Page 64 of His Secretly Pregnant Cinderella

With trembling fingers, she called her mother. The phone rang three times, and she was not sure if she was hoping her mother would answer or... Or not.

But she did.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Mom,” Morgan said.

“Morgan?” Her mother was questioning it, not because she had other children, but because Morgan hadn’t spoken to her in a couple of years.

“Yeah. I just... I needed to tell you some things.”

“Oh?”

It didn’t surprise her that her mother hadn’t seen the news. Why would she? She didn’t follow the lifestyles of the rich and famous. It only upset her.

“I got married.”

“Well,” her mom said. “Good for you. Though, I would’ve thought you’d invite me to the wedding.”

“It all happened really quickly. I’m... I’m pregnant.”

“Oh,” her mom said, and there was a wealth of hurt in that one sound. Maybe because the father of Morgan’s children had married her.

“Twins,” Morgan said.

“Twins don’t run in the family,” she said.

“They run in his,” she said. “I’m due in four months. But they’ll probably be early. I guess twins are like that.”

“So it didn’t happen all that quickly, then?” her mom said.

“Well. I guess not.”

“Did you just want to share the news?”

“I wanted... I wanted to ask you something, but I don’t know how to ask. I’m worried I...”

“What?”

“Did you love me ever? Or did I only ever just make your life hard? And was it the money? Was it that he didn’t support you? What was it?”

“Of course I love you,” her mom said. “I wouldn’t have worked so hard to take care of you if I didn’t.”

Guilt overcame Morgan then, because she had always been so bitter about how hard her mother had made it seem, and that had made Morgan feel like a burden. But... She supposed that was true. Her mom hadn’t had to take care of her. She had made a choice, and that choice had been to raise her.

And she made mistakes that had left Morgan feeling raw and wounded. And she was looking for something... Something magical in her own self that would make her know she wouldn’t do the same thing to her own children. But right now she just felt... Well, she felt guilty. That she had judged her mother so harshly. That she had been so certain in her own superiority, and all of that was breaking down slowly as she faced the reality of her own situation, of her own limitations. But even more now that she was on the phone with her mother asking her directly if she loved her.

“It’s just that you never seemed very happy to have me,” Morgan said.

The words tripped clumsily off her tongue.

“I don’t know that I’ve ever been very happy,” her mom responded.

The words lanced Morgan. “Why?”

Her mother drew a tight breath in. “I’ve never thought about it. Not really.”

“What do you live for?”

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