Waverly pulled back. Her mascara was running down her cheeks, but she didn’t seem to care. “You’re all right?” she kept asking. “And the baby?”
“We think the baby’s fine, just needs a checkup, and your sister needs to rest,” Johan assured her. Waverly looked from Beau to Johan, beaming through her tears. She managed to still look radiant despite the pink eyes and wet cheeks. “You saved us,” she said. “I don’t know what we would have done without you. Thank you.”
“Our pleasure,” Johan said simply.
Beau shifted from foot to foot, a bashful hero. “Anything for you, Boss,” he said. “You’re the brave one. We never would have found you if you hadn’t given us the information.”
“I had help,” Waverly said, her voice softening. “A very courageous young woman helped us get rescued.” Waverly hesitated, looking at Beau. “Where’s Andrew?” she asked, her expression hopeful and a little timid.
Beau looked down. “I haven’t heard from him,” he admitted finally. “I don’t know where he is.” He looked at her apologetically.
Waverly took a deep breath and squared her shoulders. “Well then,” she said, but her voice caught on the words. She said no more. Charlie reached out and took her sister’s hand, squeezing it in solidarity. She didn’t know what was happening between Waverly and Andrew, but she knew it was hurting her sister. Waverly did not respond. Her hand lay limp in Charlie’s grasp, the cold diamond of her solitaire engagement ring pressing into Charlie’s palm.
The next few hours were a blur. Waverly and Charlie gave detailed statements to the chief of police, who deigned to do the interview in the bedroom so Charlie could remain lying down. He was a granite-faced man who treated them kindly, if a bit gruffly. He was a father of a daughter about their age, he explained, and a grandfather too. He was deeply embarrassed that the kidnapping had happened in his country. When he understood about Charlie’s contractions and the need to get to a hospital in Belgrade, he made the remaining questioning go as quickly and smoothly as possible.
Partway through the interview process, Johan received a phone call. When he hung up he waited for a pause in the interview and updated them both. “When Waverly was texting us she mentioned that you suspected Ilir was the one responsible for drugging you and bringing you here. We passed that information to the police in Budapest, and I just got a call that they’ve arrested him. He confessed to everything. He’s being charged as an accomplice in your kidnapping.”
The news of his arrest should have come as a relief, but it made Charlie sad instead. Ilir with his laughing eyes and endearingly cocky swagger. He was young and idealistic, easily swayed by men more calculated and powerful than himself. He had gotten caught up in something that would cost him dearly.
By evening they were on their way to Belgrade in one of Care Network’s minivans, Charlie’s backpack and Waverly’s roller safely stowed in the back. Only their cell phones were missing. Charlie shrugged it off, stating that she’d just get another phone in Budapest, but Waverly fretted about the loss of her iPhone. Before they set off she asked to borrow Beau’s phone and sent one text, then handed it back with a troubled look on her face.
Johan drove, Beau navigated, and Waverly sat in the middle seat, while Charlie lay as comfortably as possible in the backseat. They stopped at a tiny store at a crossroads, and Waverly and Johan gathered supplies, coming out with their arms full of snacks and bottles of water. Once more on their way, Waverly made sandwiches from fresh white bread and slices of salami. Beau munched on a package of potato chips and told them about the media frenzy surrounding Waverly’s abduction.
“As soon as that first YouTube video was posted, it went viral. Your face was on every television station and every newspaper in the country. And now that you’ve been found, it will only intensify, at least for a while. We’re keeping your location a secret for now while the kidnapping investigation is under way and because of Charlie testifying, but CNN just broke the news a few hours ago that you’ve been found alive and unharmed.” Beau gestured to his phone. “I just checked my e-mail, and Ellen DeGeneres wants to interview you as soon as you get home. So does Good Morning America.” Beau waved his empty potato chip packet grandly. “With all this publicity, the Food Network is going to want to renew for at least two seasons, I’m guessing.” He grinned. “I’m telling you, Boss, you couldn’t have gotten this much media coverage if we’d spent a million bucks. This was golden. You were one of the top hits on Google last week.”
