Emergence (Awakening Series Book 2) (21 page)

Chapter 41

Lou

The morning after I left Savannah I woke to Carly's soft giggles as she played in her porta-crib. I looked over to see her little eyeballs trained on me while she gurgled and chewed on the cloth covered railing.

"Look at you pulling yourself up," I said to her. "You're getting to be such a big girl!"

After Carly was born we'd lived with Liz for a couple of weeks before moving to Savannah and this had been our room. The last time we woke up together here, Carly had been so tiny she could barely do more than sleep and eat. It felt like such a long time ago, and yet, it'd gone by in a flash.

I picked up my phone to check the time and  noticed I had some texts and two missed calls and a voicemail. All from Carson.

I listened to the voicemail first. "Hey, it's Carson. Please call and let me know where you are."

Checking the missed calls I saw the other one was from Caroline, but she hadn't left a message. The texts were next, both from Carson.

I just noticed all your things are gone. Where did you go?

I talked to Kelly. I'm not mad at you Lou. I love you. Both you and Carly, and I want you to come home.

My heart swelled reading that.
Home.
Carson was my home and I yearned to be back there with him. I texted him back quickly.

We're safe. I'm so sorry I left without talking to you first. I love you too, and we'll come home soon.

Tossing the covers back I slid out of bed, picking Carly up and changing her diaper before getting us both dressed and heading downstairs. The smell of coffee called me to the kitchen.

"There she is!" Liz said as I rounded the corner. "How'd you sleep?"

I gave her a pointed look and raised an eyebrow at her, grunting in response.

"That good huh?" she laughed.

"Yeah, my mind was going ninety miles a minute all night. I overreacted and shouldn't have left. Carson isn't the type to stay angry and even if he was, he still didn't want me to leave without talking to him. He texted me in the middle of the night and said as much.

"You know after I left Derek, got my job, had Carly and moved to Savannah, even though my life was turned upside down, I still felt confident and in control of my life and my future. I don't know what's happened since then. Reconnecting with Carson has been amazing, but there's been so much chaos lately that I've felt my confidence in myself wavering and I've been questioning my ability to take care of Carly and myself.

"I think my guilty conscience was feeding that lack of confidence or something. I can't imagine Carson not wanting Carly in his life. I should have stood my ground and stayed there to talk it out with him instead of running and now I feel like I've made a total mess. I feel like Charlie."

"Hey, you made a couple mistakes, no one can blame you for trying to protect Carly or for getting a little stuck in your head. You've been through a lot lately with the fire and trying to live at Carson's, but you are nothing like Charlie. She's a hot mess all the time, and you're just going through a phase," Liz assured me.

"Carson has done his best to make me feel at home in his house, but since I haven't gotten the insurance money from the fire yet, it's been difficult. Carly's sleeping in the porta-crib, I'm wearing borrowed clothes..." I shook my head and handed Carly over to Liz as I went to make her a bottle and get some jarred food out for her. "And speaking of Charlie, I need to call her and set her straight. She started this whole disaster of a weekend by telling Derek where to find me. Gah, I could just wring her neck!"

Liz started laughing and set Carly down in her Bumbo seat. "Here, let me feed her while you go get that call with Charlie out of the way. My kids will probably sleep for another hour so I've got time."

Thanking Liz, I left the kitchen and went out on the back porch to call my twin. Sometimes it was unfathomable that we were related. We were so different that if I didn't know better I'd swear she was switched at birth.

"Lou, I'm so glad you called," she answered.

"Charlie, what's wrong?" I asked, taking note of her morose tone.

"It's Aiden. He's cheating on me."

My heart plummeted into my stomach. I had long suspected him of being unfaithful, but hearing Charlie admit it broke my heart.

"How do you know?

"Well, the fact that I walked into our house last night and caught him in the bed with his dick in another woman was a big indicator," she said sarcastically. "But the truth is that things haven't been that great for a while and this was really the icing on the shit cake."

"Fuck. Charlie, I'm so sorry."

