“Angelica, just leave it alone. He doesn’t want you.” I crossed my arms and waited for her attack.

Her face took on a murderous hue as she slapped me across the face. Great. I was probably going to have two bruises, one from Alec one from her. Have I mentioned how much I hate reality shows?

“How pathetic.” She sneered. “Little brother stepping in to protect big brother. I’d cry if I weren’t so pissed. But wait—” She laughed and peered over my shoulder to look at Jaymeson. “I guess you didn’t know, did you? He’s your step-brother.”

The room fell silent.

I was getting kind of tired of the whole silence thing.

“What?” Jaymeson said from behind me.

I wasn’t really sure if I should say something or just punch myself in the face so I could black out.

“Jaymeson, you really should pay more attention.” The woman was an evil bitch, but before I could open my mouth to say anything, she pulled out her cell phone. “Want to know what’s so great?” She scrolled through her pictures and held up an incriminating one of Alec and April. Shit. “The power of social media.”

Her finger slid across the screen of the phone. “Sent. Now everyone knows what a dirty whore your mother is. Like mother like stepson. Am I right, Jaymeson? After all, she was the only example you had for ten years.”

I moved out of the way so Jaymeson could attack her face, but he was immobile. His eyes were filled with hatred.

Angelica laughed and walked out of the room leaving me with Jaymeson.

“I just found out—”

“Shut up,” Jaymeson snapped. “I don’t want to hear it. You’ve destroyed everything! You and your brother!” He kicked a chair. “You guys are poison! What the hell is wrong with you?”

Oh, so many things.

“Jaymeson, you don’t know the full story—”

“—Would it really matter? I mean, in the end?” Jaymeson swore violently. “A picture of my step-mom in the same hotel room with Alec just went into the Twitterverse! There were drugs in that picture, Demetri! What? You her supplier? Her own flesh and blood.”

And too far. A person can only take so much yelling until they snap and try to kill someone.

I punched him on the other side of the face, the one part of his skin that wasn’t already bruised by my fist. I didn’t stop until someone pulled me off of him.

Alec.

He jerked me away from Jaymeson. “You don’t want to kill him, Demetri.”

“What the hell?” Jaymeson roared. “You guys are freaking insane!” He stumbled to the door and flipped us off as the screen slammed behind him.

My breathing was so heavy I knew I was going to explode. I was shaking and Alec still wasn’t letting me go.

“Brothers,” Alec said, voice hoarse. “It doesn’t matter if it’s flesh and blood or not, we’re brothers.”

“We stick together,” I agreed, as he released me.

It didn’t matter that the cameras caught everything or that our secret was out. All that mattered was that I knew without a shadow of a doubt that I had one person I could count on. The one person who had protected me my entire life — had literally given up his so I could learn from my mistakes. And he’d been paying for his own for too long.

“Alec.”

“What?” He walked to the freezer and pulled out an ice pack.

“There’s something else.”

“Dude, I don’t know if I can take it.”

I cleared my throat and looked at the camera crew. “Give us a minute, guys. Pretty sure you just got primetime TV right now. You can afford five minutes.”

Ruben nodded slowly and led the crew out the front door.

“What?” Alec placed the ice pack on his face and scowled.

“Nat’s—”

“—I’m pregnant,” came Nat’s watery voice from the hallway.

The ice pack hit the floor first.

And then Alec.

Chapter Thirty-one

Alec

“What the hell?” I blinked once, twice, and saw Nat, Alyssa, and Demetri standing over me. Demetri was busy spraying me with something that smelled like rotten cabbage. “What is that?”

“Hairspray.” He shrugged. “It’s Angelica’s. It makes Jaymeson sneeze, so we thought it would either wake you up or cause a seizure.”

“I voted for seizure.” This from Alyssa. Damn protective women sticking together through thick and thin.

“I bet you did,” I grumbled as Demetri helped me to my feet and over to the couch. “Did I pass out?”

“Yup.” Demetri grinned. “You hit the floor hard. It was freaking hilarious.”

I glared.

“Or, uh…” He cleared his throat. “It would have been had you not hit your head so hard. P.S. Make sure to stay awake for at least six hours, and try not to crap your pants.” He gave me a thumbs up and put his arm around Alyssa. “Right, so we’re going to go… you guys… have fun and…” his voice trailed off as he dragged Alyssa out of the house, leaving me alone with Nat.

I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Nat was pregnant? Forget being excited. It scared the hell out of me! I couldn’t even take care of Nat, let alone a tiny human being. I felt like throwing up. “How far along are you?” My voice sounded foreign to my own ears.

“After admitting to using sex to numb your own guilt, after keeping Demetri’s adoption from him, after leaving me sobbing on the ground last night — that’s the first thing you ask?” Nat’s voice rose in pitch the longer she talked, and the more she said, the more I wanted someone to smack me.

