Trust (22 page)

“What are you—” My eyes widened as I realized what he was talking about.

He must have realized the moment I’d put the pieces together. “I’ve been a doctor for almost twenty years. Even with her efforts at concealment last night, it was impossible for me to miss. How far along is she—four, five months?”

“About four,” I answered, still attempting to wrap my mind around what my uncle had just implied.

“What about Brianna? I thought you loved her. You loved her so much you immediately fell right back into your ex’s arms and got her pregnant?”

There was no mistaking the disapproval in his voice, and I knew I needed to clear up his misconception immediately. “Sarah isn’t carrying my baby.”

“What?”

“It’s not mine.”

It was his turn to look confused. “Then why is she here—living with you?”

“Sarah is here to support me.” I paused, not sure how much I wanted to share of Sarah’s story. “And she needed some time away. I offered her a place to stay while she was here.”

He didn’t answer right away. “You have to know how this will look, don’t you?”

“What are you talking about? She’s a friend who needed a place to stay while she’s in town. Nothing more.”

Richard looked at me in disbelief. “Stephan, don’t be so naïve. You have a young woman—one you used to date, no less—living with you, who happens to be pregnant with no other man on her arm but you. How exactly do you think that is going to look to the outside world?”

My gaze drifted to the stairs. “I hadn’t really thought of it.”

And I hadn’t. Sarah had needed my help, so I offered it. She was a friend. Why wouldn’t I provide what she needed when it was in my capacity to do so?

Richard was right, though. The outside world wouldn’t see it that way. Even if they did, the local reporters wouldn’t. They would see this as a scandal to sink their teeth into.

“Does Brianna know?”

My uncle’s question brought my attention back to him. “No.”

He shook his head. “How did your life get so complicated, Stephan?”

I laughed, but there was no humor in it. “I have no idea.”

Richard leaned forward and clasped his hands over his knees. “What are you going to do?”

I sighed and mirrored his position. “I don’t know that either.”

To my surprise, Richard stood and picked up his coat. He strolled over to me and patted me on the shoulder. “You’re a smart man. You’ll figure it out.”

Looking up, I met his gaze. “Thanks.”

Richard walked over to the door, shrugging his coat over his shoulders. “Let your aunt and I know if you need anything. We’ll help if we can.”

I nodded, and then he was gone.

The severity of what he’d said weighed on me. I didn’t want Sarah to leave, not when she didn’t have anywhere else to go, but I wasn’t sure her staying was a good idea anymore either. Richard was right. Sooner or later the press was going to catch wind of who Sarah was and that she was living with me. It was inevitable.

Still lost in my thoughts, I didn’t hear Sarah come back downstairs until she was almost beside me. “He’s right, you know.”

I didn’t bother to turn around to face her. “You heard?”

“I shouldn’t have listened, I know, but I was curious.”

“It’s fine.”

She lowered her voice to almost a whisper. “I’ll go back to the hotel. I’m sure they’ll have a room.”

“No.” I turned to face her. “You are not going back to that barely functioning hotel. Especially if it means you’re going to be staying there for any length of time.”

“I can’t stay here, Stephan. You heard him.” She shook her head. “I can’t believe we were so stupid.”

I stood and pulled her in for a hug. “We weren’t stupid. We just didn’t think.”

She wrapped her arms around my waist, burying her face in my chest. “Same thing.”

“I’ll think of something.”

“Stephan, you don’t—”

I leaned back so I could look her in the eye. “I’ll think of something.”

Chapter 20

Brianna

“I don’t like this.” Cal stood in the doorway of my bedroom, his arms
crossed, with a scowl on his face.

Jade snorted. “You don’t have to like it.” She was helping me set up Skype on my computer. I remember hearing about Skype in school, but I’d never had a reason to use it myself. Who would I have talked to?

“Maybe you should set her up on the main computer in the study. It has a bigger screen.”

She stopped what she was doing momentarily and gave him an exasperated look. “Cal, when are you going to accept that Anna wants to have a relationship with Stephan Coleman? He’s who she wants. Deal with it.”

Turning her attention back to my laptop, she let him stew over her words.

“I just don’t want him to hurt her. Why is it that I’m the only one who seems to be worried about that?”

“He won’t hurt me.”

Cal walked over and sat down on the edge of my bed. His movements were slow and steady so as not to frighten me. “I know you insist that’s true, Anna, but what if you’re wrong?”

“I’m not.”

He sighed. “But what if you are? You’ve been hurt so much. I don’t want to see you hurt anymore. I won’t. I can’t.”

The last word barely made it out, and he sounded as if he were in pain. Jade noticed it, too—her fingers hovered over the keyboard as we both turned our attention to Cal.

Cautiously, I stretched my arm until I could touch the tips of his fingers with mine.

Cal slowly turned his palm over and squeezed my offered hand.

Jade moved my laptop to the side, and we both sat waiting for him to explain himself. “Don’t look at me like that.”

Jade scooted closer to him. “How else are we supposed to look at you? There’s obviously more going on here than just your dislike of Stephan. What is it? What aren’t you telling us?”

Cal looked down and sighed before getting up and walking to the window. “It’s nothing.”

Jade and I looked at each other, neither of us believing his denial. She climbed off the bed and went to him.

He barely acknowledged her as she slipped beside him. It was slightly awkward watching them. I felt like a voyeur.

She laid her hand on his arm.

Cal didn’t pull away from her . . . he didn’t move at all.

“Talk to us.”