Waverly looked pleased and handed Beau another salami sandwich. “Well, I did my best,” she said. “A professional is always a professional, no matter the circumstances. Charlie did very well too,” she said graciously. “It was a team effort.”
Waverly was trying to be strong, to pretend that she was just fine, but Charlie could sense the sorrow and worry that lay just beneath the surface. Charlie herself was feeling much better. Reclining on the backseat, she devoured two sandwiches and an entire packet of potato chips, suddenly ravenous with relief.
It was a long drive, more than six hours, and they drove through the night without stopping. Beau dozed off after a few hours. Johan drove silently, seemingly wrapped in his own thoughts. At Charlie’s request he put on some music, a favorite blues rock playlist of his, and the soulful sounds of Eric Clapton and Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers played softly against the background hum of the tires on the pavement. Waverly put her back to the side window and stretched her legs out across the seat. She was still wearing the gaudy cocktail gown, her hair half falling down in waves to her shoulders. She leaned her head back against the window and closed her eyes.
In the darkness Charlie could just make out her sister’s outline, the pert nose, the downturned mouth. She seemed so sad.
“You okay?” Charlie asked, keeping her voice pitched low so Johan couldn’t hear them, already knowing the answer.
Waverly shook her head. “He didn’t come,” she said softly. “I thought . . . I thought he would come, but he didn’t even contact Beau. How could he not at least call Beau and ask about me? I texted him just now from Beau’s phone, but he hasn’t responded.” She sounded hurt and a little bewildered.
“What’s going on with you two?” Charlie asked, shifting, trying to get comfortable against the seat.
Waverly sighed. “I wanted something so badly and couldn’t take no for an answer,” she admitted finally. “I didn’t listen to what he wanted. And by the time he was able to make me hear, I’m afraid it was too late.” She sounded so resigned.
“Was it about your career?” Charlie asked.
“No.” Waverly didn’t elaborate.
“Oh.” Charlie laid her hand on her stomach, over the baby, understanding dawning. She had a queasy feeling in the pit of her stomach, the sensation of falling from a solid place into thin air. She had noticed how unenthusiastic Andrew had seemed about the plan, but Waverly had seemed sure enough for both of them. Charlie had assumed they had come to some agreement privately. Apparently not. But what did that mean, then? Did Andrew not want the baby? What would Waverly do, raise the child by herself?
“What are you going to do?” Charlie asked, hoping her sister had a strategy, a plan to make things come out right.
Waverly shifted on the seat, leaning her head against the window, looking out at the darkened countryside whizzing by. “I don’t know,” she finally admitted.
But this baby was coming whether they were ready or not. And Charlie suddenly felt very unready.
CHAPTER 28
Belgrade, Serbia
Waverly came fully awake with a start in the early hours of the morning as they pulled into the parking lot of a darkened, squat concrete office building. “Where are we?” she asked, peering out the window. She had been dozing, thinking of Andrew and the night he proposed to her. He’d hidden the ring in a gorgeous bunch of gardenias and then when the time came could not locate it. He’d been flustered, down on one knee rummaging among the blossoms for th
e silk ribbon with the ring attached. She had thought it was adorable. Now it made her feel like crying. What was she going to do? She missed him so much, the longing felt like a sob caught in her throat. She shook her head, trying to bring herself firmly back to the present. She swallowed hard. “Is this the obstetrician’s office?”
Charlie nodded. Johan had called in a favor to a doctor he knew, who had agreed to see them as soon as they got into town. They were going to check on the baby.
They left Beau sleeping in the front seat and filed quietly into the darkened office building through a side door. Inside they all shook hands with the doctor, a gruff, heavyset man in a rumpled white coat. Johan laid his hand on Charlie’s arm as the doctor led the way to the examination room. “I’ll wait here for you.”
