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  He took a deep breath. Rhys knew they’d eventually have this talk. It was a long time coming. “I should have told you a long time ago, but I guess I kept putting it off. I just never wanted you to feel that I could love you anymore if we were related by blood. As far as I’m concerned I am your father and nothing will change that. I love you, sweetie. Forgive me?”

  “I knew.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I knew you weren’t my birth father. I’ve known since I was ten.”

  “What…how?”

  “I heard you and Uncle Colin talk about it one day. He was saying you’d have to tell me one day, and you said you didn’t want to hurt me.”

  “Oh, sweetheart, why didn’t you ever say anything?”

  She shrugged. “I thought if it was out in the open it would change things. I don’t want to lose you and I…I guess I got scared.” A tear slid down her cheek.

  Carys was breaking his heart. That she’d carried this around for so long must have been a strain. Rhys wrapped his arms around her and hugged her close. “You’ve got to know how much I love you and nothing and no one is more important to me than you.”

  “Not even, Sadie?”

  Rhys’s heart wrenched at the reminder. Sadie had been as important to him as Carys, but now she wasn’t. She was nothing to him. Or at least she would be when he was finally able to get over her. He had to remember what had happened and stay firm. “No. Not that it matters because it’s over.”

  “You…you really liked her didn’t you?”

  He firmed his lips not wanting to even talk about it. “It doesn’t matter anymore. We’re over. The minute she did what she did to you…well, I’m really sorry it happened.”

  “Do you know if she’s okay? I mean…is she out of the hospital?”

  He’d called the hospital a few days ago to check on her status and was told she’d been released. “Yes.”

  “Will she be okay?”

  “I guess she will, but you no longer need to concern yourself with that anymore. From now on it’s just you and me kid.” He wrapped his arm around her shoulders.

  “You really liked her didn’t you?” She asked again.

  “I’d rather not talk about it if you don’t mind, honey.”

  “But you did, didn’t you? You haven’t been the same. You look tired all the time and you just pick at your food. I’m worried, Daddy.”

  “Let’s just say, I liked the person I thought she was.”

  “You’re hurting now because of it.”

  “Carys—”

  “What if it was my fault that she—”

  “Don’t you dare blame yourself for what she did! She had no right to lay a hand on you. What I feel...felt for her doesn’t matter anymore. I have to deal with it. Okay? Can we drop this please?”

  “But I…I’m sorry okay?”

  “You have nothing to be sorry for. I should be the one who’s sorry. I should have spent more time with you. In fact—” He was cut off when the phone rang. “Hang on a second, honey.” Rhys stood up, walked to his desk and answered the phone. “Edwards’ residence.”

  “Mr. Edwards, this is Pricilla Barnes at the Hickory Hollow Stables. I’m afraid I have a bit of troubling news for you.”

  That was where their horses were boarded. “Is everything okay with the horses?”

  “I’m sorry, but no. It appears Buttercup has fallen ill. The vet is still here and it doesn’t look good.”

  “What’s the matter with her?”

  Carys walked over to him, anxiety shining in her eyes. “Daddy, what’s wrong with the horses?”

  “There was a puncture wound on her left flank. We thought maybe she’d brushed up against something and scratched herself, but the vet found a needle embedded in Buttercup’s flesh. I don’t know when it happened, but the wound has become infected and the infection has spread. The vet doesn’t hold out much hope that Buttercup will make it through the night. I’m very sorry.”

  “I’ll be down right away.” He hung up with a groan. This was the absolute worse time for something like this to happen. Carys would be beside herself.

  Carys clutched his arm, her fear evident. “What’s wrong, Daddy?”

  He shook his head. “Carys…I’m so sorry.”

  * * *

  “Who was it on the phone a few minutes ago?” Sadie had been in the bathroom when she’d heard the phone ring, but when she came out neither of her sisters mentioned a phone call.

  Daisy pursed her lips and folded her arms over her chest. “It was the father of Satan.”

