Page 20 of The Princess & the Prospect

Chapter 9

The knock on my door pulled me out of the thoughts that had been running rampant in my head. I came home from work during lunch again to find Anna gone. It had been a month since we were married and we barely saw each other. Granted, most of that was my fault since I was working doubles in order to bring in as much cash as I could between now and when the baby would be born. The problem was, when Deck asked me how Anna was doing a week ago, I couldn’t give him an honest answer. It had been three days since I’d seen her. When she was home, she locked the bedroom door so I couldn’t get in there with her. I had moved some of my clothes into a suitcase in the living room as a result, because she would often be asleep when I needed to get to my closet. There was no way I’d ever be able to repair the damage I’d done to us, or even hope to slap a bandage on it, if we never crossed paths.

When I opened the door, it was to find an excited Ever standing there bouncing on the balls of her feet. “Well?” She asked.

“Well, what?” I returned.

Her smile slipped into a scowl almost seamlessly. “Well, are you going to let me in?” I stepped out of the way so that she could come inside. I didn’t miss the way her face wrinkled when she noticed my blankets were still on the couch and I had a suitcase in the middle of the floor. “It’s been a month.” The words came out so quietly, I had no doubt she hadn’t meant to voice them out loud. She turned back to me with a questioning gaze, but I didn’t possess the answers she was searching for so I simply shrugged it off and moved toward the kitchen. My stomach growled even though I didn’t have an appetite. It was a reminder that I needed to eat though, even when I didn’t feel up to it. I’d lost a few pounds in the past month, and I wasn’t happy with the results. Normally, I would have hit the gym to bulk back up, but I’d need to add food to my diet before burning extra calories I didn’t have to lose first.

“Where is Anna?” Ever finally asked as she glanced around the space, taking everything in.

“Your guess is as good as mine. I’ve been coming home at lunch time every day this week trying to catch her, but she’s never here.”

“What do you mean she’s never here? And what do you mean by trying to catch her?”

“I haven’t actually laid eyes on your sister in about six days, and before that, it was only because she happened to come out of the bedroom before I left for work since I was running late that day.”

“I don’t understand. She said everything was going fine.”

“I guess if her idea of fine is never seeing me, then she wasn’t exactly lying,” I informed Ever.

“Why the hell didn’t you go to the doctor’s appointment with her?” Ever’s accusatory tone was starting to piss me off.

“What fucking doctor’s appointment?” I threw the anger-laced words back at her and she blanched. Once again, I had no clue what she was talking about.

“That’s why I’m here. I couldn’t go earlier because I had an appointment with an asshole who refused to reschedule, but I couldn’t turn the work down either. It’s probably going to be an award winning piece.” I just glared in her general direction, because I could give a fuck less about her work when I was trying to figure out why I hadn’t been invited to a doctor’s appointment for my own baby.

“Ever, get back on track. What doctor’s appointment?”

“She really didn’t tell you about it? She was going to be able to find out the sex of the baby today and everything,” she chirped happily until she remembered I knew nothing about that.

“No, she didn’t tell me about it.” I felt my temper rising as each word was spit out past my clenched teeth.

“What is going on that you live with my sister, but don’t seem to know anything going on with her?”

I laughed at Ever then. There was no humor in the sound, and yet there wasn’t a more appropriate response, because this had to be fucking joke. “Are you seriously asking me that? Don’t you think that’s a better question for your sister instead of me?”

“She’s not here to ask,” Ever pointed out.

“I don’t know what her deal is. I just told you, every time I try to be here to catch her while she’s here, and not locked up in that room, the truck is missing from the driveway. I’ve been working a lot of overtime trying to save up because babies are expensive and insurance doesn’t cover anything. Though, I don’t know exactly what I need to cover either, because I didn’t even know she had a doctor appointment.” My nostrils flared with the words that grew louder and angrier as I spat each one out.

“This isn’t okay,” Ever stated quietly.

“No shit!” I hissed at her. “None of this is fucking okay. I tried to talk to her when she first moved in. I thought we were going to be okay. Granted, I figured it would take a while to get to a good place, but still… It’s been a goddamn month and I’m still waiting to talk to her again. That’s my baby she’s carrying. I should at least know about appointments even if she doesn’t want me there. From what you’re saying, she probably knows about the sex of the baby and she’s out there with that knowledge while I’m here not even knowing that it was a possibility.”

“I’m sorry, Joker. You’re right. That isn’t okay. Let me see if I can get a hold of her.” Before Ever could get the number dialed on her cell phone, the front door opened and a beaming Anna walked in the living room of my house. She wasn’t alone as I expected though. A blonde little pixie walked in right behind her. Both of them were laughing before they looked up, obviously startled to see us here. It was then I realized Ever must have parked on the street instead of the driveway. She must have been afraid to block me in. Granted, I would have thought the two women who seemed stunned to see people in the house should have noticed my bike parked in the carport.

“Gretchen?” Ever asked, obviously the first to be pulled from the surprised stupor everyone else had fallen into.

“Hey, Ever,” the pixie responded shyly, ignoring me completely.

“What are you doing with Anna?”

“Am I not supposed to talk to her?” Gretchen countered defensively.

“I just didn’t realize you were friendly.” I didn’t miss the wounded tone in Ever’s words.

“Well, she works at my sister’s studio so we’ve become friends.”

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