Her glare was murderous, so I decided that instead of answering right away, I should probably think before I said anything else.

Nat sighed and joined me on the floor. My body and mind waged war against one another. Part of me needed her closer, yet my conscience wouldn’t allow it. Guilt forced me to push away the need I had for her — maybe love wasn’t strong enough to combat what was wrong with me.

I finally decided on saying the one thing I knew people always said when they did something stupid. I hated even saying it, because by saying it I was being like every other person out there that said it over and over again but kept repeating the same shitty behavior. “I’m sorry.”

“Are you?” She huffed. “Do you even know what you’re sorry about?”

“Everything.” I swallowed. “Every damn thing.”

“The baby? Are you sorry about that?”

“No! Hell, no.” I reached for her hand and held it, even though I wanted to tug her into my arms. “Nat, listen to me. I’m scared as hell, but I would never take back what we’ve shared.”

Her face fell. “Shared?”

I released her hand. “Nat, you have to know—”

“—No.” She jumped to her feet and turned to glare at me. “No, you don’t get to play that part. Get your head out of your ass, Alec Daniels, or so help me God I’m going to punch you again.”

“What—”

“—No.” Nat licked her lips and pointed her finger in my face. “You’re the only person who doesn’t see it, Alec. And I’m sick and tired of your martyr attitude. You think everyone would be better off without you, am I right? Oh poor me, I make so many mistakes, I need to go sulk in private and fix my shit before I can even hope to deserve happiness, blah, blah, blah.”

Holy shit. What the hell kind of crazy person was possessing her? I jumped to my feet to argue with her. She had it all wrong. I was protecting her! “Nat.” I laughed bitterly. “You don’t understand.”

The crack of her hand hitting my cheek was so loud I could have sworn the earth shifted beneath my feet. “Snap. The. Hell. Out. Of. It.” Tears welled in her eyes. “For me, for our baby. Alec, you can’t control this. You can’t fix this. You can’t wish it away, and you sure as hell can’t abandon everyone who loves you! Together. We do this together, or so help me God, I will hunt you down and murder you myself.”

Her chest rose and fell with exertion as tears poured down her face. I pulled her trembling body into my arms and closed my eyes.

“Shit,” Jaymeson said, forcing me to open my eyes and glare at him to leave or reap the consequences. “She just made me want to apologize, and I didn’t even do anything.”

“Jaymeson, this isn’t a good time—”

He held up his hand. “Clearly you guys have got issues to deal with, and as much as I want to watch her slap you again and then take my own turn — you need to see this.”

He held out a cell phone.

Nat stepped back and examined it with me.

Jaymeson sighed. “It’s my step-mom’s cell phone. She drank like all night last night, and I went to check on her a few minutes ago. Her phone was ringing off the hook so finally I went to check her messages. She was still sleeping or something, I don’t know. Her bedroom door was closed.”

“And?” My heart dropped into my stomach.

“Dude…” Jaymeson shook his head. “As much as I hate you right now, she freaking played you like a fiddle.”

“Pardon?”

“Just read the messages.” He placed the phone in my hands and leaned against the kitchen counter.

I flipped through the first two not seeing anything alarming until I came to a group of messages from Ruben, the producer to the show.

GREAT PERFORMANCE! THANKS AGAIN. NICE DOING BUSINESS WITH YOU. WILL CUT YOU THE CHECK FRIDAY.

“What the hell?” I scrolled to the next message.

I WANT THIS EMBARASSMENT OVER — DO WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO. —CARTWRIGHT

“Son of a bitch!” I clenched the phone tightly in my hand and counted to ten to keep myself from breaking something.

Jaymeson sighed. “Look, I don’t know what she’s got going on, but—” His cell phone rang. “Hold on.” He rolled his eyes and answered. “Hey, mom. Yeah, I took your phone, but—”

Face pale, Jaymeson swore. “Stay there, just stay there, okay? I’m calling the ambulance. It’s going to be fine, okay?” Jaymeson’s hands were shaking as he ended the call and dialed 911. “My mom just overdosed. Her name’s April Cartwright. She’s at 1211 N. Prom Avenue. Yeah, I don’t know. She didn’t say what the pills were. She just said she thinks she took too many and she feels funny.” Jaymeson swore. “Make it faster!”

He hung up and slammed his phone against the counter. “Damn it!”

Demetri and Alyssa barged into the house. I could tell Demetri was five seconds away from fighting on my behalf, but that was before Jaymeson literally started banging his fist against the countertop.

I moved to stop him but Demetri had his arms around Jaymeson before I had a chance to.

“This is all your fault! All of it!” Jaymeson jerked against Demetri, but he pinned his arms down.

“Your mom needs you right now,” I said, calmly walking toward him. “You need to get your shit together and fast.” I looked up to see Demetri’s confused gaze. “April is being taken to the hospital. She may have overdosed on some pills.”