Page 20 of What the Leos Burned (BLP Signs of Love #6)

It had been almost two months since that call from Zay in Amsterdam.

No texts. No follow-ups. Nothing.

Princess told herself she was over it, that silence was an answer all on its own.

That she’d been stupid to expect anything different from a boy chasing the world with no map for how to love someone while doing it.

But the ache in her chest lingered. Even when she laughed with her new friends on campus.

Even when she buried herself in poetry assignments and avoided playlists that reminded her of him.

She’d just finished reading the syllabus for her upcoming Intro to Creative Writing class. Her lap was warm from the sun and the weight of the thick paperback she could barely see over her belly. It now curved like a quiet truth beneath her hoodie, now undeniable.

Her cell phone buzzed. She stared at the screen and gasped.

It was Zay calling. After all this time since their last argument, he now called.

Her heart stopped, then kicked back in like it was trying to escape.

She hesitated, and in those few seconds, she debated on answering. She knew she could get on with life without him. She didn’t need him. They didn’t need him. But she remembered her father’s voice.

“He has a right to know,” her father had told her. “It’s your life. You’re grown, and it’s your family now. You have control. I won’t make you do anything. But he has a right to know, Princess.” With that thought, she quickly answered.

“Hello?”

There was a pause on the other end before she heard his voice.

“Damn, . . . you actually answered.”

His tone was lighter than she expected. Nervous, but playful, like he was trying to test the water before wading in.

Princess leaned back on the college’s study hall couch, shifting slightly. “I did.”

Another moment passed.

“I thought you’d cuss me out,” Zay admitted. “Or just hang up on me. Or both.”

“I thought about it,” she said quietly. “But no.”

There was another moment of silence.

“We left Amsterdam a little over a month ago,” he said, finally. “Been to Luxembourg. Now we in Camden. You’d love it out here. Got that real underground vibe you like, posters on the walls, cyphers on the corners.”

Her lips twitched, but she didn’t smile.

“I’m glad the tour’s going good,” she said, voice soft but distant. “I mean it.”

Zay sighed on the other end, and something in that breath felt heavy.

“I need to tell you something,” she started gently.

“Wait—” He cut her off, voice tighter now. “Let me go first. It’s major. Like, for real.”

Princess sat up straighter, throat suddenly tight.

“Okay.”

He exhaled again. “I want to tell you the truth about that night. After the show in Germany. I was drunk, hyped . . . It was wild. Deuce invited some people back to the hotel. I barely remember the end of the night, but I woke up, and there was this girl. I didn’t know her name, barely remembered how she got there . . .”

Her chest clenched.

Zay’s voice dropped. “She hit me up a few days ago. Said she pregnant.”

Everything in Love’s surroundings stopped.

“I’m sorry,” he said quickly. “I didn’t mean for it to happen. I wasn’t thinkin’. I was outta my head. I thought—hell, I don’t know what I thought. I just . . . I wanted to tell you before you heard it from anybody else.”

The blood drained from her face.

“I loved you,” she whispered. “I waited for you. I believed in you when nobody else did. I gave you everything. Everything, Zay.”

“I know, I know?—”

“No, you don’t!” she yelled, finally unraveling. “You don’t know what it’s like to stay up all night praying somebody you love is safe, only for them to treat you like a damn placeholder! I stayed loyal to you when you were nobody! When nobody clapped at your shows but me!”

“I never meant for this to happen. I never meant to hurt you?—”

“But you did!” She cried. “And now some girl I don’t even know gets to have your child? You think sorry fixes that?”

He was quiet. That silence hurt worse than anything else.

“Say something,” she choked out. “Say something real.”

“I’m sorry, Prin,” he murmured. “That’s all I got.”

Her heart cracked like thin glass.

“Don’t call me that again,” she said, voice shaking. “Don’t call me anything.”

She wiped her eyes, and her hands trembled.

“Don’t ever contact me again, Zay. I mean it. I hate you. You ruined everything. You ruined me.”

She quickly clicked the end button and hung up.

Princess sat there for a while, letting the sobs take her. Students and faculty walked by her, watching, but no one intervened. She didn’t scream or throw things. She just cried. Hard and slow. Until the tears made her nauseous.

She stood up, dizzy, and ran into the student bathroom. The moment her shoes reached the toilet, she dropped to her knees and vomited.

Afterward, she sat on the cool floor with the door wide open, hoodie lifted halfway up as she stared at her reflection in the baseboard mirror. Her belly curved gently above the waistband of her leggings.

She wiped her face and whispered, “You deserve better.”

She remained seated on the floor and pulled her Creative Writing book from her backpack and rested it on her lap, where it barely balanced.

She stared at the cover through glassy eyes.

Maybe I can’t change the past , she thought.

But she could write the hell out of what came next. She had to. Now that she was writing for two.