Chapter 9

CHAPTER NINE

HER — PRESENT DAY

“So, my love, what are you craving for dinner?” Cal asks, sneaking up behind me and wrapping his arms around my waist to touch my stomach as we finish putting away the groceries. He’s always doing that—holding us both. His hands cradle my bump as he nuzzles into my neck.

“Hmm, I was thinking something easy tonight. We can just snack if you want.”

He turns me around to face him. “Absolutely not. I’m going to cook whatever your heart desires.”

I chuckle. “Oh, is that right?”

He nods, easing me toward him with that sly smile I love so much. “You asked for a vacation, and that’s what you’re going to get.”

“But it’s your vacation, too,” I remind him, pulling his hand to my lips and kissing his fingers. They’re long, lean, and soft as they brush my cheek. “You deserve to rest.”

His hand goes to my stomach again. “I will have plenty of time to rest once you and baby girl have been fed.” After pressing a kiss to my nose, he tugs on my hands, pulling me toward the couch. “Now, why don’t you sit down, get off your feet, and let me handle the rest of the evening?” He lifts my feet, placing them on the coffee table carefully.

“We still have to unpack,” I remind him, though I’m in no hurry to move, if I’m being honest. Now that I’m still, I’m more in tune with the dull throbbing in my lower back and the aching of my feet. Maybe Cal’s right. I have a tendency to overdo things and not listen to my body, though this pregnancy has tried to force me to change that.

“We can unpack later.” He holds my foot, running his thumb over the spot that aches the most, as if he can sense it. “Right now, all I want you to think about is relaxing.”

I close my eyes on command and drop my head back against the couch, thinking of nothing except the way his hands feel. A smile creeps onto my lips, and I hear him sigh as he moves to sit on the coffee table, switching from one foot to the other.

I’ve nearly been lulled to sleep when he slows down, then stops. Carefully, he places my feet back on the table and stands, kissing my forehead and whispering, “Now then, I’ll get you some warm tea and dinner, and we’ll get this vacation started, hmm?”

I hum in agreement, eyes still closed. “We could order pizza.”

“Pizza?” His voice is low and husky, as if I’ve suggested something for the bedroom, not the kitchen.

I nod.

“Pizza it is, then.” He kisses my head again before I hear him moving into the kitchen. He’s opening cabinets and moving things around as he says, “I brought canned sauce, so it might not be as good as I make at home.”

“Cal,” I chide, “just order pizza. You’re on vacation, too.”

He clicks his tongue. “Taking care of you relaxes me.”

I smile to myself. He’s a good man. He’ll be a good husband and a good father. I’m one of the lucky ones here, and everything that has happened today almost made me forget it.

When I open my eyes, the world around the cabin has begun to get dark, making it so I can just make out the shadow of the tree line up ahead. From here, it’s as if nothing else exists in the world. Just us. Our family. I look back over the couch to see Cal pulling the premade dough out of the package. At home, he makes everything from scratch when possible, so I know even this concession is a bit of a vacation for him.

Still, I could relax more if I knew he was relaxed.

I stand slowly, and Cal looks up to protest, but I stop him. “I’m okay. I just want to take in the view.”

One corner of his mouth upturns as he stares at me. “Best one in the world.”

I drop my head, shyness suddenly overtaking me. I’ve never felt like the most beautiful person in any given room, or the most desirable, but Cal changed all of that. He makes me feel seen and wanted and loved in a way no one ever has.

Turning away from him, I cross the room to look out the oversized windows into the dark woods surrounding us. It’s quiet here, the snow blanketing the trees and the ground. On the porch, I spot the hot tub covered in snow. There are footprints across the porch, both human and cat from the looks of it. I hope the cat has made it somewhere warm by now.

I can’t help wondering if we’ll be the type of family who has a pet someday. Though I have no experience with them, I think I’d like a cat. A puppy feels like too much work with a baby, but perhaps…

A sigh rushes out of my lungs. If I’m being honest with myself, I can’t imagine Cal ever agreeing to a pet. He likes cleanliness and order too much.

Then again, maybe this baby will change him. The smile is back, and I feel it radiating from deep inside of me. This little girl is going to have her daddy wrapped around her finger.

This pregnancy wasn’t planned, and in the beginning, it wasn’t necessarily wanted, but now I’m so grateful to Cal. He’s going to be everything a father should be, and our daughter will have the sort of childhood I dreamed about when I was growing up alone in my room while my mother worked all hours of the day and night. When babysitters came and went through what felt like a revolving door. I longed for permanence, for someone who knew my favorite foods, what I liked to play, how I needed to be comforted when I was sad or sick or tired.

My mom tried, but it wasn’t the same. She was just one person, one parent, and most kids I knew had two.

You will have two, I promise my daughter. No matter how this happened, I’ve given you that.

A sudden flicker of movement catches my attention near the edge of the house, ripping me from my thoughts. At first, I wonder if it’s an animal—a deer, most likely—but then I see their faces.

The couple from earlier. The homeowners.

