The Billionaire's Second Chance

Chapter 4

Hannah

I have been staying with Bella in her spare bedroom for the past month until I am able to get a job and get my own place and, let me tell you, I can’t wait. Not that I don’t love Bella, but I needed somewhere for just...me. It seems that every day I have been stressing myself to the point of getting sick. I could barely keep anything down; headaches galore, weak body, dizzy. It must be because I was nervous about this job interview I had with Offbeat Incorporated, a new advertising company for the entertainment industry that was opening up their 5th branch, right here in Crossdale. With my degree in Human Resources and the internship I completed in my junior year of college, I ended up being one of the three finalists for the position. All I had to do now was play the waiting game to see if I got the job. And patience was never a strong virtue I had.

“Are you sure you’re okay? You don’t look so well.” Bella stated as we both went shopping at the mall. I wanted and needed to update my wardrobe in case I were to get this job, and it never hurt to have some new clothes anyway. I always wanted to work in Human Resources and, believe it or not, I thoroughly enjoyed it, although the worst part of the job was firing people, but I felt that with the right company, I would be able to make a difference for my colleagues.

“Yeah, I think I’m okay. I’m sure it’s from the stress with everything going on. Looking for a place to live, supporting myself and going for this job is putting a lot of stress on me. I’m sure once I get everything settled, I will be okay.” I tried to sound confident, but something inside was telling me that something was wrong. Something was very wrong. I tried to push that thought to the back of my mind and tried to concentrate on the clothes I was looking at in front of me.

We continued shopping, going from store to store picking out some of the cutest clothes we could find, but I knew Bella was keeping an eye on me the entire time. I was standing in front of one of the mirrors, checking out a dress I picked and I noticed how pale I actually was. My eyes looked sunken in and my face looked sickly. I started to rock back and forth, not being able to keep my balance. “Bella...” I cried out with a weak voice. Bella snapped her neck, turning to look at me and caught me as I started to collapse on the ground. I heard Bella screaming for help with on lookers rushing to help me and trying to keep me comfortable while they waited for the ambulance.

What seemed like an eternity, the pain in my body increasing with each passing minute, the emergency responders finally arrived and hoisted me onto the stretcher, allowing Bella to ride with us to the hospital. They immediately put an oxygen mask on me and started to monitor my vitals, speaking all this medical speak that I couldn’t understand. All I could comprehend were the questions they were asking Bella. I eyed them from the gurney as they went back and forth.

“Can you tell me what happened?” one of the paramedics asked a flustered Bella.

She wiped the tears away and took in a breath before she was able to calm herself down enough to explain what was going on. “We were shopping and she wasn’t feeling well. She has been sick on and off for the past month, since she has been home. We thought it was stress induced.”

“What makes you think this was stress?” he asked. “Are there any health conditions you know about or any medication she’s allergic to?”

“No, I can’t think of anything off the top of my head. We thought it was stress because she had just broken up with her boyfriend of four years when she found out he was supposed to marry someone else per a contract made by his father, packed her life up and moved back to Texas when they were supposed to be in California, with nothing so much as a bag of clothes and nothing else. So yeah, we thought it was the stress of that, considering she didn’t have anywhere to go, no family and no job.” Bella snapped at the paramedic, “Now, enough with the personal questions and keep it about what could have caused her to go pale and pass the hell out in the middle of the mall.” The paramedics eyes went wide. Bella was a true firecracker.

“Do you know of any diseases she may have had? Did she go out of the country at all in the past 6 months?”

“She was healthy as a horse and no she doesn’t really travel. Not that she told me.” The ambulance pulled up to the hospital and rushed me inside with Bella trailing the paramedics. They started shooting out information for the nurses and the doctor came and got the information and looked at Bella.

“Family only, I’m sorry.” He looked at her with apologizing eyes. I felt a sense of panic start to overcome me. I needed her with me. I couldn’t be there by myself.

“Sir, she doesn’t have any family. It is literally just me. No siblings and her parents passed away two years ago and she has no boyfriend or husband. Please, let me be with her.” Bella begged and pleaded with her eyes. The doctor paused and looked at her, not believing what she was saying. But the look in her eyes said otherwise and, with a nod, Bella was able to go into the room with me to make sure I had some sort of support.

I soon passed out, finding out later I was out for a couple of hours. I was hooked to an IV with saline solution due to extreme dehydration. When I woke up, I looked over to my right and saw Bella watching TV. It looked like reruns of Grey’s Anatomy. “Bella? What happened?” I croaked with a dry throat. Bella handed me a glass of water, which I graciously sipped. “Thank you. What happened? What am I doing here?”

Bella had a sad look in her eyes, almost like she blamed herself for what happened. “Oh Hannah. We were shopping and you almost passed out. We called 911 as soon as we could and we rushed you here. They did some blood tests and some scans to make sure everything was okay.” Bella took my hand into hers and squeezed. She was scared, we both were. This has never happened to me before and I couldn’t wrap her head around what could have caused it. I was normally a healthy person. The last time I was in a hospital was when I was a freshman in college and broke my arm jumping from the top of the bleachers by the football field when I was drunk. Not my most graceful moment.