  Sadie frowned. It took a few seconds before she got what her sister was talking about. “Rhys? What did he want?”

  Daisy shrugged. “Who knows and who cares. You don’t need the aggravation. The doctors said no stress or you’ll end up in the hospital again. Speaking of stress, I really think you need to take a leave of absence from your job.”

  “You really should,” Rose chimed in. “I mean, your blood pressure is higher than it should be and being as that you’re almost through your first trimester without any prenatal care, you should really be taking care of yourself.”

  Sadie rolled her eyes. She loved her sisters to death, would do anything for them, but they drove her crazy with their babying her. From the time she was born, they’d played substitute mothers to her and all were extremely overprotective. Where her mother didn’t seem to give a shit about her wellbeing at times, they seemed to overcompensate for it.

  Sadie propped her feet on the coffee table and leaned back against the couch. “The doctor didn’t say I needed to be on bed rest just that I need to take care of myself. And without a doctor’s note, there’s no guarantee I’d still have a job if I were to wait until the baby was born and then take another couple months off after the delivery.”

  Daisy waved her hand dismissively. “You don’t have to worry about your job. Between me, Rose and Lily, we can take care of your expenses. And if you want to go to school and get your degree, we’ll take care of tuition.”

  She rolled her eyes. It was an old argument and one she didn’t intend to back down from. “I don’t need you guys to pay my bills. And I wouldn’t feel comfortable having you guys pay for school. That’s what grants and financial aid are for if I choose to go.”

  Rose blinked. “Why not? We make plenty of money. You don’t have to work if you don’t want to.”

  Sadie rolled her eyes. “Do you guys hear yourselves? Maybe I’m not the head of the HR department at a huge corporation, or a high powered entertainment attorney or a supermodel, but I like my job just fine, and I like paying my own bills and I enjoy my independence. And another thing, I know you guys are just trying to help, but I’ll eventually have to talk to Rhys because of the baby. He has a right to know.”

  Daisy patted her on the hand. “Sweetie, we know that, but you’re in a precarious emotional state right now. You don’t need him complicating your life any more than it already is.” She spoke to Sadie as if she was indulging a child. That drove her absolutely nuts.

  When she was at the hospital, the doctors had wanted to keep her a couple extra days to monitor her blood pressure because of the baby. Daisy and Rose had shown up and along with Lily, the three of them had been hovering over her like mother hens. It wasn’t so bad when they were at the hospital because Sadie could feign sleep and they wouldn’t bother her as much.

  But here at home, they wouldn’t leave her alone. Because her arm was in a cast and her butt was still sore, they wouldn’t let her lift a finger. They screened her calls. That part she didn’t mind so much since she had managed to avoid her mother, but every little thing she attempted to do was thwarted. Thank God Lily would eventually go home, but Daisy and Rose who had both freed up their calendars to be here, were driving her nuts. Sadie seriously considered running away.

  “I’m pregnant, not on my deathbed. You guys are treating me like I’m some invalid and it’s getting tired. If you two haven’t forgotten, I’m a g
rown woman and it would be nice if I was treated like one. And another thing, I’m going back to work next week. I don’t need the two of you to be my nursemaids. I’m not the first woman to have her heartbroken and I certainly won’t be the last. Furthermore, I will get in contact with Rhys because it’s the right thing to do and not when you two decide my situation isn’t so precarious. Got it?” She’d said it more aggressively than she meant to and instantly regretted her words.

  Rose and Daisy looked positively crestfallen.

  Unable to bear the disappointment and hurt in their eyes, she swung her feet off the coffee table and stood up and headed to her bedroom. Once inside her sanctuary, she closed the door and lay down. She didn’t mean to hurt their feelings; normally she’d rather lose a limb than to do that. Maybe it was the pregnancy hormones that had caused her to lash out. She didn’t know. But it was hard to sort out her feelings when she wasn’t allowed time to herself to think about them.

