by April Lust
“Yes, I’m serious. It was at our eighth grade dance. Well, actually it was after the dance when his chauffeur dropped me off. He was about half a foot shorter than me and he was sweating through his suit. It wasn’t really great.”
“Sure it wasn’t,” Ethan said with a grin. “He wasn’t me.”
“You wouldn’t have asked me to that dance.”
“I’m seven years older than you. It wouldn’t have been worth the jail time, no matter how cute you probably were.”
“I was only semi-cute. I had a lot of baby fat. And I forget about you being older than me.”
“I forget about you being younger than me. Does it bother you? The age difference?”
“No,” Amelia answered honestly. “I always assumed I’d end up with an older man. Actually, I expected my future husband to be even older than you.”
“Thanks,” he said wryly. “Wasn’t that Anthony guy around your age, though?”
“No, he was older than me.” She paused for thought. “He was younger than you, though.”
“Yeah, just keep rubbing it in.”
“Does the age difference botheryou?” she asked with a quick laugh.
“Nah, I like the idea of a trophy woman. You’re gonna have to chase the kid around, though. I’ll have to keep both hands on my walker.”
“You’re not getting out of childcare duty that easily, Ethan.”
His hands slid around, his large, warm palm resting on her stomach. “What do you think?” he asked. “Boy or girl?”
She smiled. “I know the appropriate answer is ‘as long as it’s healthy it doesn’t matter’ but I kind of want a boy.”
“Yeah? Me too. I can get him a little tool bench and let help me with spark plugs this time next year.”
Amelia laughed. “Of course, a girl would be a lot of fun, too,” she said. “Pretty clothes and someone to give all of my porcelain dolls to.”
“You have porcelain dolls?”
“Most of them belonged to my mother, actually, but I kept them.”
“Do you have a lot of her stuff?”
“No, not really. I have the dolls. I have a blanket she made for me when she was pregnant. And I have two photo albums. What about you?”
“I don’t have anything of my mom’s,” Ethan said. “A few pictures I can show you when we get back. But we didn’t really have a lot of stuff and she wasn’t the sentimental type. She didn’t go the keepsake route. And with Dad...most of his stuff is still at HQ. Part of the legacy. His jacket and military stuff.” He looked up at the sky, which had gone dark while they spoke. “This is what I brought you out here for,” he said. “Look up there.”
Amelia glanced up and then caught her breath. “Oh, wow! Ethan, it’s amazing!” Stars twinkled like diamonds cast carelessly across the black velvet of the sky. “Is it always like this out here?”
“It’s better with you.”
Amelia took a deep breath. There would never be a better moment to get this question answered. Once and for all, she had to know. “Ethan, why did you ask me to marry you?”
“You really don’t know?”
“No, I don’t.”
“Amelia, I don’t want us turning out like Jimmy and his ex-wife. I want us to raise this kid together. I want us to be a family.”
“I see.” She looked up at the sky, the one filled with stars that suddenly looked cold and remote. “I’m getting cold. Is it okay with you if we go back to the tent?”
“Sure.” Ethan stood, tugging her to her feet.
She grabbed the blanket and hurried back before he could see her tears.
Chapter 24
Amelia
Amelia lay on the air mattress, staring blankly into the darkness that surrounded her. She’d been awake for hours. She’d turned her head away when Ethan had started to kiss her once they got back to the tent. He’d believed her when she’d said that she was worried about the closer campers overhearing them, but, truthfully, she’d been afraid that she would start to cry if they had sex. It was always so good with him and she didn’t need anything that wonderful clouding her judgment. Not when she needed to think.
Ethan wanted to marry her. He wanted to raise their child together. And she wanted so much more from their marriage than that. It couldn’t work. It never worked. She’d seen the families that stayed together “for the kids.” Misery, bitterness, and pointless fights between two people tied only by circumstance. That wasn’t the life she wanted for herself or for their child.
A light speared through the tent and she looked quickly around for the source. Her cell phone lit up again. Amelia untangled herself from the blanket and from Ethan’s arms.
He muttered under his breath and rolled over, so she went still again. Once he’d settled back into a comfortable position and she knew he wasn’t going to wake up, she reached for the phone. It was three o’clock in the morning; there was really only one person it could be. She wasn’t surprised when she saw her father’s name flashing on the display.
He could take her home. The thought came out of the blue, but she didn’t have the urge to push it away like she had so many times since she’d left home. Instead, Amelia pictured her room, her big comfortable bed and the thick curtains she could draw across her big windows.
The picture was more than a little inviting. A familiar place to hide, to regroup, to lick her wounds. A familiar shower to cry in. She knew from past experiences that no one would hear her there.