“Scans for what? I don’t think I hit my head or anything”. My head wasn’t hurting, even though I was a little dizzy. All in all, I just wanted some answers.

“Let’s call the doctor so he can let you know what’s going on.” Her face fell. I knew that Bella knew what was going on but didn’t have the heart to tell me herself. Bella pushed the call button and we waited patiently in silence for the doctor to show up.

“Bella, please, tell me what’s going on.” She shook her head, tears forming in her eyes. A lump formed in my throat and I couldn’t help but think of the worst possible scenarios that I could muster. Maybe it was cancer, a brain tumor. I was dying. All these thoughts kept running through my mind and I started to hyperventilate.

“I can’t...I don’t know how to say the words. But you need to calm down. Please Hannah, trust me on this.” tears formed in her eyes and she reached out and gripped my hand. “I can say this though, you’re not dying, not yet, anyways or from the lack of trying.” This made us both laugh. At least that was a good thing, right?

Soon, the doctor came in to give us updates on all the testing they have been running. “Good evening Hannah. I’m glad to see you’re finally awake.” He said as he started to flip through papers in my chart.

“How long have I been out?”

“About 3-4 hours. You gave us quite a scare though. We did some bloodwork and did a cat scan and a MRI to make sure there was no internal damage.”

“Internal damage? I’m not following.” I was confused.

“Bella stated you collapsed. We wanted to make sure you had no head injuries and what not.” I nodded in agreement, not sure exactly what was going on, but I was going to pretend it all made sense. The doctor took a deep breath. “Okay, so we got the results of your blood tests. The good news is there are no infections or anything in that matter. However, you are pregnant.” my eyes went wide and my breath hitched. Pregnant? How can I be pregnant? I haven’t been with anyone since I left Austin in California and me and Austin have always been careful. I was on the patch and we used condoms most of the time and we never had a problem with not using them before.

“I’m sorry doctor, you must be mistaken. I can’t be pregnant. I’m on the patch and have been for as long as I remember. There is no way that I’m pregnant.”

“The patch isn’t one hundred percent Hannah. Have you been sick recently in the past few months where you were on any antibiotics?” the doctor asked. I was thinking and my eyes went wide. Oh s**t.

“I had strep about 4 months ago,” I said softly.

“When was your last period?” he asked me.

“Thinking about it, I have had my period but it’s been lighter than normal. I thought I missed my last one because of all the stress I was under. It happened to me in the past.” It made sense to me. When I was under massive amounts of stress, I seemed to skip a period, so this was nothing out of the normal for me. It happens all the time.

“So, antibiotics can interfere with the absorption of the hormones in the patch and the light period could be implantation bleeding. Sometimes, with some pregnancies, it seems like you have periods, but that really isn’t the case. Think back, Hannah, when was the last time you remember having a normal period?”

Tears were brimming in my eyes as I tried to blink them away. Bella linked her fingers with mine and cried with me. This was my worst nightmare. Not the fact that I was pregnant, I’ve always wanted a baby, but the fact that I was pregnant and didn’t have Austin. “4 months ago...” I cried out. The doctor nodded and called for an ultrasound machine to be brought up to the room.

“I need to tell Austin. Do you have your phone?” Bella’s eyes went wide. I could tell she wanted to tell me something but she didn’t know how.

“So, I deleted his number because I wanted to help you get over him and so you wouldn’t be tempted to call or text him from my phone in an act of desperation...” she stated. We obviously didn’t think this was going to happen, so I don’t fully blame her for deleting his number, but damn, the one time she listened to me. “I blocked the number too. I’m so sorry Hannah. I didn’t think you would want it and, well, we didn’t expect you to get knocked up with his baby.” I went to reach for her as she started to cry and instinctively, Bella flinched as she knew I could pack a mean punch when I wanted to, especially when she’s upset.

I rubbed her hand in mine to try to calm her down, surprising her. “Okay...then call Eli. You surely still have his number since you hooked up with him when you both came to visit us.” I shrugged. I knew Eli and Bella hit it off a couple of times and they exchanged numbers, so at least this would be an easy fix.

“One, I didn’t hook up with Eli, that’s gross. Two, I blocked and deleted his number too...”

“BELLA! Why would you do that? What if something happened and I needed to get a hold of them or they needed to get a hold of me?” I became furious and rightfully so, well, at least in my mind I thought so. The one time I needed this information she didn’t have. But I wasn’t upset with Bella, I was more upset with myself because if I would have kept my cell phone, I would have been able to reach Austin.

“I’m sorry, please don’t be mad at me! I wasn’t thinking.” Bella started to cry. I instantly started to feel bad, tears had that effect on me. Bella just did what she thought would be good for me, to help me get over Austin and I shouldn’t be mad at that.

“Hey, I’m sorry for getting upset.” Bella wiped her tears away and nodded her head, giving me a silent apology as well.

“So, I have an idea that we could try. We can call your landlord and see if we can get a hold of Austin that way and, if not, we can try to find out that information we never looked up.” We planned in the past to look up the name Austin Nicholson and see what the internet brought up. I knew Austin came from money, so somewhere, his family should be mentioned. But first, I took Bella’s phone and called up the old landlord of our old building, hoping to get some answers.

I needed to get some answers.