They spent all day in bed. It was one of the few times that Hannah was going to allow herself to be lazy but it was more than worth it as they cuddled together between rounds of lovemaking. They ordered takeout food and ate it in barely any clothes at all as they lounged together in the sheets and eventually drifted off to sleep when the night came. Hannah didn’t even care that she’d missed a lecture at school. This was worth it.
The next morning, she was completely energized. The first thing she looked at when she woke was the sparkling diamond on her finger and thought of everything it represented. It shined like a star right below her eyes and seemed to have a luster all its own in the pale, dim light of the early morning. She got up like her hips were on a well-oiled hinge and yawned into the morning with a smile on her face. She looked over and saw Chance, still fast asleep, his mouth hanging open into his pillow. Once or twice she caught him drooling like that.
She got out of bed, thankful that the morning sickness phase of this pregnancy was over because she didn’t want anything to ruin this day for her. The sun was getting ready to shine through the trees, the spring air was slowly turning into summer enough that they could sleep with the windows open, and the coffee maker was waiting for her to start her day. Everything about this was almost too incredibly perfect but she was going to let herself enjoy it. She wasn’t going to let the what-ifs and the paranoia at the back of her mind get anywhere near her.
Ben was gone. He decided to go express his hyper masculinity elsewhere and ruin other lives. Their lives could begin. She’d be a lawyer soon, Chance would be her husband. They had a beautiful lakeside home and a future waiting for him.
She wanted to thank him. He’d been so perfect and kind to her recently that she wanted to get him something more. She knew he’d say that the baby and the nursery and the nights they spent together and the mornings thereafter were plenty of thanks and praise for everything but she wanted to show him more. She never wanted to stop showing him gratitude. So she poured herself some coffee and set to getting dressed in the early morning. She’d go find him something, she wasn’t sure what, but she’d know it when she saw it.
She’d never gotten him an actual gift before so it would be a nice practice for his birthday or Christmas. Maybe she’d get him some sort of fancy accessory for his bike or some kind of expensive lighter with an engraving. She wasn’t sure, but she knew she wanted to get out of the house and come home with something that would make his eyes light up. She could never match the gift of the engagement ring, but she could try.
She left him a note so he didn’t worry and headed out to the store just as the sun was crowning over the tops of the trees that were around the lake. She got into the car that Kat had loaned them and headed into town with the radio blaring and her windows down. She loved the summer. She knew it wouldn’t last forever but she was so ready to be out of the long drawl of winter that she was willing to wake up anyone else she met on her way to the mall to let out all this happy energy.
Maybe it was a little obvious that she got laid last night.
***
She’d gone through window shopping many of the stores. She didn’t think Chance liked sports enough to appreciate some kind of jersey or hat from a local team. She wondered if she could get something embroidered with the Knight’s logo but also didn’t want to disrespect the club if it was somehow against protocol. She had a smoothie in her hand and was looking at the ties in one store when she realized that the gift she was going to return to Chance with was the least of her worries.
She saw him. At least she thought she did. It was just a flash and then he was gone but she’d know those eyes anywhere. Ben had a way of getting his gaze to pierce, no matter where he looked at you from. She remembered the murder in those eyes from the night that he held a gun to her head and threatened to take her away from the future she was now in.
But the more she looked, the more he was gone. She stepped towards the place where she’d seen him, lingering between the fragrance section and the shoes. But he was gone. There was nothing there. The crowd had moved in like high tide and then Ben and his haunting face were gone completely, not even a sign of his back to show her he’d walked away. Maybe she was seeing things, maybe she hadn’t gotten enough sleep last night or maybe it was some pregnancy side effect she didn’t know about. She could make an OB/GYN appointment.
But no. She’d seen him. You couldn’t make up the way those eyes sent a chill down her spine. Not even her memory could make them as real as they’d looked just a moment ago. Ben had been here, Ben had been watching her. He knew where to find her in a public place, what kept him from knowing where she returned home at night?
She wondered what was going to be irresponsible, calling Chance and scaring him for no reason or not calling him and thus giving him no warning that something strange was going on? She needed to make a decision before she had something of a small meltdown in the middle of the department store.
She dialed Chance, if only to hear his voice. It was always a sound that calmed her down.
“Hey babe, got the note how’s—”
“Chance, I saw him.”
“Huh?”
He was still groggy with sleep and she imagined him sitting at the island in the kitchen in nothing but his boxers and a mug of coffee in front of him. She needed him to wake up, however. She needed him alert. She needed someone to tell her that she was being paranoid and wrong about the whole thing.
“Ben, Chance. I saw him in the mall.”
“What?”
He was awake now. Maybe he was pacing around the kitchen, maybe he dropped the coffee mug in surprise. But his voice was nothing but venom and it almost scared her. But she didn’t care. Even if this was a false alarm, she needed to see it through. She needed Chance to know.
“He’s gone now. I’m not even sure—I don’t know. But I saw his eyes Chance, his eyes. They were so real and then they were gone. He just slipped into the crowd and disappeared.”
“Come home,” Chance ordered. “Now. We’ll figure it out but you need to come home. We need to sort this out together where you’re safe.”
She didn’t disagree, and that invitation had been the advice she’d been looking for. She put down her shopping bag, ignored the fact that she had planned to buy several maternity clothes in her hands, and moved towards the exit.
“Stay on the phone with me until I get to the car,” she begged.
“I will.”
He ended up staying on the phone with her the whole way home.