gave way did she realize that the horrible cry came from her own throat. Thane caught her and held her close as tears rained from her eyes.
“I’m sorry, Maggie,” he said in full view of her twin and parents. His lips whispered against her wet hair. “Jesus Christ, I’m so sorry.”
“Let go of me.” She started to struggle, sick with herself for the feelings of love that still lingered in her heart and tortured her soul. She should hate him. Detest him. Spit in his face.
“Just listen.”
“Go to hell.” She broke free, and, feeling like a fool in her bathing suit, her chest rising and falling in fury, her towel dangling from her neck to the floor, she managed to lift her chin and glare at him. “Don’t ever…ever touch me again. Ever!”
Stumbling, feet leaden and unsteady, she scrambled out of the room, and when her gaze swung to Mary Theresa’s, she thought she saw a glimmer of satisfaction beneath the shining veneer of her sister’s regretful tears.
Stomach threatening to upchuck, she managed to grab hold of some rags of her dignity and, with her back ramrod stiff, hustled down the hallway to her room, shut the door slowly, and headed for the bathroom, where she locked both doors and somehow managed to splash cold water over her face before the abdominal pains hit.
Gale-force cramps struck. Maggie doubled over, becoming so sick she threw up and shook, heaving, crying, feeling that she was about to die, and not really giving a damn either way.
Thane and Mary Theresa? Oh, God. Let me die right now and end this, she silently prayed. A baby? Mary Theresa is going to have Thane’s child?
She heard the sound of shouts from the living room, then running footsteps as, presumably, Mary Theresa raced to the sanctuary of her room. Within seconds someone was pounding on the bathroom door. Bam! Bam! Bam!
“Let me in, Maggie,” Mary Theresa begged. “Oh, God, I made a mistake. A horrible, horrible mistake.” Her fist thudded against the door. “Let me in. Please.”
Maggie ignored her. Whatever happened to her sister wasn’t any of her concern. Soon she’d leave Rio Verde for good, and she vowed never to return.
“If I could do it all over again, I swear, this would never have happened!” Again the pounding, resounding through Maggie’s brain, echoing in her heart. “Maggie, please, let me in!”
Never, Maggie thought, flushing the toilet as her stomach, emptied of dinner, heaved again. This time nothing but bile spewed from her throat.
“Go away!” she cried.
Thane and her sister. Oh, Jesus.
I’m sorry. I don’t even love him, Mary Theresa cried, and for the first time Maggie heard the difference