Her Christmas Eve Diamond - Page 29

Brad had just told her he loved her. On the phone. And while she wanted the warm feeling to spread throughout her body, she couldn’t help feeling something was wrong. His voice—the tone of it.

Had something happened to him? She pressed for the next message.

‘Cassidy, honey, I’m so sorry. I really wanted to speak to you. I’ve left you a letter at home—it explains everything. I will be back, I promise. And I’ll phone you as soon as I get there. And I’ll email you as soon as I get near a computer. I love you, Cassidy.’

Get back from where? Her fingers scrolled for his name and pressed ‘dial’. It rang and then diverted to voice mail. His phone must be switched off.

Where was he?

Her agitation was rising. She didn’t need this right now. Her gran was in Theatre. She should be concentrating on that. And he should be here with her, helping her through this. Where was he?

She sent him a quick text. ‘Still at hospital with Gran. What’s going on? Won’t be home for a few hours.’

Maybe he’d been called into work again? Maybe that was it. But something inside her didn’t agree.

She walked back inside. There was nothing she could do right now. She had to stay here and be with her gran. There was no telling how she’d be when she woke from her anaesthetic. Cassidy wanted to be close.

And no matter how much she wanted to know what was going on with Brad, he’d just have to wait.

CHAPTER NINE

20 December

THE alarm sounded and Cassidy groaned and thumped the reset button with her hand. Even stretching out from under the warm duvet for a second was too cold. She heard a little muffled sound and seconds later felt a little draught at the bottom of the duvet.

Bert. The alarm had woken him and he was cold, too, so he’d sneaked into the bottom of her bed just as he’d done for the last ten days.

Ten days. Two hundred and forty hours—no, it had actually been forty-seven hours since she’d last spoken to Brad.

Sometimes when she woke in the morning—just for a millisecond—she thought everything was all right again. But then she remembered he was gone, searching for his daughter in North-blooming-Woods, Wisconsin. She’d had to look the place up on the internet—she didn’t even know where it was.

By the time she’d got back from the hospital that night, Brad’s flight had been in the air for four hours. He was long gone.

And although it helped just a little that he’d tried to contact her and that he’d left her a letter, it didn’t take away from the fact that he’d gone. Just like that. At the drop of a hat.

She knew she was being unreasonable. He’d waited nearly two years to find his daughter—of course he should go. But her heart wasn’t as rational as her head tried to be.

Her heart was broken in two.

What if he never came back? What if the only way he could have contact with his daughter was to stay in Wisconsin? What if he fell back in love with Melody’s mother?

Every irrational thought in the world had circulated in her mind constantly for the last ten days and nights. Even Bert wasn’t helping.

He kept looking at the door and sniffing around Brad’s shoes in the hope he would reappear again.

She had to be the unluckiest woman in the world. Twice Brad had phoned her mobile—and both times she had missed his call. Both times she’d been working and both times she’d been with a patient.

He’d phoned the ward one day but she hadn’t been on duty. And when he’d phoned the flat she’d been visiting her gran, who was still in hospital.

Every time she tried to call him back she’d received an ‘unobtainable’ signal.

He’d warned her. He’d warned her that North Woods was aptly named, surrounded by thick woods and hills with poor reception for mobiles and internet connections.

He’d sent two emails letting her know that he’d contacted a family lawyer and made contact with Alison. After some fraught negotiations he’d been allowed supervised access to see Melody twice. They were currently stuck in the land of legal mumbo-jumbo, trying to figure out the parental rights of two Australians in the US. Alison was covered—she’d married an American. But Brad’s position was more difficult, particularly when he was officially only on ‘holiday’.

It didn’t help that his lawyer was advising him to look at extradition since Melody had been removed from Australia without permission.

She really, really wanted to talk to him.

She wanted to hear his voice, feel his arms around her, feel his body pressed next to hers. Particularly now. A warm dog around her feet might be nice, but it just didn’t cut it.

She didn’t even feel festive any more. Her favourite time of year had been blighted by the fact the man she loved was on the other side of the Atlantic. The flight had taken fourteen hours to reach Chicago, and then another few for the air transfer to North Woods. It wasn’t exactly the easiest place to get to. And it wouldn’t be the easiest place to get home from either.

But as soon as he did, she knew what she was going to do. She knew what she was going to say. This forced separation had clarified everything for her. She’d made up her mind.

Now all she could do was wait.

* * *

Brad’s heart was in his mouth. His little girl seemed completely unfazed by him. Alison was another matter entirely.

Ten days of trying to keep his temper in check. Ten days of biting back all the things he really, really wanted to say.

Once she’d got over the initial shock, Alison had been shamed into a visit at his lawyer’s office. She’d brought her husband along, who seemed equally outraged that Brad had dared to appear into their lives in North Woods, Wisconsin.

It hadn’t taken long for his lawyer to go through the legal aspects of removing a child from another country without parental consent. Alison’s lawyer had been surprisingly quiet and encouraged his client to agree in principle to some short supervised access spells.

He’d been here ten days and had spent three hours with his daughter.

He’d also spent innumerable hours trying to contact Cassidy back home.

Home? Scotland?

In Brad’s mind right now, home was wherever Cassidy was. Wherever they could be together. He wanted to spend hours on the phone

to her, talking through things with her and telling her how he felt.

But North Woods didn’t seem to be a place with normal communication methods in mind—and to be fair, Joe, his private detective, had warned him about this. In theory, he would have managed to co-ordinate time differences, shift patterns and visiting schedules. But reality was much harder. Right now it seemed as if an old-fashioned carrier pigeon would be more effective than modern-day technology.

He glanced at his watch. Time for another visit. Time to see his gorgeous blonde, curly-headed daughter, who could skim stones across the lake like a professional. Time to get the wheels in motion to learn about more permanent types of access. Time to set up an agreed method of communication between them all. One that meant he could talk to his beautiful daughter without having to face the minefield that was her mother.

Time to get his life in order.

22 December

A Christmas bride. That’s what smelly-cat woman had told her. Was there any chance she could go and demand her twenty quid back?

Right now it felt as if she’d been conned. False pretences. That’s what they called it. But she’d never heard of a fortune-teller being sued. Just as well she’d never believed any of it.

Cassidy tugged her thick black boots on, trying to ignore the trickle of water inside that instantly soaked through her sock. There was about three feet of snow outside. It had been the same last night when she’d come home from work.

If she’d been organised—or cared enough—she would have stuffed her already soaked boots with newspaper and stuck them under the radiator. Instead, she’d flung them across the room and fallen into bed instantly.

She couldn’t even be bothered to prepare something to eat. Her cupboards were a disgrace. Oh, if she wanted chocolate or crisps or bakery items like chocolate éclairs or cupcakes, she was fine. If she wanted anything substantial to eat, she was well and truly snookered.

Tags: Scarlet Wilson Romance
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