He shrugged. “I just don’t want him to hurt her. That’s all.”

Jade wasn’t letting it go. “But why? Why are you so sure he’s going to hurt her? He hasn’t yet.”

“I just know, okay?” His voice took on a hard edge.

I flinched.

Jade must have seen me out of the corner of her eye, because she glanced in my direction before turning her attention back to Cal. “No, it’s not okay. This has gone on long enough. Give me one good reason why you think he’s going to harm her.”

“Because I’ve seen it before, all right?” He threw his hands up in the air, and instinctively, I pressed myself back against the headboard of my bed. “There. You happy now?”

I tried to take in one breath at a time. They were staring at each other. Cal’s nostrils were flared with his agitation. If it were me standing there beside him, I would have been cowering at this point, not unlike I was now. Jade, however, stood her ground.

“No. I’m not
happy
. I need you to explain what you mean when you say you’ve seen this before. What, exactly, have you seen before?”

He didn’t answer.

“Cal, honey, I need you to explain yourself. You’re acting irrationally, and we need to understand why.”

For the first time since he’d walked away, Cal looked over at me. His gaze met mine, and I realized he looked sad. “Our neighbor.”

He paused, continuing to stare at me.

“We don’t have a neighbor, Cal,” Jade interjected when he failed to elaborate.

“Not here. When I lived with my dad.” He hesitated. “We had a neighbor. She was really nice. She and her husband moved in next door when I was sixteen. Every afternoon when I came home from school, she’d have cookies for me, and I’d help her with things around the house. Mow her lawn and things like that, when her husband was away.”

We waited.

“One night, I heard some noises coming from their house. I couldn’t make out what it was, but it made me nervous for some reason. The next day, though, she was there to greet me with cookies just like before, so I let it go. A couple weeks later, I heard it again. This time, when she brought me cookies the next day, I saw her limping. When I asked her about it, she brushed it off and told me it was nothing I needed to worry about, just husband and wife stuff.”

Cal sighed and ran a hand over his face. It was the first time he’d broken eye contact with me since he’d started talking. “It happened a few more times, so I asked my dad about it. He said she and her husband probably liked it rough and to mind my own business.”

Jade stepped closer to him. “I’m assuming that wasn’t what it was, right?”

“No. Yes.” He sighed. “I don’t know. One day I came home from school, and there was an ambulance there along with a police officer. I only got a glimpse of the neighbor who had been so kind to me, but what I did see left an impression I’ll never forget.” His gaze found mine again. “She had bruises down both sides of her arms—I don’t know about her legs because she was wearing pants, but she was limping again, so I can only assume they were there, too. I heard the medic say something about rope burns.” He paused again. “Back then, I didn’t know what all that meant, but I know now. I won’t let that happen to you, Anna.”

I was speechless, and so was Jade.

When he realized that neither of us was going to say anything in response to his confession, Cal stormed out of the room, and a few seconds later, we heard the front door slam shut.

While he was gone, Jade finished setting up my Skype account, and I sent the contact request to Stephan. Jade explained I had to wait for him to accept it and then we’d be good to go.

She continued to reassure me that Cal would be fine, given time. We both picked at our food, intermittently glancing at the door until the dishes were washed, dried, and put away. When we finished, I went to my room and sat on my bed with my laptop open, hoping that Stephan would accept my request.

That was where I was when I heard Cal return. He didn’t bother to come into the room to see me. Instead, I heard some murmuring and then the sound of their bedroom door closing.

I didn’t know what to do. Should I stay and wait for him to come to me, or should I go to him? I felt responsible for the pain he was feeling. Memories were powerful things. I knew that better than anyone. It was my fault he had to relive what had happened.

A sound coming from my computer startled me. I almost threw it across the bed, away from me, before I realized what it was. The Skype icon at the bottom of the screen was lit up.

My stomach suddenly felt as if it had a hundred butterflies in it, all trying to get out at once. Shaking, I moved my curser over the box and clicked on it.

Are you there, sweetheart?

Excitement surged through me as I placed my hands over the keys.

Yes. I’m here.

:)
Good. Are you alone?

Yes.

I’m going to send you a request for a video chat. A box will pop up on your screen. Press the green button with the video camera, and then I’ll be able to see you.

Okay.

I’d barely typed out the word before a black box with two green buttons and one red appeared on my screen. Following his instructions, I pressed the green button that looked like a video camera. Seconds later, Stephan’s face appeared on my screen.

He smiled when he saw me. “Hello, Brianna.”

“Hello, Sir.” I smiled back at him. It was so good to see Stephan, even if it was only through a computer screen.

“Did you have any problems loading Skype onto your computer?”

I shook my head. “No. Jade set everything up for me. She said it was easy.”

It felt somewhat strange talking to him like this. I was used to being able to touch him and feel his body pressed up against mine when we had our evening conversations. I missed sitting with him in his chair.

“What were you thinking about just now?”

I looked up again quickly. “I was thinking that talking to you over the computer like this . . . not being able to touch you . . . feels weird.”

The corners of his mouth turned down a little. “I miss you being here with me, too. We’ll see each other soon, though. I promise. Until then, this is the best alternative.” He shifted, moving his laptop closer so that I could see more of his face. “Tell me about your day. What did you do after you left the hotel?”

“Not a lot. We came back here, and I read a little. Then Jade helped set up Skype for me.”

“Did you eat?”

“Yes.”

“Lunch
and
dinner?”

“Yes, Sir.”