"Yeah, yeah. I know you never liked him anyway. I guess now I see why. I think you'll be proud of me though. I packed up everything, took Margaret, and I'm at a hotel right now. I called Mom, and I think I'm going to drive out and stay with them for a while until I figure out what to do."

"I know it's scary, but you'll find your way. It's what we Evans girls do."

"I hope so," she said, but didn't sound convinced. "Did Derek find you?"

"God Charlie. I can't believe you told him where I was. I mean, what were you thinking?"

"I'm really sorry, Lou. I thought I was doing the right thing for both of you. Your marriage was so much like mine that I just thought if I could hold mine together, maybe you could too. From the very first time that we both started having problems with our husbands we had something to bond over. We bitched and moaned about them and I thing we were really close at that time in our lives. Then you decided to get divorced, and I was jealous that you were so easily able to make a decision like that and walk away. Even though I knew Derek gave you every reason in the book to leave him, I hated the thought that we wouldn't have anything to talk about anymore, and that if you would give it a chance, you two could get back together. I was jealous that you had the balls to walk away, and I didn't.

"It got even worse when I saw how happy you were with Carson. I wanted something like that for myself, but I was still stuck in my miserable marriage trying to figure out how to navigate the rest of my life with Aiden, instead of thinking about my happiness, but after walking in on him last night, these feelings of disgust washed over me, and then anger that he would do that to us. It was like something shifted, and I realized I wasn't stuck in this shitty relationship, that I was staying for the wrong reasons, and that he had given me cause to get out. I could leave, and I could be free to start over too. I felt like a weight was lifted off my shoulders. It is scary to consider such a huge life change, but the alternative, staying in a loveless marriage to a complete dickhead, is so much worse.

"I feel like I completely understand what you were going through with Derek, and I'm so sorry that I tried to push you two back together. I can't imagine staying with Aiden after this discovery, and if I had known then what I know now, I never would have tried to push it on you either. I'm really sorry Lou."

I sighed, deciding that I wasn't going to harp on it anymore. Derek knew I didn't want him. Charlie knew she was wrong. It was over.

"Speaking of Derek, you know yesterday he was over at the house trying to convince me that he loved me and then not two hours later I stopped by his hotel room to tell him I never wanted to see him again and he had some woman with him."

"Wow. Derek really had some woman in his hotel room? Like in his bed?"

"Yes, Charlie. Some great men we chose to spend our lives with huh?"

"You can say that again," she laughed.

"He kept saying how he wanted
me
back, but he never said he wanted Carly. I had to remind him about her several times, and each time I did, he'd be like,
oh yeah, Carly too,
but it was like she was just an afterthought."

"Well, what about Carson. He did seem to have a strong bond with Carly. I really didn't give him a fair chance, but I promise I'll rectify that if I ever get to see him again."

I put my head in my hands and looked down at the ground trying to think of a good way to tell her the whole truth, but nothing would come to me so I decided to just lay it out there.

"Charlie, I haven't been one hundred percent truthful with you about Carson. We didn't meet after I moved to Savannah, we met when I came down last March for the interview with Foster & Company."

I let that sit there for a minute, waiting for her to put two and two together. A moment later she gasped.

"Wait, he's the guy you met!? The one night stand?"

"Yes," I breathed out, relieved that I didn't have to spell it out for her.

"He's Carly's father. Why didn't you tell me before?"

"I'm sorry I didn't. I never told you about him initially because I didn't want you to accidentally mention something to Derek. When I found out I was pregnant I told you about my one night stand, but I didn't mention his name to you at all, so you couldn't have known. Liz only knew because she was there when I picked Carly's name. Hell, I didn't even tell Carson until yesterday that he's her father. I couldn't tell you before I talked to him because I knew you two would meet at some point, and I didn't want you to blurt it out and tell him by accident... or on purpose."

"I deserve that, I guess... So, what did he say?"

I groaned. "He was upset and took off. I guess he needed a minute to let the news sink in. In the meantime I packed up all my stuff and drove to Liz's. I've been a total idiot about the whole thing. He never wanted me to leave in the first place and I just took off without saying anything. I'm probably going to go back to Savannah tomorrow and try to smooth things over with him."

