(A special thanks to Lynn for beta reading this! Thank you to all who read, follow, fav, review this!)
*No disclaimer needed as I helped create Outlaw Queen, not Adam or Eddie per the COWARDLY ADAM!*
Pregnant. Regina was pregnant. It wasn't possible, as he had taken every possible precaution, but had she? Robin asked himself the question, and red mist of rage engulfed him as his totally panicked brain scrambled for an acceptable answer. Counting to ten didn't help. He got up to a thousand before he reached the glaringly obvious conclusion and finally trusted himself to turn and speak to her without yelling.
"I'm going to presume you are going to claim this is my child?" he drawled with biting cynicism, while battling to keep a lid on the fury still simmering inside him and retain his legendary cool control. They had moved to the living room, Robin pacing the floor.
He could not believe he had been suckered in by Regina's so called innocence, she was like all the rest, like Zelena had said, if not worse, because she had succeeded where other women had failed with the oldest trick in the book.
"Robin, of course the baby is yours," she answered.
He heard the shock in her voice but ignored it.
"You now you are the only man I have been with in well over a year. I love you and I thought you loved me," Regina said.
"You thought wrong. I don't do love, don't believe in the concept, especially now," Robin said. "And how close are you and this Jefferson guy?"
"Why are you being like this?" she looked at him with hurt in her eyes. "Jefferson is just my friend."
"Why? Because I have no wish to be tricked into become a father," he said mockingly. "Remember in the beginning. I always used protection, you then suggested going on the pill and I was a g fool, because of your assurance was tempted by the idea of condom free sex for the first time in my life. I introduced you to my own private Doctor Martin, and he supplied your birth control pills. You did not even have to remember to collect them as he arranged for them to be delivered to you here. So there could have been no missed prescription, no mistake, no tell me, when did this conception occur?"
Whatever reaction Regina had expected, this sneering, cynical hard eyed stranger standing facing her bore no resemblance to the Robin she'd thought she knew and loved. Her emotions were frozen in shock and she simply stated the facts.
"The weekend in Vancouver. I forgot to take my pills with me," Regina answered.
"I might have guessed," Robin's logical mind, no longer blinded by sex, put two and two together and instantly saw through Regina's devious plan to trap him. Did she also know about his grandfather's will?
"I remember the only time you argued with me instead of being the eager lover was when I returned from spending Easter in Maine. You complained I never took you anywhere with me, and stated the only time you had been out of the country was a weekend in Mexico right after high school. You had not even been to Canada, so I took you there. Now you expect me to believe you mistakenly left your pills behind and never thought to mention the fact in the three days we stayed? How very convenient for you," he said mockingly. "That was the end of April, and now it is the beginning of July, you must be two months pregnant."
"Nine weeks," she amended softly. Maybe it was the shock of Robin behaving like the biggest horse's ass on the planet, she rationalized.
"What took you so long to tell me? You're a highly intelligent woman, Regina and your timing is perfect. But no one takes me for a fool, and if your usually spectacular wanton display in bed last weekend was supposed to soften me up to get me to marry you, you are out of luck."
Regina slapped him across the face before she could think. In the fog of her mind, she was devastated that he thought she could be that devious to deliberately get pregnant for his money.
"I thought you were my boyfriend. I thought you-"
He cut her off.
"Come off it, Regina, don't pretend you are that naive. I got you this apartment, I pay your rent here," Robin reminded her.
"If you think for one minute you can trap me with a child that was never on my agenda...think again," Robin said.
Regina sank down onto the couch, her mind in turmoil. He had said a child was not on his agenda. Typical business speak, she realized, for what he meant. He did not want their child and it was like a knife to her heart. She could not bear to look at him, and took a few deep, steadying breaths. Then finally the import of his disavowal of love as a concept registered in her mind, and in a blinding flash of clarity, she saw she had been deluding herself from the very start of their relationship. She had fallen in love with him, but he had not with her.
Now a lot of little niggling things over the past year made sense. Why he never suggested she go to meet his family and friends, or go anywhere with him on his travels. He had always had some excuse for not being around when her family came around to see her.
Her shoulders slumped and her head fell forward. She raised her hands to run them despairingly through her tangled hair, blinking away the tears that threatened. How could she have been so dumb, so mistaken about Robin, her first great love?
Red had tried to warn her, only she had let love cloud her senses to listen to her friend.
Robin looked at Regina's down bent head and saw the utter devastation she could not hide. The shock and anger that had overtaken him subsided a little. If she was pregnant of course he would take care of her. But first he needed Doctor Martin to confirm the pregnancy and, given he had been away for weeks at a time throughout their affair, he needed to be certain the child was his before he could even consider marrying her, though no child of his was going go be born out of wedlock. Lock being the operative word, he thought cynically...marriage meant the end of his bachelor days.
