Page 34 of Cinderella's Secret Baby

“I’ve been meaning to check in with Dad,” she continued evenly. “Maybe I can catch him before he’s out on the water again.” He was fishing every day and loving it.

“Hopefully they’re not at the gate when we get there,” he said grimly.

Her phone pinged at that moment and so did Hunter’s. Here in the mountains, they were in and out of service constantly. It wasn’t unusual that both of their phones would buzz for attention simultaneously, but this seemed like more noise than usual.

Amelia glanced at her screen. Her messages were filtered, but she had set up an alert for Jasper’s name. It was only a clickbait headline teasing his disappearance as a family trait. The article claimed Hunter was “hiding” his “runner-up wife” and her “money baby.”

She told herself it was okay that she was getting raked over the coals so long as Jasper’s situation was getting renewed visibility.

“What’s wrong?” Hunter asked.

“Nothing. Just a nasty headline.”

“Those aren’t supposed to come to you.”

“I can’t keep from seeing all of them,” she said, but he was already commanding his phone to “Call Carina.”

“You got my message?” Carina asked as she answered. “I just confirmed it.”

“Confirmed what?” Hunter snapped, glancing sharply at Amelia.

A pause, then in a confused voice, Carina said, “That Eden married Remy.”

“Sylvain?” Hunter asked out of sheer astonishment.

Carina’s swallow was audible. “Yes.”

Hunter was quiet. Too quiet. Amelia couldn’t tell if he was scorned or betrayed or embarrassed or furious or all of the above.

His only reaction was to say flatly when they got home, “The attention here is about to get worse. We’ll go to Vancouver where security is easier to manage.”

Within a few hours, they had landed in a drizzly Vancouver. After crawling across the bridge into West Vancouver, they arrived at a modern two-story home that, frankly, didn’t look as welcoming or posh as the chalet. It was kind of boxy and had stone columns and a brick drive and a fancy front door, but Amelia was thinking that everyone who had ever complained about West Coast weather and traffic and the price of real estate was justified in their disparagement.

Then they walked inside, and she was confronted by one hundred and eighty degrees of windows. With suitable drama, Mother Nature turned off the rain. The clouds parted to allow rays of sunshine to crash onto platinum water. As she walked out to the terrace, a warm breeze that was sweet as pineapple kissed her cheek in greeting.

“Oh. Kay,” she murmured. “I get it.”

She walked back into the living room of white leather sofas. They were arranged to face a fireplace that looked through to the dining area furnished with space-age chairs and a glass table. The kitchen had a pass-through like a restaurant, but it was currently shuttered.

The house was built into the mountainside so there were several terraces at different levels, one overlooking the pool, another that offered a view of the inlet and the city skyline and a land mass in the misty distance.

“Is that Vancouver Island?” She squinted against the sheen on the waves.

“Yes. And always glance down there for orcas.” He pointed.

“Get out of town!”

“True fact.” He had pulled Peyton from her seat and was following her around, watching her reaction, but now said, “I have to make some calls. I’ll show you where my office is so you can find me if you need me.”

The housekeeper had whipped their luggage up the spiral staircase, not that there was much of it. Hunter had assured Amelia she should leave most of her clothes in Banff, claiming Unity had stockedallhis homes with appropriate selections for the climate.What did that even mean?

He carried Peyton as they started down the spiral staircase. It also wound upward so the hollow space took up three floors and had spheres of modern art suspended in the column of empty air.

“Is Remy one of your calls?” she asked.

“If he wanted to talk to me, he would have called by now.” Hunter spoke with so much frost, she sealed her lips.

They stepped off the stairs into a rec room tricked out like a pub with a full bar, a dance floor, a pool table and a dart board. There were comfortable pockets of seating and three televisions hung at convenient angles. Four sets of glass doors appeared to fold back upon themselves, opening the room to the patio and pool area. There was a hot tub out there as well. Hunter showed her a switch that ignited a semicircle of fire surrounding an outdoor eating area.

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