Cutest Couple Read Online Free Page B

family?”
    “Your family moved back to Virginia,” she protested. “Right after graduation. How was I supposed to be able to find them?”
    “That’s a bullshit excuse and you know it.”
    She looked away.
    “So that was it? One fucking letter and you’d done your duty?” He threw up his hands. Seriously, she thought that had been enough? And now she was telling him here, in front of everyone? This was horrible enough without adding a full audience of former classmates to the mix.
    Even though most of them probably knew about the situation already.
    Oh my God, everyone thought he was a deadbeat dad, didn’t they?
    He looked around the pub. The people surrounding them had long since given up pretending they weren’t paying attention and were all looking at the two of them, listening avidly.
    Fuck them all. Let them listen.
    “And when you didn’t hear back from me, you thought—what? I didn’t care?”
    She glanced away.
    “Great. So not only did I get you pregnant, I’m now an asshole deadbeat dad. Great to know you thought so highly of me.” He couldn’t take another minute of this conversation. “I have to go.”
    “Where are you going?” She looked both guilty and panicked.
    “I don’t know. Somewhere. I need to go think, figure this whole thing out.”
    “Marc, wait—” She reached out her hand, then let it drop back down.
    “No. You can wait for a while. You’ve had ten years to adjust to parenthood. I’ve had ten fucking minutes.”
    “Okay, I understand. Just...let me talk to Ben first. Before—”
    Ben. His son’s name was Ben. He hadn’t even had input into that decision.
    That’s why Rafael asked...
    He was going to be sick. Or punch the wall. One of the two.
    “Are you telling me you haven’t had ten years to prepare Ben for this possibility?”
    She swallowed hard, enough so he could see her throat working. “I just...don’t want him to get hurt.”
    “And there’s that wonderful opinion of me again.” He shook his head, disgusted. “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t want to cause our son any distress.”
    He’d reached the absolute end of his rope. With one last glare, he turned around and stalked out of the pub.
    * * *
    Oh, shit.
    Bree stood, frozen, watching Marc leave. He opened the door, strode through, let it slam shut behind him.
    He never looked back.
    Everyone else, however, was looking all they wanted. She glanced around to see her classmates staring at her, a few starting to whisper to each other.
    She and Marc had put on quite a show.
    Tess. Where was Tess? She turned in all directions, her ponytail whipping from one side to the other, but Tess was nowhere to be found.
    Probably back in the kitchen or taking care of some emergency or other.
    Great. The one true ally she had here tonight had missed the whole damn thing.
    Everyone else, on the other hand, had had a front-row seat for the drama that had just played out. They’d seen everything, heard everything. And in just five minutes, they’d gone from Deadbeat Marc to Bitter Lying Bree.
    They were all staring at her. Looking at her, judging her. God, it was just like being eighteen, unmarried and pregnant again.
    She fumbled for her purse, hands shaking. She dug for her keys, her fingers trembling so much she could barely grab the key chain.
    Teeth clenched in a poor approximation of a smile, she pushed her way through the crowd and headed for the door. Any attempt to talk to her was brushed off with a shake of the head and a brisk walk to the exit.
    Outside, she rushed to her car, unlocked the door and flung herself inside. Wrapping her fingers around the steering wheel so tightly her knuckles turned white, she tried to figure out what the hell she was going to do next.
    The door to the pub opened up again, noise and light spilling out onto the walkway, and it spurred Bree into action. It only took three tries, but she got the car started, put it into gear and got the hell out of there.
    * * *
    A son.
    He had a