  Maybe it was a good thing because, since her sisters’ arrival, she hadn’t had much time to dwell on the horseback riding incident. A shudder moved through her body as she thought of what could have happened. People died from falling off of horses, especially at that pace. That Carys would go to those lengths to get rid of her spoke of something much deeper than Sadie had even imagined. But then again, for a split second, Sadie had read something in the girl’s eyes that she hadn’t suspected. Regret. It didn’t matter though because the adrenaline flow had carried her over to the teenager and caused her to strike.

  Sadie had never raised her hand to anyone in her life and it still sickened her that she had. If she thought an apology would have made a difference, she would have given one, but the look in Rhys’s eyes when he saw her in the hospital told her it was over. She cursed herself for being all kinds of fool, for not telling him about Carys. The girl clearly needed help. And as long as she hated Sadie there was no future for her and Rhys. She’d recognized it weeks ago but had been fighting against the inevitable.

  Sadie loved Rhys. He’d touched her heart and spirit in ways that Terrell or Jordan never could. Had there been another woman in the picture vying for his love, Sadie would have fought for him tooth and nail. But she couldn’t make him choose between her and his teenage daughter.

  It was just as well, as much as it hurt—hurt so much she still couldn’t bring herself to cry, she had her baby to think about. As she’d told her sisters she would get in contact with Rhys about the baby, because like she said, he had a right to know. But from there, she had to decide what she’d do next. There was no way she’d be able to trust Carys around her baby and Rhys definitely wasn’t the kind of man who’d not be in his child’s life. Even though she was still getting used to the idea of her pregnancy, Sadie already loved her child more than life and she’d do absolutely anything in her power to protect him or her from harm. She’d have to ask Daisy what her legal options were before she decided how she wanted to handle it.

  Sadie’s arm hurt which meant the painkillers were wearing off, but she didn’t want to take them. She welcomed the pain if for nothing else to distract her from the ache she felt within.

  A soft knock on her door broke her out of silent musings. She released a deep sigh and called out, “Come in.”

  Daisy and Rose walked in looking contrite. They came inside and sat on the bed next to her, one on each side.

  “We’re sorry,” Rose said quietly. “I know we can be pushy, but it’s because we love you and you’re our baby sister and sometimes it’s hard to forget that you’re all grown up and capable of making your own decisions.”

  Sadie managed to sit up. “I’m sorry for snapping at you two. I know you mean well and I appreciate you acknowledging that I am an adult. But don’t think I’m not grateful for the support you’ve given me.”

  Daisy rubbed Sadie’s back. “I’m sorry too, kiddo. Like Rose said, we sometimes get carried away. I guess we appointed ourselves as your protectors because you’re just too sweet for your own good. You let people take advantage of you and you sacrifice so much. You could have done so much more with your life, been so much more.”

  Sadie sighed. “Don’t start that again, Daisy.”

  “But you gave up your scholarship. You shouldn’t have done that. We would have made sure Thorn was taken care of.”

  Sadie shook her head. “But that’s just it. You guys were all getting established in your careers. I couldn’t have you interrupt your lives when you all were on the fast track to success. It just made more sense that I be the one to take care of him. I didn’t mind. Besides, I wouldn’t have had it any other way. I loved him. It wasn’t like Mom would have been much help. It was my pleasure. So please don’t make it seem like it was a big sacrifice for me.”

  “You could have been finished with med school by now,” Rose reminded her.

  It had been Sadie’s dream to eventually be a pediatrician, but dreams sometimes had a way of changing. Now she simply wanted to be happy, something that was probably a long way off. For now, she was content with her quiet life, and writing poems and now raising her child. “Maybe one day.” She shrugged, it wasn’t that important to her anymore. What was, was her baby.

  Daisy raised a brow. “So when do you plan on telling Rhys about the baby? You do know there is absolutely no way, I’m going to allow my niece or nephew to spend one second around the bride of darkness?”