My heart skips a beat, my mind trying desperately to make sense of this. Why would they be standing outside the house? What are they doing out in the snow? To get to where they are, they’d have to walk around the house and through the woods to reach the small area of yard space.

I suck in a shaky breath, and almost as if they’d heard me, their heads slowly turn. Before, they were looking at each other, their heads slightly covered by the hoods of their coats, but now they’re looking directly at me.

For several seconds we just stare at each other, frozen in a moment of fear on my part. I have no idea what they want or what they will do. I blink, trying to find my voice. “Cal.”

He doesn’t hear me, though, humming to himself as he works in the kitchen chopping something. I open my mouth, speaking louder and not breaking eye contact with them. “Cal.”

Behind me, his humming stops. “Did you say something?”

“Come here.”

The man looks at the woman, then back at me. Can they read my lips? Did they understand what I said?

“Babe?” Cal calls, still no closer to me.

“They’re outside. Watching us.” Chills line my skin as the reality sinks in. How long have they been there? Why are they there? What do they want?

Finally, I hear his footsteps moving toward me, and I glance over my shoulder at him.

“What did you say?” he asks, brows drawn down.

“The homeowners. They’re—” When I turn back, the couple has disappeared. My heart sinks. It’s as if they were never there. I peer at the space in the snow where their footprints are located, but it’s covered in tracks from both people and animals and offers no actual proof of anything. “Gone.” I swallow as Cal’s hands come to grip my shoulders.

“What’s the matter?”

“They were standing out here,” I tell him again. “We made eye contact.”

He leans closer to me as if he still might not have heard. “What do you mean? They were just standing out in the yard?”

“Yes. Over there by the edge of the house.” I point toward the spot. “When I walked up, I noticed them. I’m not sure how long they’d been there. When they realized I’d seen them, they walked away.”

“Maybe they were checking something.” He stares out into the yard. “Like, I don’t know, a bird feeder or a spigot cover or something.”

I move past him without a plan, hurrying toward the door.

“Where are you going?”

I slip on my shoes and whip open the door to step outside, but as I do, my foot hits a patch of ice on the porch. I didn’t even realize Cal was behind me until I feel his arms catch me. My weight slams into his chest, knocking the wind from my lungs. “Careful,” he warns, helping me to steady myself. “Are you okay?” He looks me over, but I’m not looking at him. I’m looking for them.

Where did they go?

I don’t dare take another step forward.

“Sadie,” he says, frustrated.

Finally, my attention falls back to him. “Sorry. What?”

“Are you okay?” His hands are on my arms. “You scared me. You could’ve fallen.”

“I’m…I’m okay.” I blink away the fog from my eyes, focusing on him as he pulls me inside with a worried look on his face. “I just, I could’ve sworn…”

He shuts the door behind us, cutting off my fears. “Let’s get you inside before you get hurt. I’ll sprinkle some salt on the porch after dinner, okay? Lucky thing I was there.”

I swallow. “What were they doing, though, Cal?”

He shrugs, hardly looking back at me. “If we see them again, we’ll ask. I’m sure there’s an explanation. You said they were in the yard, not on the porch. If they’d been trying to watch us, they wouldn’t have seen much from out there.”

A shiver runs over me. “They give me the creeps. I can’t explain it. I just feel like they’re not good people.”

His hand smooths over my arm as he eases me back down onto the couch. “Mother’s intuition, maybe? You’re feeling extra protective right now, as you should be. But let me worry about them, okay? I’m sure it was an innocent misunderstanding.”

I glance back over the couch. “And if it wasn’t?”

His lips form a worried line as he looks me over before deciding on an answer. “Then you know I won’t let anything happen to you. Either of you. You’re safe with me.” His eyes flick down to my stomach, and he squeezes my hand.

I smile at him, knowing he’s trying to reassure me, though it’s doing no real good. He walks away long enough to throw the bell peppers on the pizza and pop it into the oven, and when he returns, he pulls my legs onto his lap, massaging my calves. When his eyes meet mine, there’s a sort of weight to his gaze that wasn’t there before. “You know we’re in all of this together, right? You and me.”

I nod, closing my eyes. My heart seems to be slowing to a normal rate, but I still can’t shake the feeling of something crawling across my skin. Or erase the memories of their eyes burning into mine, like they wanted me to see them. Like they wanted me to know they were watching.

Once we’ve eaten dinner, we move to the bedroom to sort through our things. I don’t care if I’m only staying somewhere for a single night, I’m unpacking and moving in. When we first got together, Cal was the opposite. Once, when we went on a vacation for an entire week, he kept everything in his bag, neatly organized. Slowly, I’m convincing him my way is far superior.

With food in my belly, I’m feeling better than before. The worry has almost completely subsided. Cal was right most likely. There was probably a legitimate reason for them to be in the yard, and they were embarrassed thinking I’d worry they were watching us, exactly like I did.

Pregnancy has taken a toll on not only my body, but my emotions. Everything is heightened now. Fear, worry, anxiety. Love. My eyes find Calvin at the thought.