Just as she moved to answer the call, though, it ended. As she was debating on calling her father back, a buzz indicated a voicemail. She had deleted all the others without listening, but she played this one, pressing the phone tightly to her ear so Ethan wouldn’t hear anything in the event that he woke up.
“Amelia.” Her father’s voice filled her ear. It had been so long since she’d heard him when he wasn’t shouting or trying to intimidate her. Was it her imagination or did he actually sound contrite? He definitely sounded hesitant. Her resolve melted completely. “I... I just want to talk to you. Please, honey. I’ll be awake. Just...just get in touch with me.”
She listened to the voicemail twice more, thinking of what Penelope had said. “I wouldn’t count on rebuilding that relationship.” But what if she could? This was the longest she’d ever rebelled against him. Maybe he finally understood. She turned the phone in her fingers, thinking hard.
In the end, she didn’t return her father’s call. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she was still too frightened that she was going to be disappointed with what he said. Furthermore, she didn’t want Ethan to overhear. Instead, she sent a text.
“I’m in the campground in the Valley of Fire. Can you send a driver?”
“I’ll come myself.” The reply read. “I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’m so glad you’re willing to talk to me.”
Amelia pulled her clothes on over her pajamas and waited for her ride, sitting in the front of the tent with her arms wrapped around her knees. Her heart ached when she looked over at the large lump under the covers that was Ethan, but she didn’t know what else to do. She didn’t want to marry for convenience any more than she’d wanted to marry for status. Was it too much to ask for someone to simply want her for who she was? For someone to just love her?
# # #
When the car pulled up, she eased out of the tent, walking as quickly as she could while still being quiet. She didn’t want to get caught and she definitely didn’t want a big scene. She couldn’t imagine that she’d be popular among the members of The Angel’s Keepers if she was discovered sneaking out in the cold hours before dawn, especially if they saw her father behind the wheel of the big luxury car.
Amelia slid into the passenger side of the car, looking at her father in the glow of the dashboard lights. He looked haggard and exhausted and his jaw was clenched tightly. This was far from the warm welcome she’d been hoping for and her heart was pounding with nerves. What was he going to say?
“Why wer
e you out all the way out here?” he asked, putting the car in drive and pulling away from the campsite.
“The Angel’s Keepers are here,” she answered. “The whole club. It’s a camping trip to kind of build morale.”
He pulled out his cell phone and tapped out a message, glancing up at the road casually. “Interesting idea. I wouldn’t have thought that they’d have the funds for it.”
“Membership is up. Who are you messaging?” she asked as they pulled out of the lot. Her father hadn’t even looked at her since she’d gotten in the car.
Gregory shoved the phone down into his jacket pocket, care not to let her see. “I’m just letting security know when we’ll be back.”
“You have security now?” That was a new development. The gates had always been enough for her father’s tastes. The thought of additional personnel was frightening rather than comforting. Had they been hired to keep other people out, or to keep her in?
“Yes, I do. It was time to do something a little more than put up a gate. There have been some...issues.” Gregory shook his head and frowned, his tone growing stern. “It’s not anything for you to be concerned with.”
“I’m just worried about you,” she said.
He didn’t reply and his hand kept drifting toward the phone in his pocket, checking and checking again for a reply to his text message. Would he be that concerned with getting the okay from security? Would a reply from a security guard even take that long? The car jounced along over the rough edge of the road the fourth time he looked down at the phone and Amelia tightened her grip on the seat belt.
“Can you slow down, please?” she asked, her voice wavering a bit.
“I wouldn’t imagine you’d have a problem with my driving after running off on a motorcycle,” Gregory said. He eased up on the accelerator and put the car into cruise control, though. “Is that better?”
“It’s fine.” Amelia closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the buttery leather headrest of her father’s Lincoln.
Had she really thought that he’d sounded contrite on the phone? She should have known that it was only another one of his tricks. Maybe she could sleep until they got home. Anything to keep herself from crying.
Amelia was half asleep when she heard her father’s cell phone ring. She was just wondering who would be calling him at this hour when she heard him curse viciously under his breath. She heard a rustle as he raised the phone to his ear.
“I told you not to call!” he snapped in a low voice. “Not now!”
It was so surprising to hear that tone in his voice that it was a struggle to keep her eyes closed. He was usually so controlled with other people. She felt him glance at her and she tried to stay relaxed. If he knew she was awake, he’d disconnect.
The voice at the other end of the line was tinny but recognizable. It was the same man who had been shouting in Gregory’s office before she’d left with Ethan. Something Miller, she thought.
“Make time,” Miller demanded. “We need to move and we need to move now. We’ll go through you if we can’t get around.”
“I told you I’d have new information and I will,” Gregory said roughly. “Give me two hours and don’t forget I’ve got more power in this situation than you do.”
