AllFreeNovel
Share Us
What, he had no idea. Because if she had information, she hadn’t bothered to use any of it. His work had continued, unabated. Even that shipment had eventually been sorted out, all to the positive aside from the delayed delivery and the continued need to prove himself as cheap, thug labor.
So what did she know?
He exited the park and heard the distant rumble of the subway. Although he’d rather call a car or jump in a cab, he wasn’t going to put himself anywhere near this destination with a credit card payment or someone else’s testimony. It was the same reason he’d used cash to head uptown and he’d do the same to ride the subway back down.
Those sightless eyes that had stared up at him from the leaves filled his thoughts once more. He pulled the single ride fare from his pocket and swiped it through the turnstile, heading for the downtown trains.
As he flew down the metal stairs, the gaze in his mind’s eye morphed into another one.
/>
Nova, with those sad green eyes, filled his thoughts. Only instead of sadness, he imagined them as they would look.
When they saw nothing—not one single thing—for the rest of her life.
* * *
Nova’s eyes popped open in a rush, her usual path from dead asleep to wide-awake undeterred by her new surroundings. As this was the second time she’d woken in the bed, she wasn’t as surprised as the first. She took in the beige walls and modest furnishings. Tasteful, but bland, was the order of the day in Nikolas’s guest room.
And yours for as long as you need it, she quickly reminded herself.
A fair reminder that paint colors and a fancy bedroom suite didn’t make a home.
In fact, if she were honest with herself, she had to admit that she felt safer here than she had anywhere for almost the past year. Those nights she’d slept at her mother’s apartment, in the last days of Allegra’s illness, had been restless and unsettling. Yes, she’d been in her old bedroom but she’d been so scared of what was to come.
And then her time with Ferdy, so wondrous and new at the start, only to turn unpleasant in a matter of months.
She considered it now, secure in a room more than two thousand miles away from him, and wondered what she’d ever seen in Ferdinand Adler. Or how she’d been so incredibly wrong about him.
Why hadn’t she left sooner? While she was incredibly excited for the new life growing inside of her, what had possibly possessed her to continue a relationship with the man?
Last night’s freak-out in Nikolas’s kitchen over the water was a prime example. How had she let things get that bad? So bad that even now, after months away from him, she could get so upset about some spilled water.
While he’d never actually hit her, his terse tone and genuinely dismissive attitude had grown worse in the months they were together. Would it have progressed to physical abuse?
She laid a hand protectively over her belly, concerned at the idea that her child might have been exposed to something like that eventually.
Worse, she had to admit the truth. Just as she’d spent those quiet, lonely nights during her mother’s last days, aware that Allegra wasn’t going to get better, in her bones, she knew the same about Ferdy. If she’d stayed—if she hadn’t found the reason to run that afternoon in his office—she’d have ended up in a far worse position than she found herself in now.
The thought gave her shivers and she huddled under the covers, her arms wrapped around the baby and her mind whirling with all that still lurked in the shadows.
What was she going to do? She couldn’t stay here forever. And what if Ace, or his family, didn’t want anything to do with her?
She’d spent yesterday afternoon hopeful that a visit with Marlowe and Ainsley would produce positive results, but what if it didn’t? What if...
Frustrated and sick of her own thoughts, she tossed off the covers. Yes, she had a lot to think about and a lot of it was freaking scary. But huddling under the covers?
Ferdy Adler had done more of a number on her than she’d ever imagined if that was how she was going to handle the world around her moving forward. Her child deserved better and so did she.
Within a few minutes she’d brushed her teeth, combed her hair and put on something fresh from her bag. She’d noted a small laundry room off Nikolas’s kitchen and she’d ask him if she could do a load of laundry later that day, as well. In the meantime, the least she could do was make him some breakfast. Her culinary skills were somewhat limited but she could manage pancakes and eggs for breakfast.
Nova padded out to the kitchen, finding the door to Nikolas’s room still closed. She took some satisfaction in that and proceeded to the kitchen to bring her plan to life. She easily found the ingredients for pancakes and even lucked out with a package of bacon in the fridge.
Twenty minutes later the distinct scent of heaven began to permeate the condo as the bacon sizzled in the oven. The siren’s song had its desired effect and in another minute she heard the distinct click of Nikolas’s bedroom door.
“Please tell me you’re not a figment of my imagination.”
Nova turned from the counter, her head bopping to an internal beat, the act of doing something going a long way toward crushing the apprehension she’d woken up with. “I don’t know you well enough to bring you breakfast in bed, but I thought it’d be nice to wake up to a meal.”