Waverly noted how his hand lingered on Charlie’s arm, how Charlie leaned in ever so slightly to his touch. She smothered a little satisfied smile. It had been too long since Charlie had let someone care for her. It had been too long since she’d had someone to lean on. Charlie’s fiancé, Shane, had been sweet but too soft. Waverly had only met him briefly the one time Charlie had brought him back to the US from Johannesburg, but the impression he’d left had been one of idealism and a dreamy sort of optimism. Hardship would have snapped him. Charlie had been the strong one in that relationship. But Johan projected a solid, steady calm. He was a man to trust in a crisis, to depend on. He was an oak tree, strong enough for her sister. Plus, he was quite good-looking in a clean-cut sort of way, with those broad shoulders and that delicious accent to boot.
Waverly followed Charlie and the doctor, taking a seat by the exam table in a clean but worn exam room. Charlie pulled down the top of her jeans and lay back on the table. The doctor asked her some questions, then squeezed gel from a tube onto her stomach. And then Waverly realized she was about to see the baby. Her stomach did a quick little flip. Nervously she gripped the arms of the chair. In a moment she would be seeing her child for the first time.
The ultrasound screen flickered black and white, the image wavering indiscernibly for a second. And then all of a sudden there was the baby, a clear profile—little lips and nose and forehead. She was sucking her thumb, seemingly relaxed.
The doctor zoomed the ultrasound wand around Charlie’s stomach, then said, “All is okay. No problem. Baby is good.”
Waverly released a breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding.
Charlie nodded, looking immensely relieved too. “Can you tell if it’s a boy or a girl?” she asked.
The doctor furrowed his brow, moving the wand to a different position and studying the image for a moment. “A boy. It is a boy. See, here.” He pointed.
The little dark bump looked indiscernible to Waverly, but the doctor was certain. Charlie grinned. “I knew it. I knew it was a boy.”
Waverly blinked, taken aback. In theory she did not care about gender. Girl or boy, either was fine, just as long as the baby was happy and healthy. But still she felt oddly disappointed. She had been so certain it was a girl because of her recurring dreams. She had bonded somehow with that little dark-haired girl. Now she was faced with the reality of this child, a boy, not the little girl whose face she had been dreaming about over and over in the past few months.
Charlie rested her hands gently around her belly, cradling the child. “So he’s okay? Nothing to worry about?”
The doctor shrugged. “We cannot predict early labor, so he could come at any time, but he is stable. Rest and avoid stress. You will be okay.”
While Charlie wiped gel from her stomach and dressed, Waverly sat quietly in the chair. The doctor had printed out a photo of the ultrasound, and she studied it, tracing the contours of the baby’s face, his little thumb stuck in his mouth. Looking at his face, she tried to swallow her disappointment. He was healthy and well. That was all that mattered, she told herself. But it was not all that mattered, not to her, not if she were honest. For the first time Waverly felt a tiny niggling of misgiving in the pit of her stomach. Charlie had known it was a boy, while Waverly had been imagining a different child altogether. That fact, coupled with Andrew’s strong misgivings, were making her feelings about the baby complicated. She wanted him, of course she wanted him, but when she looked at the baby’s face she felt no recognition whatsoever. He was a little stranger in her sister’s belly.
She tucked the photo in her purse and tried to put away her doubts.
They piled back into the van.
“Where are we going?” Charlie asked as they turned out of the doctor’s office parking lot and headed back toward the outskirts of Belgrade. The early morning was still black around them and chilly, the streets almost deserted.
“Somewhere safe,” Johan said. He didn’t elaborate. From the passenger seat Beau gave a wheezy snore and shifted deeper into sleep. Charlie nodded, seemingly satisfied, and settled back against the window, closing her eyes. In a moment she was also asleep, her head tilted back, mouth open a little.
Waverly remained awake. She reached into her purse and touched the ultrasound photo. She thought of Andrew and that disastrous breakfast at the Paradise Hotel. I love you, my darling, he’d told her, I will always love you. But we do not want the same future, and I don’t know what we can possibly do to change that.