He never judges me for any of it, not my changing body or the many other ways I’ve transformed into someone almost unrecognizable to myself. He just jumped in headfirst and didn’t look back. I never imagined I’d find someone like him. Someone who puts himself firmly in my corner and loves me so easily.

When he catches me staring at him, a smile on my lips as he folds his shirt into the drawer, his face goes blank. “What?”

My smile grows bigger. “You’re cute, you know that?”

His lips twitch as he closes the drawer and walks toward me, looping his arms around my waist and tugging me toward him. “I love you, do you know that ?”

I cock my head to the side, pretending to think. “Hmm…I could use some convincing.”

He chuckles from somewhere deep in his throat, pressing his lips to mine with a lingering kiss. “I’m always happy to prove that I’m a man of my word.”

His mouth trails down my cheek, across my jawbone, and down my neck as I giggle and shrink away from him. “Oh, yeah? How would you do that?”

Carefully, we ease onto the bed, a hunger in his eyes that fills me with warmth. “I can think of a few ways.”

Later, we’re lying in bed, still undressed and wrapped in blankets. If I have my way, we’ll spend the entire vacation right here. With a few breaks for snacks, that is.

My hands go to my stomach at the thought, rubbing over my bump in slow, methodic circles.

Following my lead, Cal places his hand on the top of my belly, smoothing his thumb across my skin. “Is she kicking?”

“Not at the moment, no,” I say, smiling over at him. “I think she’s sleeping.”

He speaks through his yawn, “That doesn’t sound so bad right about now.”

I turn my head to face him, studying his features. He’s handsome—and knows it—with rugged features you don’t expect from a college professor. Once my college professor. His face is tan and worn, with a light scar that runs across one cheek. You can’t see it from far away, which makes it extra special that I could easily draw it from memory. Proof of the hours I’ve spent this close to him, memorizing every detail of his features. He has long, unfairly gorgeous dark lashes, and blond hair that is starting to show just the earliest signs of thinning. He’s perfect, and I love him, and in this moment, I’m sad I nearly let something so simple tear us apart.

“I love you, you know?” I whisper, reaching out to brush his nose with my finger.

His eyes connect with mine, lingering there as he releases a breath like a sigh. His green eyes dart between mine as he struggles to find what he’s trying to say. “I’m so sorry.”

I prop up on my elbow. “You have no reason to be sorry. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Tears spring to his eyes, and he runs a hand over his face. “I’ve done…so much wrong. This girl…she…she grew up without a father. Without me. And did she ever wonder if it was because I didn’t want her? Did she question her mother’s story and wonder if I’d chosen to walk away?” His expression wrinkles with pain, as if he’s crumpling in on himself. He reaches across and touches my stomach again. “All I can think about is…what if it was her? Our baby girl. What if she didn’t have anyone? What if she didn’t have me?”

I put my hand on his, squeezing his palm against my stomach. At the sudden light pressure, our daughter kicks, making us both giggle. I cup his cheek, forcing him to look at me. “But she does. She does have you. She does, and she will. And, as far as I’m concerned, both of these girls are lucky to have you.”

He squeezes his eyes shut. “You have every right to be angry with me. To want more answers. To want to talk about it or, or to want to not talk about it. I don’t know. I don’t know what I’d do or what I’d want if the situation were reversed…”

“You told me as soon as you knew.” I run my hand along his cheek again, drawing his attention back to me. “That’s what matters. That’s what counts.”

“You really forgive me? You aren’t going to leave?”

“Of course I’m not. There’s nothing to forgive.” In my heart, I almost believe it.

He kisses my lips, his hand cupping the back of my head. When he pulls away, he says, “I don’t want to do this alone. I want you to meet her. To get to know her. I want you to be a part of all of this.”

“I want that, too,” I admit, and surprisingly, I’m not sure it’s a lie. This baby, our daughter, will have such a small family as it is. The fact that she could have an older sister is nothing short of a miracle. Perhaps I could force myself to look at it like that, rather than the tragedy it currently feels like.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, in fact, what if you asked her to come here tomorrow? I mean, obviously it’s at least an hour’s drive, so maybe she won’t want to, but if she did, the three of us could have lunch together and be able to really talk and get to know each other without the pressures of being home and balancing work and everything.” And we don’t have to invite a stranger into our home. “If you think it’s a terrible idea, we can just meet her at a restaurant back home instead. It was just a thought.”

Now it’s his turn to prop up on his elbow, staring at me as if I’ve sprouted a new head. “Are you serious?”

“Why not? It would be good to meet her, and it’s rare the two of us have time off together. And once the baby gets here, I’ll want time to settle into that. It’s better to have met her before, don’t you think?”

He looks hesitant.

“We don’t have to if you don’t want to, but I think it could be nice to sit down with her for a quiet lunch, figure things out. Decide what our next steps will be.” I lower my voice, trying to sound like him as I tease, “Make a plan.”

“You know I love plans.” His lips twist in thought as he looks away from me before finally nodding. “If you’re sure about this, I think it could be really good, actually.”

“I’m positive.” I kiss his lips, a feeling of dread in my stomach surprising me. At least, a second ago I thought I was positive.