Page 98 of Otto: The Hawthornes

Chapter 15

Esther

Imet Otto’seyes in confusion while Noel sobbed against me. “What’s going on? What are you doing here?”

“I thought you were dead,” she gasped, her arms tightening around my back. “Why aren’t you dead?”

“Why would I be dead?”

“Come on, let’s take this inside,” Otto ordered gruffly, ushering the two of us inside. “Titus, call Dad.”

“But—”

“Now,” Otto snapped, leaving him on the porch while I led a clinging Noel inside.

“I can’t believe you’re okay,” Noel breathed, wiping her eyes with the sleeves of her sweater. All of a sudden her arms dropped down to her sides, and she stared at me wide-eyed. “You’repregnant?”

Right. She hadn’t known. She’d left with Ephraim the morning after I’d told my parents about the baby and I hadn’t seen her again before they’d brought me to the cabin.

“Mom and Dad didn’t tell you?” I asked dubiously.

“They said that you’d gone to stay with some friends from another chapter,” she replied slowly. “To hopefully find a husband.”

Otto scoffed.

“And you believed that?”

“No,” Noel muttered defensively. “But it’s not like I could argue.”

“Yeah, I know.”

The weight of my parents’ influence on their children was suffocating. If it hadn’t been for Becka, I would’ve never had the courage to question the status quo. Noel didn’t have that.

“I thought you must’ve gotten in trouble or something,” Noel said quietly. “But no one talked about it.”

“Well, you weren’t wrong,” I replied dryly. “I told them I was pregnant.”

“How did you get pregnant?”

“Please tell me you know how babies are made,” I blurted, staring at her in disbelief.

“Of course I know that,” she snapped, her cheeks turning pink as she glanced at Otto. “With him?”

“Hi, I’m Otto,” he said as he held out a hand for her to shake. “I’m Esther’s husband.”

“Yourwhat?” she yelled, dropping his hand like it burned her.

“My husband.”

Noel’s expression shifted from disbelief to confusion to horror in the space of a heartbeat. I wasn’t sure if it was the relief of finally seeing my sister again or the shock of having her standing in Otto’s house, but I found myself fighting laughter. If someone would’ve told me a year before that I’d be married to Otto Hawthorne and pregnant with his baby, I was pretty sure I would’ve worn the same expressions.

“They didn’t send you away?” she said slowly, taking a step backward as she glanced around the house. “You took off withhimwithout telling me? You’re disgusting!”

“Hey,” Otto barked. “Watch it.”

“That’s not how it happened—”

“I thought you weredead.” She huffed. “And all this time you were just living down the road with this—thisatheist?”

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