Total pages in book: 27
Estimated words: 25414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 127(@200wpm)___ 102(@250wpm)___ 85(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 127(@200wpm)___ 102(@250wpm)___ 85(@300wpm)
There was a reply to that comment. OMG, I thought the same too! I always wondered if she liked Killian while he was engaged to Gracelynn. We all saw photos of the crash. It should have been impossible for her to survive that accident, yet she did and now poor Gracelynn is dead. What if? She’s hella shady so I won’t be surprised. Time for conspiracy theories. Who wants to join me?
With a curse, I turned my phone off and dropped it on the nightstand. Beside me, Julianna rolled over and pressed closer into my body, as if seeking for my warmth. I wrapped my arms around her, my throat swelling with emotions.
She buried her face into my neck and a pained groan spilled from her throat. My body tensed and I thought she was in physical pain, but then I heard it. The unmistakable sound of Gracelynn’s name on her lips.
“Grace,” she whimpered again. “No, please. No.”
I squeezed my eyes shut. Just when Julianna was finally letting go of Gracelynn’s ghost, finally moving on without any remaining guilt at the fact that she survived the accident when her sister didn’t – the media had to ruin it all.
I wasn’t stupid; I knew she read those articles and comments online even when she’d lie and say she didn’t. I knew because her nightmares were back again, after years of them being silent.
My wife whimpered in her sleep and my heart broke at the pained sound. A lonely tear slid down her cheek as I brushed my fingers over her forehead, trying to smooth out the tension lines.
“It’s okay,” I whispered as her body did a full twitch. She cried out softly. “I got you, Princess.”
She eventually settled back to sleep and I kept her body anchored against mine. Cupping her pregnant belly, I smoothed a hand over the heavy mound, tracing the uneven streaks and lines over the stretched skin. I expected one of the babies to kick in response, but it appeared they were all napping. Good, Julianna needed some sleep.
“Daddy?” A little voice called out from outside the door. Cameron must have woken up from his sleep. “Mommy?”
“Yeah, Buddy. I’ll be there in a second.” I untangled myself from Julianna’s side and got off the bed. When I opened the door, Cameron was there with his little giraffe plushie under his arm and his thumb in his mouth.
I instantly knew something was wrong. He only put his thumb in his mouth when he was scared or worried. “What’s wrong, Cameron?”
“I had a bad dream and then woke up.” He sniffled, his little face scrunching up as if he was about to cry. “I can’t s-sleep.”
I hoisted my shaking son up in my arms and he pushed his head into the crook of my neck, sniffling some more. “It’s okay, daddy got you. Everything is alright,” I crooned in his ears.
I walked back and forth in the hallway, still holding him in my arms while he calmed down. When he was half-asleep, we went back to his room only to find that he had wet the bed. Well, shit. There was no option, other than putting him in my bed, next to his mother. I watched at he cuddled up next to Julianna and my heart swelled.
My wife and babies were here and all together, safe and comfortable in my bed.
I might have done a lot of things in my life that I was proud of, but this right here – this perfect scene was my real pride. My family.
I did forgo sleep for cleaning up Cameron’s bed so Julianna didn’t have to do it in the morning. It was when I took out the clean bedsheets from his drawers that something else caught my eye.
A wrinkled paper under all that stuff.
Why was Julianna’s medical document in Cameron’s drawers?
I scanned the paper, feeling my heart drop in the pit of my stomach as I read along the words that didn’t really make sense to me, but I somehow knew what they meant. What the risks were.
***
Julianna
I woke up with a start, my eyes flying open but I didn’t know what woke me up. My heart thudded in my chest and I wondered if it was another nightmare that I couldn’t remember.
I look at my left and while Killian was missing, Cameron was in his place. I smoothed a hand over his head, admiring his cute sleeping self before I got out of bed to find my husband. A quick glance at the clock told me that it was almost three in the morning.
The Spencer Manor was quiet and dark as I made my way to his office on the opposite end of the hallway. The door was half-opened and I peeked inside to find him standing on the balcony of his office, shirtless and staring into the night.