Nicholas led me from the dark and returned me to a place of safety and warmth.
“Do you know when I first fell in love with you?”
Nicholas snuck behind me on the balcony.
“When?” I whispered.
He cradled me. He leaned, pinning me against the stone railing. I welcomed his arms, even if they weighed as heavily as the collar at my neck.
“Our parents’ wedding.”
“You’re such a liar.”
“And again when you rejected the offer to sell your company.”
“Right.”
“And each and every day since then.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“You should.” His words caressed me, capturing me in promise and captivity. “Every day I find a new reason to love you, Sarah Atwood.”
The injection site from the fertility drug ached. “Every day you give me reason to hate you.”
Nicholas held me tighter.
“Do you hate me now?”
I wished I hesitated. Wished I had any other answer. Wished us away from the estate, to a place where we could be free and happy and safe.
“I love you more than ever.”
I rested, panting, nuzzling against him in breathless amazement. His hands caressed me, rubbing my goose bumps and creating more. His touch grazed my tummy. I held him there, imbedded within me, sharing a moment of hope.
I knew the little life in me belonged to us.
I closed my eyes. “Just for tonight.”
“Tonight.” His voice deepened. “Tomorrow. The next day.”
“Just…tonight.” I could think of nothing beyond a heartbeat yet. “Just now, and we can lose ourselves.”
“I’m not lost, Sarah. Not with you.”
And neither was I.
But I couldn’t say it. I couldn’t risk it.
“Just for tonight.” I pressed my lips against his before I whispered any confessions that would tangle us deeper together.
But the words felt wrong.
The implication terrible and aching.
I didn’t want tonight.
I wanted it to be us.
Just for…forever.
Nothing good came from calls before sunrise.
My phone buzzed against the nightstand, but I tangled within Nicholas’s arms. The sheets caught my legs. I rolled with a groan.
Naked.
Of course I was naked. Naked, sticky, and completely and thoroughly humming with a newfound strength. Rejuvenated.
Loved.
Confused.
One touch was impossible with Nicholas. One night a dangerous proposition. If I wasn’t careful, it’d become all mornings with him.
And maybe that’s what I wanted. What I needed. For both of us.
All three of us.
Bumper didn’t make mornings fun, but the call made me equally queasy. I bumbled for the phone. Hamlet rolled back over. Nick kissed my shoulder.
I wasn’t ready to confront him yet.
I answered, but Mom rambled before I greeted her.
“—I can’t tell, this bottle is empty—”
“Mom?”
“If your father were here, this never would have happened.”
It was too early to talk about Dad. Did she have any clue what time it was? Did I? I squinted at the windows, but Nicholas slept with blackout curtains in the peaceful dark.
He’d like sleeping on the farm.
Not the thought to have. Not now. Not yet. Not ever.
The bedside clock read 5:30 AM. I had no idea when we finally fell asleep.
“Mom, what’s wrong?”
Her voice shrilled in confusion. “I just can’t see what I took.”
“Took where?”
“These pills shouldn’t need to be refilled yet.”
My stomach flipped. I clutched the phone. “What pills?”
“I must have taken too many.”
And my stomach flopped. I slid from the bed and searched for anything to cover me. Of course my clothes from last night weren’t in the bedroom.
How did we even get into the bedroom?
“Mom, which medication did you take?” I asked. “Was it for blood pressure?”
“I don’t think so…”
“The anxiety meds?”
“No, of course not.” Her tone shifted, sharpened. “I’m not an idiot, Sarah.”
“Do you need to go to the hospital?”
Nicholas slipped from the bed and pulled on a pair of slacks. I rummaged through my bag to find a dress and forced it over my head. It caught over my breasts.
And then again on my waist.
Uh-oh.
I smoothed it as I raced to find a scrunchie. “Mom, are you okay?”
“I can’t remember when I took these pills.”
That was the most terrifying and frustrating answer she might have given, and it killed me that I didn’t know either. I didn’t just hide from the Bennetts for two months. I avoided my own mother, calling her from pre-paid cellphones to say I loved her.
She didn’t realize I was gone.
She hardly remembered I hadn’t lived at the farm for the past seven months.
I couldn’t risk it. I had to check on her. I rushed to the bathroom to brush my hair and teeth.
“Mom, I’m in San Jose. I’m hours from Cherrywood Valley. Do you need to call an ambulance?”
“What for?”
I dropped the brush and groaned. “Because you took the pills.”
“What pills?”
“Mom.”
“Sarah Meredith Atwood, I don’t know who raised you to take that tone with your mother, but it certainly wasn’t me.”
I lowered the phone for a cleansing breath. She sounded downright mean.
It wasn’t supposed to be this way. Mom wasn’t sick before Dad died. At least, not that I noticed. She suffered through his chemo with the rest of us, but his death hit her hard. And then, once Josiah and Mike died, she became a completely different person. I hired chefs to cook, a maid to clean. She fired them all. I was the only one she let care for her, the only one to stop the bleeding when she tried to hurt herself.
Except for Darius.
“Call the doctor and go lay down,” I said. “I’ll be there as soon as I can, okay?”
“Fine, fine.”
She’d forget the instant she hung up. I called our physician for her, redialing twice before she picked up in a groggy haze. I explained the situation, and the doctor promised she’d be there within the hour.
Sooner than me. I bound my hair into a pony tail and turned to Nicholas.
He deserved an explanation. A moment of gratitude. A declaration of my love. Anything to explain how much the previous night meant to me, and how difficult it was to even consider what I was supposed to do now.
“There’s a plane waiting at the airport.” He skipped the complicated talk and offered me comfort instead. “We can be on the ground in Cherrywood Valley in an hour and a half.”
“We?”
“You aren’t going alone.”
“I’ll take my guard,” I said.
Robert, the beefy guy with a personality as scarred as the injuries he earned from a tour in Afghanistan, seemed solid enough to deal with my dementia-aggravated mother.
“You don’t have to come.”
“Yes, I do.”
Fine. I didn’t have time to argue. Bumper wasn’t the only thing unsettling me this morning. I slipped on a pair of shoes and burst from the bedroom.
Reed groggily rose from the sofa, tossing his blanket to the floor—over the pile of our clothes, wrinkled and discarded.
“Hey.” His wink was thoroughly inappropriate, and, at any other time, I might have giggled. “What have you two been doing?”
“Nothing.” I answered too quickly. “I gotta go home. My mom might be in trouble.”