Page 20 of Finding Forever

So, they ate in silence, after which she retreated to the bathroom for a shower and a change of clothes. While Cade—who had showered and changed during the two hours he’d been hiding from her— caught up on his business correspondence.

They didn’t speak at all for the rest of the flight and when their plane landed a little after one-thirty am Saturday morning at a private airfield, they were both exhausted and not really in the right frame of mind to talk anyway.

It wasclose to three in the morning when Cade and Fern wearily trudged into his luxurious apartment in Clifton. Fern was so exhausted, she only vaguely registered her airy surroundings, absently noting a lot of white on white on beige. Cade, who’d driven them from the airport himself, gently deposited her one suitcase on the floor just inside the front door, and shrugged his own larger, heavier tote bag from his shoulder, carelessly dropping it with a thump.

“There are two spare bedrooms,” he told her stifling a yawn as he spoke to her for the first time in hours. “Choose whichever one you want.” He jammed his hands into his charcoal gray trouser pockets and stared at her broodingly. “I haven’t slept since this all began; I’m going to bed.”

Before she could respond, he picked up his bag again, and stalked down the softly lit hallway. He turned into what she assumed was a bedroom and shut the door with a quietsnick.

Fern stood just inside the front door where he’d abandoned her, staring after him and knew that this was a small taste of what was to come over the next thirty-six months. She’d known not to expect friendship, but she’d hoped for at least some kind of amicability between them. This wasn’t a very auspicious beginning and she couldn’t help feeling hollow and a little despairing.

“Stop it,” she admonished herself impatiently, wrapping her arms around her quivering body. She couldn’t keep telling herself—and him—that she expected nothing from him, only to turn around and feel sad and sick to her stomach whennothingwas exactly what she got.

She was being ridiculous and childish and stupid and she needed to grow the hell up fast. For the sake of her sanity and for her baby’s well-being.

Chapter

Six

Despite feeling like she was carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders, Fern fell asleep fairly quickly and managed to get a few hours’ rest before the smell of coffee tantalized her into wakefulness.

She opened her eyes to a bright, unfamiliar room, delightfully decorated in fresh whites and greens. She sat up in the queen-sized bed, yawned—God, why’d she still feel utterly knackered?—and stretched, allowing herself a moment to get oriented before pushing the comforter down and sliding out of bed.

She stood quietly for a second, waiting for signs of nausea or dizziness. Her morning sickness could—contrary to the name—strike without warning at any time of day. For her it was usually worse in the afternoons leading into early evenings.

She’d had a hell of a time hiding it, first from the faculty at the catholic school where she worked for a pittance of a salary—Granger’s reasoning being that she did not need money when she already earned food and board—and then from her stepsisters, after she’d been recalled home a week ago to remain on standby in case the Hawthornes finally accepted Granger’s invitation to spend the weekend. Her stepfather had wanted her around to present a “united front” to the Hawthornes.

Fern stifled a gleeful chuckle as she considered how badly that decision had backfired on him. She still couldn’t believe that bizarre stroke of luck. She’d been desperately looking for a way to contact Cade Hawthorne and then Granger had simply offered him up to her on a silver platter.

Happy that her stomach was somewhat stable this morning, she threw back her shoulders and padded to the window to open the shutters and then gasped at the sight that met her eyes. It was gray and misty outside, but she could still see enough to recognize that this apartment was pretty high up on the mountain, with ocean views that would undoubtedly be spectacular once the mist lifted. She hadn’t really spent a lot of time in Clifton, but her stepsisters loved it and would often come here to see and be seen.

She was excited at the prospect of taking a walk down on the beach later. For a second she wondered how she would convince Granger to let her roam around unaccompanied, when she remembered that she no longer had to answer to Granger. That she could simplygo. She felt a curl of excitement in the pit of her stomach and gave a disbelieving little huff of laughter.

She checked the time on her phone—which had been ondo not disturbmode since she’d run off with the Hawthornes—and groaned when she realized that it wasn’t even eight am yet. She’d barely slept five hours. No wonder she still felt exhausted. But she was up and awake, and unlikely to fall back asleep again now even if she tried.

She left her bedroom to walk into the open living and kitchen area. The space was dominated by the wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling sliding glass doors which offered an uninterruptedpanoramic view of the ocean. Well, it would on a clear day, today all she saw was mist and that was okay too. It was atmospheric and beautiful in its own way.

Cade was in the kitchen, standing beside a gleaming state of the art coffee machine. One of those intimidating things with all the bells and whistles that could make anything from your bog-standard black coffee to lattes, cappuccinos, and hot chocolates. He was fully dressed in yet another three-piece suit—this one navy blue with a pale blue tie—freshly shaved and recently showered if his damp, neatly combed hair was any indication.

For someone who must have got even less sleep than her—what with him having showered, dressed, and made the coffee already—he looked disgustingly alert.

He was casually propped up against the kitchen counter, legs crossed, while he sipped from his mug of steaming coffee. He was staring out into the grayness, seemingly lost in thought, but Fern’s presence startled him into meeting her gaze.

She froze beneath that intense regard. Not sure what to say to him. The rings on her left hand felt like a heavy burden this morning, weighing her down.

“Good morning,” she croaked, uncertain of his mood.

He nodded, not speaking, staring at her over the rim of his mug as he took another long sip from his brew. Fern became abruptly aware that she was barefoot and in her sleep T-shirt. It wasn’t very revealing, a simple, mid-thigh, white cotton, men’s T-shirt—a hand-me-down from her former friend’s ex-boyfriend. It was actually one of the more boring tees in the collection.

Fern still felt exposed in the garment though and crossed her arms over her chest and curled her toes self-consciously against the hardwood floor.

“You want some coffee?” he finally broke his silence to ask.

“I’dlovesome, but I haven’t seen a doctor yet. About the baby?” His eyes frosted over and she felt his emotional andmental retreat. She continued doggedly, her voice trailing off at the end as she said, “So I’m not sure I can have any…uhm, y’know, caffeine?”

“How’d you get that scan if you haven’t seen a doctor yet?”

“After a missed period, nausea, mood swings, swollen and tender breasts—” She blushed when his eyes fleetingly dipped toward her breasts, before he dragged them determinedly back up to her face. “And two positive home pregnancy tests. Which—let me tell you—werenoteasy to obtain in a place where my every move was watched like a hawk, I snuck out to a walk-in clinic for confirmation. That’s when I got the scan. They confirmed the pregnancy, handed over some pamphlets about prenatal care as well as options on whom to reach out to if I couldn’t keep or have the baby. They also referred me to several OBGYNs and advised me to have some other tests to rule out, y’know…” She flushed and shifted her shoulders uncomfortably. “To rule out STDs and stuff.”

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