Gregory threw his phone into the cup holder and Amelia pretended to stir at the loud sound. “What was that?” she asked, making her voice as groggy as possible.
“Don’t worry about it, Amelia. It’s not your concern,” he said, biting off each word with a snap. “Go back to sleep.”
The car surged forward again. Two hours would be just enough to get them back home. She couldn’t pretend that the new information didn’t have something to do with her; it was all much too convenient. Her heart began to pound again and she knew without a doubt that she’d made a huge mistake. And the worst part was that she had no idea how to fix it.
# # #
“Dad?” Amelia asked as she walked into the house. There had been two guards at the gate and two in the hallway. She wondered how many more were scattered around the grounds. She also wondered what had frightened her father so badly. “Can we talk for a little bit?”
“Not now, Amelia,” he answered, glancing down at his cell phone. He’d barely had it out of his sight since that phone call that had made him so angry when they were leaving the Valley of Fire. “I’ve got a lot of work to do today and that drive out to pick you up took up more time than I thought it would. I expected you to be at Ethan’s house.” Gregory frowned at her, obviously annoyed that she wasn’t where he’d planned for her to be.
“Well, I wasn’t. Andyour message said you wanted to talk,” she reminded him, holding her ground.
He turned to face her, sighing impatiently. “I wanted to talk about you having some sense and coming back home. Now you have, so there’s nothing left to say to you. Why don’t you go up to your room and get some sleep?”
Amelia couldn’t do anything but stare as he turned away and went into his office. He’d basically just sent her to her room. Her feet carried her upstairs and she automatically went into her bedroom. It was exactly as she’d left it. The maid had been keeping it vacuumed and dusted and the sheets and white down comforter were fresh and clean.
The bathroom was sparkling, too, and she turned the shower on, letting the hot water run until it steamed up the clean glass. Maybe she could steam herself clean of the way it felt to be rejected yet again. Although, to fair, Ethan hadn’t rejected her. He wanted to marry her. He wanted to take care of her.
Amelia poured body wash into her bath pouf and began scrubbing a little harder than she really needed to. That was part of the problem. She didn’t want Ethan thinking that sheneeded him.
She wanted them to be on equal ground so she would know he wanted her, not just that he felt responsible for her. In short, she wanted him to want her like she wanted him. Not just for sex. Not just to make raising a child easier, if such a thing was even possible. But for anything and everything else that came along.
Aubrey had said life hardly ever worked out the way a person planned. Amelia paused in her scrubbing, wondered if she’d really ever planned anything in her own life. Other than losing her virginity, that is.
If she was completely honest, she had to admit she hadn’t. She tended to just let things happen to her. Her father didn’t want her to work, so she simply let him pay her way. Ethan had wanted her to go back home with him once he found out about the baby, so she’d gone home with him to get away from her father. And now she was back at her father’s house to get away from Ethan. And she was supposed to be an adult.
So what did she really want to do? She let the hot water pound down on the very center of her head as she tried to think. She wanted to work, to help people. Now more than ever, she thought she’d be the perfect candidate for a crisis pregnancy center or a job in some kind of women’s health field.
She didn’t want to be just “State Rep. Stratton’s daughter.” She wanted to stand on her own two feet financially. She wanted freedom.
And she wouldn’t get it here. Amelia reached out and turned the water off with a quick flick of her wrist. Maybe life wouldn’t always work out according to plan, but having a plan was a good start.
Once she was dry and dressed, she began to pack. She’d call Aubrey once she was done and ready for yet another fight with her father.
Chapter 25
Ethan
Ethan woke up when a shaft of sunlight plunged through the thin material of the tent. Damn it, he’d set an alarm and, apparently, it hadn’t gone off. He’d planned to take Amelia back out to watch the sun rise. He rubbed his hands over his face tiredly and rolled over, reaching out to pull her close and apologize for his phone not waking them up.
But she wasn’t there. His hand met only empty sheets when he reached for her for the second time in their relationship. He sat up so fast that his head spun.
“Amelia?”
She didn’t answer. A thousand sce
narios ran through his head. She could have been attacked by something, either human or animal. Maybe she’d gotten up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and she’d gotten lost. Maybe she was just gone.
He shut the thoughts down, grabbed his jeans and yanking them on. He jerked the shirt he’d worn yesterday on, as well, because he didn’t want to take the time to dig through his bag for anything. He didn’t even bother to tie his boots before he grabbed his cell phone and prepared to duck out of the tent.
Ethan went still when he saw the text message notification. It was from Amelia and it was several hours old. He opened the message, not sure that he really wanted to see what it had to say.
I’m sorry, Ethan. I can’t marry you. I’ll keep you up to date about the baby, but I need some time. Please don’t contact me.