"Well, let me know if he won't take you back because I'll be more than happy to kick his ass."

I laughed. "He already texted me to say he loves me and wants me to come home. I'm just so thankful I didn't do too much damage, he was really upset with me."

"Well, given how he stares at you as if you are the best thing that ever happened to him, and seems to love Carly just as much as he loves her mom, I'm pretty sure you're going to be fine," Charlie assured me.

"God, I hope so. I don't know what I'll do with myself if I messed this up," I confessed.

"It has to work out, and you know why? Because your relationship with Carson gives me faith that someday, when I'm ready, I'll find someone who makes me happy too."

I could hear her quiet sobs through the phone and my heart broke for her all over again.

"You will, Charlie. You will," I said with confidence.

Chapter 42

Lou

"Liz? Do you think Zach and Vanessa want to get in the pool? I'm thinking about taking Carly out there."

Liz and Rick had a heated pool at the back of their house, and even though it was October, the weather was mild for this time of year in Virginia, and I wanted to take full advantage of it, especially on such a sunny day.

"I'm sure they'd love it," Liz said. "I think I'll join you all as well."

About fifteen minutes later I was in the pool with Carly in her covered baby lounger while we floated around the pool together watching Zach and Vanessa jump and cannonball off the diving board.

They had so much enthusiasm for life and no idea how quickly it could take a turn for the worst. Sometimes I wished I could go back to being a kid and just enjoy it. No jobs, no money issues, no stress, their only worries were what to eat for dinner, and what to wear to school the next day.

My phone rang from the poolside and I swam over, pulling Carly behind me, to answer it. After five minutes on the phone with the insurance adjuster, it seemed at least some of my stress had been alleviated. They were going to pay my claim on Monday. The money would be wired to my bank account.

I was relieved that I could finally secure a place for Carly and I to live and afford to furnish it. Even if nothing else worked out in our favor, at least we had the silver lining of knowing we'd have a roof over our heads and warm beds to sleep in.

"Hey!" Liz said, coming out onto the patio. "I made margaritas. You want one?"

"I'd love one actually."

"Was that Carson?" she asked, referencing my phone call as she leaned over to hand me a drink.

"No, it was the insurance company. They're finally ready to pay my claim," I told her feeling relief wash over me.

"Oh, that's great news!"

"Yeah, now I'll be able to find a new place for Carly and me to live," I agreed.

"So, what about living with Carson?" she asked, taking a sip of her drink.

"Well, he never really asked me to live with him. It was more like an offer to stay for a while after the fire. I took it as a
just until you get back on your feet
kind of thing, and I wouldn't want to take advantage of that now that I have the means to move. What I need to do is get a game plan for going forward. It's just been so nice to have him around to lean on for support, I felt like I finally had someone to help me raise Carly."

"This is another one of those things Lou. He loves you and he says he wants the both of you in his life. If he's serious about that, then I can't imagine why he'd want you to move out. And if Carson is as smart as you say he is then you should at least hint to him that you're thinking about your own place and give him a chance to ask you to stay," Liz said.

Liz's advice had always been priceless to me. During the end of my marriage to Derek she had been my sounding board and helped me get through the toughest of conversations. I'd always been able to rely on her, and she had never steered me wrong.

After leaving Dr. Roland's office I climbed in my car stunned. I was pregnant with Carson's baby. My god, I didn't know anything about him, not even his last name. How am I going to explain this to Derek?

I fumbled for my cell phone and called Liz.

"Hey Lou, what's up?"

"Liz, you aren't going to believe this..."

"What?" she asked.

"I'm pregnant."

I heard her gasp, apparently as shocked as I was at the news.

"Oh no, Lou. Now even if you do go through with the divorce, you're still going to be stuck with that asshole in your life forever," Liz said, apologetically.

"Liz, it's not Derek's baby! He's sterile."

"Oh my god. And he let you think that you were the one who couldn't get pregnant? What a lying, sorry, piece of shit. All that time you spent being upset over the fact that you couldn't have children and the whole time he knew it was him. What I wouldn't give to have a hall pass to hurt that dickhead."

I laughed. Liz always knew what to say to lighten my spirits.