Unfortunately he could not deal with this now, as he needed to make some phone calls to make. "I need to go, but don't worry, I will speak with Martin tonight. He is an excellent doctor and discreet. He will take care of your pregnancy and I will pay for everything. I can assure you."
She slowly lifted her head and stared at him for a long moment. She wasn't crying and her usually dark eyes were oddly blank. "I'm not worried, and I'm sure he will," she said quietly, and glanced back down at her clasped hands.
"Good," Robin hesitated. He had never seen Regina look so defeated. Maybe he should say something. But he didn't know what to say, as he was still in shock. "I'm going to get a glass of wine and go outside."
Ten minutes later, he'd had time to think. Maybe he had been a bit harsh on Regina. Either by accident of design, it didn't really matter, she was still a pregnant woman. He walked back in and found her sitting in the kitchen, with a cup of tea in one hand.
"I'm going to leave now and be in touch with you tomorrow," Robin said.
Regina put her tea down and looked at Robin. He was dressed in a charcoal grey suit, perfectly tailored to fit his broad shoulders. How had she ever imagined he was her boyfriend? she thought, appalled at her own naivety. On his birthday last three months ago, she had bought him a nineteenth century solid gold deal in the shape of a heart. She had spotted it in an antiques shop, and thought he would see the symbolism in her gift, that she was giving him her heart. How dumb was that?
She could only nod, incapable of speaking to the ruthless, arrogant pig...He had ripped her heart to shreds with his brutally cynical reaction to her pregnancy, coldly accusing her of being the worst sort of gold digger, plotting and planning to get pregnant on purpose to get his money.
When he had casually told her his good friend the doctor would discreetly 'take care' of her pregnancy, as though her unborn child was less than nothing, a blip to be dispensed with in the smooth running of his life, she'd known it was over between them.
Robin didn't want a baby. It was not on his agenda...What kind of cold hearted man was he that he could even equate a baby with a business agenda? But then business was his life and everything else came last, she realized. A termination was what he was offering her, not the love and the support she had stupidly expected. His solution was to pay his doctor friend to make the baby go away.
Regina heard the door shut. Getting to her feet, she walked into the bedroom and fell flat on the bed. With her head buried in the pillow she finally let the tears fall. She cried with pain and grief for a love that never was, and the loss of her innocent illusions, and finally cried herself into a sleep of physical and mental exhaustion.
The next morning, Regina woke up later than usual. The night before came flooding back to her, causing her heart to break all over again. Robin's brutal reaction to her pregnancy appalled her all over again and suddenly his parting words that he would discuss the necessary arrangement with her today replayed in her mind. She panicked. She couldn't stay here, she would take her baby and leave. That was the only thought in her mind as she leapt off the bed, heading for the chest of drawers and stumbling over a rug...
Robin was at the office, signing off some forms when he saw the door open and in walked, Zelena. "What are you doing here?"
"I just wanted to stop by and see if I could get you to come with me for some lunch," Zelena said.
"I'm not interested," Robin declined shortly.
"You look tired, Robin. Let me give you a neck massage, and it will help you relax," Zelena said as she walked to stand behind Robin.
"Cut the crap, Zelena," Robin said as he stood up from his desk as he deflected her hands. "Leave now."
"You really are a devil," Zelena said as she smiled and left the room.
Robin went to his bar and poured himself a drink, when had he become such a cynical devil, he asked himself? The shock of Regina's news, that he was to become a father had worn off, and he was able to think clearly. He had never wanted to marry, but if he was honest with himself, he would like a child, someone to have everything that he had worked so hard for.
Regina...the beautiful Regina, would it be such a hardship being married to her? He was her first love from what she had told him, and the thought of her with another man was not one he like to contemplate. He took another sip of his drink. He thought back to his conversation, more likely his railing off on her like he had. He felt guilt on how he talked to her.
Robin put his glass down and called his driver, his decision made. He would marry her. Surprisingly, he did not feel trapped as he had first thought. He would meet with Martin and find out all he could about a woman's pregnancy, how soon he could get a paternity test as well.
But first, he felt this sudden need to see Regina. He told his driver to stop by Regina's first on his way out. But he took one hell of a knock when he finally got to her apartment, to find that Regina and the baby she was carrying, his baby, was gone!
(A/N-Okay I know that was harsh the way Robin treated Regina, once in the whole discussion he did think he was being too harsh and again at the ending of this chapter. I promise he will have to make up for that later on.)