Page 48 of The Prince's Castaway Baby

“Haven’t you searched for him online at all lately?”

“What would be the point? He’s not coming back. He’s probably off with some other young, hot girl right now.”

Ella shakes her head firmly. “Lucky for you, you know the world’s best celebrity-gossip follower. I’ve made a point of not following him, out of solidarity, but I know all his handles.”

She pauses for a moment, tongue out as she looks him up.

I’m not sure if it’s the idea of seeing him that makes my stomach lurch, or the sickness that seems to not be going away. Typical of me, really, to get worse-than-average morning sickness. The name is misleading, anyway — I’ve been sick all day every day.

My baby doesn’t care if it’s morning or not.

But the fact is that thinking about Jensen fills me with a cold chill. I have a whole folder on my computer filled with pictures we took together, selfies and dumb stuff, and photos I took of him when he wasn’t looking. He’s beautiful in every single one of the candid shots, and I can’t bear to look at any of them.

Even hearing his name makes me want to burst into tears.

And I haven’t said that to Ella, because I know exactly what she would say. That I feel this torn up inside about everything because I’m still in love with him.

But how can I be in love with a man I only knew for a couple of weeks?

How can I still miss him this much?

“‘Playboy Prince ready for his next act?’ ‘A new era for the Prince of Parties?’” Ella mutters a few more headlines like this out loud, and I slump back in my chair.

“See? I told you. He’s forgotten all about me.”

“Ah, but did you know he’s been doing charity work?”

“Charity work?” My mouth drops open in shock.

Jensen is a caring guy, but I would have assumed him to be way too self-obsessed to think about other people for long enough to do charity work of his own volition.

“Yeah, look,” says Ella, scrolling through some photos he’s posted lately. “He seems to have done a total one-eighty on his public appearance.”

“Really?”

“Yeah! Oh, wait, he’s actually livestreaming right now.”

She pulls the phone back for a second, taps on a button, then points the phone back at me. A blast of static blares out of the speaker like a heavy windstorm has swept through the kitchen. And there, on the screen, wrapped up in a thick winter coat, goggles, and a furry scarf, is Jensen.

“That’s a great question, LemonPlay32,” he shouts as if he’s trying to hear himself over the wind and through his thick hood. “Dr. Schröder told me this morning that there have been a bunch of studies on how the melting ice is impacting us humans, and how it’s literally making us sicker because contaminated stuff can get frozen in the ice.”

A comment pops up from another user, demanding to know how we can stop it,as well as letting Jensen know how brilliant and handsome and wonderful he is.

“Individual action goes a lot further than you think, actually! One of the most useful things you can do is call whichever politician is in charge of your local area and demand thattheydemand that the government puts more focus on the environment and climate issues. The more people that speak up, the more we can get done — together.”

I watch as he keeps answering questions, absolutely enchanted by the man I’m seeing. Can this really be the party prince transformed? Because this Jensen that I’m seeing on the screen ismy Jens.

This is the man I fell in love with. The one who’s well-meaning and caring and trying his best to make things better.

All this time, I had thought he would go straight back to being the guy from the gossip mags again, but he’s doing expeditions to the Arctic all by himself. And he’s not talking nonsense, either! This is real conservation stuff!

This is exactly the kind of work I’m trying to do.

Could this have really been because of me?

“Okay, he’s changed,” I concede. “So what? It’s not like he would want to hear from me now, not after everything that happened. It’s fine, really. I don’t have anyone else, so I’m going to do it myself and I’ll just have to cope.”

Ella stops the video, and my heart aches with the need to hear Jensen’s voice again.

---