  Sadie would have been annoyed with her sister’s bossy tone if she hadn’t been thinking the same thing herself. “When I can figure out a way that my child won’t be harmed by Carys. She may have hurt me, but I’ll be damned if I let her have a chance to do it to my baby.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  Sadie breathed a sigh of relief when Daisy had to fly back to LA to deal with one of her clients she referred to as ‘the brat’, some young hotshot that Hollywood touted as a bad boy. Daisy had been more than a little perturbed to have her vacation cut short, but apparently, her client wouldn’t stop blowing up her cell phone. She left with the promise to return as soon as she could.

  Sadie was sad to see her go, but happy at the same time because her sisters still attempted to coddle her to the point where she wanted to scream. Lily still came by on a daily basis, but at least she eventually went home at nights. Rose, on the other hand, was in between contracts and had arranged her schedule so that she wouldn’t have any more big photo shoots for another few weeks. Sadie didn’t mind too much because Rose was the most laidback of her sisters and tended to not hover as much, although she too could get overbearing if she wanted to.

  It was kind of nice having someone around to talk to, to shop with and to take her mind off of the mess she called her life. And Sadie was getting used to doing everything one-handed. The downside to having her arm in a cast was that it itched like a son of a bitch, and the simple things she took for granted like dressing herself was a pain in the ass.

  At Sadie’s insistence, she went back to work. Getting back into a routine also gave her relief from thoughts of Rhys. By the end of her full week back on the job, Sadie knew she had to tell him about the baby. There was no point in putting it off because the end result would be the same whether she waited to tell him now or later: they would still be apart.

  Her heart still ached for him and she missed him more than she thought possible, but she had her child to think of and its safety. Even though she’d come to the realization that he had every right to be upset with her for slapping Carys, especially since from his perspective felt it was unprovoked, she wouldn’t let that monster anywhere near her baby. In retrospect, Rhys had shown a great amount of restraint, more than she would have had the roles been reversed.

  When they had been dating she’d familiarized herself with his office hours and would sometimes stop by his department on her breaks so she’d made a mental appointment to show up when she knew he’d be available. The planning was the easy part, when she had to stand in front of his office door and knock was the hard part. She must ha
ve stood there for at least ten minutes, five of those minutes she considered turning around and walking away, but finally, with a burst of bravado she tapped on his door and braced herself.

  “Come in.” She missed that sexy baritone voice and how it made her feel when they made love.

  Taking a deep breath, she turned the knob and stepped inside his office. He didn’t look up at first so she got a chance to observe Rhys without him noticing. It had only been a couple of weeks since she’d last seen him, but he looked as if he’d lost weight and there was at least three days’ worth of stubble on his face. Rhys had always kept his appearance tidy so it broke her heart to see him like this. He was just as broken as she was and she didn’t know if that made her feel better or worse.

  “Hi, Rhys.”

  He brought his head up sharply when he recognized her voice. The color drained from his face as if he’d seen a ghost and then it turned beet red. “What are you doing here, Sadie?”

  “I think it’s time we had a talk.”

  “About what, Sadie? How you attacked my daughter? How she’s torn up and blaming herself for our breakup?”

  She could barely keep herself from rolling her eyes. The only thing Carys was probably upset about was not having Sadie around to torture anymore. “I owe you an apology for what happened. There are no excuses and if I had done things differently, then it would never have come to that.”

  He frowned. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means exactly what I said. May I sit down please?”

  He shrugged. “You plan on staying that long?”

  Her cheeks flamed at his less than welcoming words. But what did she expect? “Okay, if you prefer that I stand fine, what I need to tell you shouldn’t take that long. And I’ll get out of your hair.”

  He sighed, raking his fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry. That was rude of me. Please have a seat, Sadie. How’s your arm by the way.”

  “No. That’s okay. My break won’t be much longer so I won’t keep you. And the arm is getting better thanks. There’s really no sense in beating around the bush so I’m going to come right out and say it. I’m pregnant and it yours. I’m not telling you this because I’m looking for money. I’m capable of looking after myself and the baby, but I thought you had the right to know.”