Chapter 4

That night, I told Emily about it.

Emily tensed up. "He called you?"

"Yeah. I didn't pick up."

"How did he know you changed your number? Didn't you cancel the old one?"

"He probably tracked it down some other way."

Getting anyone's number was easy for Andrew.

"Do you think he found out? Or is it something else?"

I cut in. "I don't know. But whatever he wants, I can't let him find me."

Emily was quiet for a moment. "Charlotte, have you ever thought about another possibility?"

"What?"

"Maybe he just wants to find you."

I paused, and then I laughed, "Emily, Andrew isn't like that. If he wanted me back, he wouldn't have let me go so easily."

Emily didn't say anything else, but I knew what she was thinking. She had always believed Andrew still had feelings for me.

But whether he had feelings didn't matter. What mattered was that he never once let me feel them.

Over the next few days, Andrew called twice more, and I didn't pick up either time. After that he gave up. No more texts came, and it was as if none of it had happened.

I let out a breath, though I couldn't have said what I was feeling.

By my fifth month, I was showing.

When I went grocery shopping, the older women who worked the counters started making small talk with me. "Honey, how far along are you?"

"Five months."

"Where's your husband? How come you're always on your own?"

I smiled, "He's away on business."

I told that lie so many times that it came out more naturally every time.

One afternoon, I was out walking when I ran into an older woman from the next building over. She was in her seventies, with white hair and plenty of energy.

She said, "Charlotte, out walking by yourself again?"

I smiled, "Yes. Hi, May."

Her name was May Collins, but everyone called her Granny May. She had been a labor and delivery nurse before she retired, and she looked out for me more than anyone.

She looked me up and down. "You haven't looked so good lately. How are you sleeping?"

"Okay, but I get leg cramps sometimes."

"That's calcium. I'll bring you some calcium pills. My granddaughter brought them back from overseas, and they're better than anything the hospital gives you."

"You don't have to go to the trouble."

She waved it off. "What trouble? Being pregnant on your own is hard enough."

Then she looked at me as though there was something else on her mind. "Charlotte, I hope you don't mind me asking."

"Go ahead."

"The baby's father. Is he no longer with us, or is it something else?"

I paused. "We're divorced."

May sighed, "Young people these days."

She didn't say anything else, but that evening she brought over a big bag of calcium pills and folic acid, along with a handwritten list of things to watch for during pregnancy.

The handwriting was neat and careful, as if she had written it especially for me.

I looked at that sheet of paper, and my throat went tight. So that was what it felt like to have someone look out for me.

In my sixth month, things took a turn.

That day, I was racing to finish a proposal when a news alert popped up on my phone.

The headline read: [Mason Holdings Heir Andrew Mason Linked to Star Olivia Quinn in Late-Night Sighting.]

The photo showed them outside a restaurant.

Andrew wore a dark gray coat, and a woman with long hair past her shoulders stood beside him, turning her head to talk to him.

It was Olivia Quinn, and I knew her.

She was one of the biggest stars in the business, a two-time Best Actress winner, beautiful and from a good family.

Her father ran Quinn Realty, which did business with the Masons.

I had seen her a few times at Mason family events, and the way she acted around Andrew had always been off. She was too warm with him, far warmer than a friend would be.

Once, I asked Andrew about it privately. He gave me two words. "Just business."

Apparently, the business had gone a lot further than that.

I stared at the photo for a few seconds, then closed the article.

I would be lying if I said it didn't hurt, but mostly it felt absurd.

We had been divorced barely six months, and he was already in the headlines with another woman, while I sat in a rented apartment carrying his baby and revising proposals.

However I looked at it, the contrast was a joke.

My phone buzzed again. It was Emily.

Emily: [Did you see the news?]

I replied: [I saw.]

Emily: [You okay?]

I replied: [I'm fine.]

Emily: [Don't tell me you're fine.]

I thought about it and typed out a line: [Really, I'm fine. He has nothing to do with me anymore.]

After I sent it, I looked down at my round belly and muttered, "Pumpkin, your dad is really something."

Then I went back to my proposal. Life still had to go on.

In my seventh month, someone showed up in Willowville.

That afternoon, I came back from a prenatal checkup and saw a black SUV parked at the entrance to my complex. It had Riverside plates.

My stomach dropped, and my steps slowed without my meaning them to.

The door opened, and a middle-aged man in a suit got out.

I knew him. It was David Shaw, Andrew's personal lawyer and one of the few people he trusted completely.

When David saw me, his eyes went straight to my stomach, and his face changed. He hadn't expected to find me like this.

He greeted me with stiff politeness. "Ms. Lane."

I stayed where I was. "David, how did you find me here?"

"Mr. Mason sent me."

Those words sent my heart straight down. "He knows?"

David glanced at my stomach again and didn't answer directly. "Ms. Lane, Mr. Mason would like to see you."

"I don't have anything to say to him."

"He said if you don't want to come back to Riverside, he'll come here."

I answered more calmly than I expected to. "That won't be necessary. The divorce agreement was clear, and we have nothing to do with each other anymore. He has no reason to come after me, and I have no obligation to see him."

David was quiet for a moment, and then his eyes dropped to my stomach again. "Forgive me for being blunt, Ms. Lane, but I don't think this is something you can settle by saying you have nothing to do with each other."

I knew exactly what he meant. He meant the baby.

Knowing Andrew, once he learned I was carrying his child, he would never let go.

It wasn't because he cared about me. It was because in his eyes, this child carried Mason blood, and to the Masons, blood mattered more than anything.