"So you're having a baby with the one night stand guy? What are you going to do?" Liz asked. "Do you know how to get in touch with him?"

"I have no idea," I sighed. "And I don't know how to tell Derek. He's going to be so angry with me, but at least he'll let me go this way."

"Lou, no way, don't tell Derek about the baby. If you're getting divorced, it's really none of his business, is it? You don't need to rub salt in the wound."

"What do you suggest then, just ask him for a divorce?"

"You need to research some lawyers and talk to someone soon. You also need to tell Derek that you want a divorce, and move out of the house as quickly as possible. You're more than welcome to stay with me as long as you need to, even after the baby is born."

"But..." I protested.

"Lou, just do this one thing for me. I don't want you to tell him. What if he does something rash?"

"You think he would hurt me?" I ask her.

"I don't know, Lou. I've only met the guy a couple of times, but what I do know is that people can react poorly to all sorts of situations, and I'd rather you be safe than sorry. He's hurt you before, and he could be tempted to do it again."

"Okay, Liz. I won't tell him," I told her knowing I'd be devastated if anything happened to my baby. I'd only just found out I was going to be a mother, but I was already in crazy protective mode.

After hanging up with Liz I went straight to my house and packed some of my things. Derek came home as I was loading my car.

"Where are you going?" he asked.

"Can we talk inside?" I asked him, hoping he wouldn't cause a scene out in the yard.

"Whatever it is Lou, just say it."

I contemplated telling him about the baby, but decided to stick with Liz's advice and not bring it up. It would only make things worse and I didn't know how he'd react.

"I want a divorce Derek," I said, meeting his eyes. "We haven't been happy in a while and at this point, after everything, I just don't see how we can move forward. We haven't treated each other well in a long time, and I don't think we can ever get back what we used to have," I said, pleading with my voice and hoping that he'd understand.

"What? How can you do this to me?" he asked.

"Derek, please lower your voice," I said, looking around the neighborhood, hoping none of our neighbors were overhearing our conversation.

"Lou, don't do this to us. Let's go to counseling, you can quit your job, I'll stop sleeping around, we can be happy again if you'll just give us a chance."

I shook my head. "Derek, I'm sorry, but I've given you as much time as I can and nothing has seemed to change."

"This isn't what I wanted Lou. I just wanted to take care of you, and provide for you. I wanted to give you everything, but you wouldn't let me. God, I'm such a failure," he ranted, grabbing at his hair.

He said he wanted to provide for me and give me everything, but I knew what he meant was that he wanted to possess and control me.

"You're not a failure Derek, we've failed at this together."

"My mom isn't going to see it that way. She's going to see my failure to become a father, and my failed marriage and think I'm worthless."

I didn't agree with that. She would probably blame it all on me since her son could do no wrong, but I didn't think it needed to be said. He'd find out soon enough.

"I'm sorry Derek, but I've made up my mind. I'm going to go stay with Liz for a while until I can figure the rest out," I told him.

"Fine. I should have known this was coming, so just get your stuff and go. I won't try to stop you," he said, turning to go inside the house.

I stood there staring at his back, wondering what had just happened. He wasn't going to hurl insults or tell me how it was all my fault?

"So, that's it?" I asked, unwilling to let it drop.

"Yeah, that's it," he said, stopping at turning around. "I'm done trying to make you happy when it's obvious I have no idea how to do that, so just do me a favor, get your stuff and go."

I clenched my jaw and followed him into the house, rounding up a few more necessities and promising to come by with a truck to move some things into storage as soon as I could.

Later that night as I sat with Liz at her kitchen table, telling her how Derek reacted, she said, "That loser didn't know what he had when he had it. How could he just let you walk out the door? I mean, for your sake I'm glad it went that way, but it's obvious he's not a very smart man.  A smart man would never have let you just walk away."

Liz was right then, about Derek not being smart, and definitely about keeping the baby a secret based on his later reaction to the fact that I was pregnant. I had to believe that she was right in this case too, and that Carson would want us all to be a family, and would ask us to stay with him. I couldn't wait to get back to Savannah.