She had thought he would come around, that she could somehow convince him to change his mind. But it looked as though she was wrong. She bit her lip, imagining her world devoid of Andrew. It was unthinkable. His presence in her life was her bedrock, a steady point from which all else in her life radiated. If he were absent, what would she have to stand on? How could she possibly raise a child without him? Had she made a mistake?
No, she told herself firmly. She could not think like that. What’s done is done. There was the reality of the baby, alive, healthy, and coming in a few months or less. This was the child she had longed for and cried for. It did not matter that it was not the child she had been dreaming of. He was her responsibility, her blessing. In a few months he would be in her arms. Indeed, the nursery was already set up, the beautiful Restoration Hardware crib already made up with Egyptian cotton sheets in a pale buttercup hue. She could not abandon the baby any more than she could imagine her life without Andrew. She was truly stuck.
The ride took a little less than twenty minutes. Johan pulled up to a quiet, dark house and switched off the ignition.
“We’re here.” He opened the driver’s door. “Wake Charlie, will you?”
With a sigh Waverly untangled her legs from the sequined evening dress and slipped her feet into the uncomfortable matching high heels. Johan did not wake Beau. “The fewer people who know about this place the better,” he said when she asked if she should rouse him. Waverly gently shook Charlie. “We’re here,” she whispered, although she had no idea exactly where here was. She thought they were still somewhere in Belgrade.
Charlie stretched and yawned, then clambered awkwardly out of the backseat, following Waverly down the narrow concrete walkway to the front door. They appeared to be in a residential area, with rows of tidy, darkened houses sleeping behind gates and fences. Somewhere a dog barked and another answered it. Otherwise all was silent. The house was large and traditional looking, with white walls and a red-tile roof that sloped down over a wide porch. Johan knocked lightly on the front door, and from somewhere in the recesses of the house a light sprang to life. After a moment the door opened and a dark-haired woman poked her head out, eyeing them. Behind her an enormous Great Dane nosed his head around her hip. Waverly took an instinctive step back, but the dog merely looked at them with mild interest.
“Where are we?” Charlie asked.
“This is a safe house,” Johan answered them, greeting the woman in halting Serbian. “It’s for women who have been rescued or escaped trafficking. You’ll stay here until the trial is over.” He ushered them into the front hall and closed the door behind him. “No one knows you’re here, and we need to keep it that way for the safety of the
other women.” His voice was sober. “This is Vesna, the housemother. She’ll look after you. Tell no one where you are. Do you understand?”
Charlie nodded and yawned hugely.
“That won’t be hard,” Waverly muttered. “Neither of us has a phone, and frankly, I haven’t had any idea where I am since we left Sarajevo.”
“Good.” Johan smiled tiredly. “Let’s just keep it that way for now.”
The next morning Waverly and Charlie arrived early for breakfast after spending a very short night in twin beds in a spartan but functional room. Vesna had handed them towels, pointed out the communal bathroom and the dining room where breakfast would be served at seven thirty, and left them alone. Fatigued, they had not even bothered to shower but had fallen into their beds, desperate for sleep.
A little after seven, showered and somewhat refreshed, Waverly trailed Charlie down the stairs, looking around curiously. She could hear movement and voices in other rooms but saw no one else. The house was large and spacious with beige tile floors, wide doorways, and minimal furnishings. The scent of toast drifted up the stairs, buttery and enticing, and Waverly’s stomach rumbled. It had been many hours since the salami sandwiches in the van. They entered an open dining/kitchen area with two long wooden tables and a bay window overlooking a fenced backyard. The Great Dane from the night before was outside and standing at the window, pressing his enormous muzzle to the glass, eyeing them. There was only one other person downstairs when they arrived, a petite girl with a dark auburn ponytail. She wore glasses with thick yellow plastic frames. She was standing over a toaster with a bag of sliced bread.
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