Because of Them (Because of Love #2)

Chapter One

AUDREY

T he smile on my face grows tighter than the knot forming in my stomach. I’ve been standing here, looking brighter than I feel, for over an hour. I stand even taller, pushing my shoulders back and loosening my grip on my clipboard. My wide smile never wavers, but my cheeks are beginning to strain. My feet hurt inside my professional kitten heels, my stomach is all twisted, and all I want to do is pull in the damn flags. But I still have a horde of potential buyers waiting their turn to traipse through the upmarket four-bedroom townhome with the biggest backyard in the suburb. Standing in a line across the manicured front yard, that is just a fraction of the huge outdoor space, each small group looks ready to throw down an offer and call it theirs.

The afternoon sun blasts down on us all, suspiciously bitey for late winter. I use the back of my sleeve to wipe the beads of sweat from my forehead. The black cotton fabric comes away wet, and for once I’m thankful for the dark tone that forms the unofficial ‘uniform’ my boss insists on.

In the line, women stand in front of their partners, hiding away from the blinding glare and finding whatever small sliver of shade they can. A gentleman takes off his suit jacket, draping it over his shoulder to roll up the sleeves of his white business shirt. Too bad for all of them I already have the perfect buyer in mind. Securing such a prestige sale will be a huge boost to my career, and just what I need to finally convince my boss that I don’t need his head over my shoulder all the time. I wasn’t willing to risk it on the gamble of the open market.There is no doubt in my mind that my ex-husband will want to snap this property up for himself.

I don’t blame him. The back garden is the perfect blank canvas for growing flowers, and there is plenty of space for our daughter Maisie to play and grow. The modern facade and clean lines remind me of the renovations he used to plan for our house.

Callum and I officially divorced almost six months ago, but emotionally, we’ve been separated for much longer than that. It took me a while to get used to the idea of him moving on, and a fling of my own before I was ready to accept it. But as our relationship as co-parents continues to improve, I’m finally ready to help him move on with his life. In a professional capacity, at least.

My bitterness stopped me from helping him search for a new house early on. It was fun, watching him move into a tiny two-bedroom unit. How petty I was … and it turns out that two-bedroom unit was exactly what he needed to find his true love.

If only the same could be said for me. But no. My brief adventure into the world of dating apps was cut ceremoniously short. Turns out everyone blushes over a single dad, but single mums are much harder to love.

My fling with Michael was … everything and nothing all at once. He was young and immature, but I sat across the picnic table from him, and I was transfixed. His body builder physique was overpowering in all the right ways, and no sexy man bun could steal my attention from the way his henley clung to his rock-hard abs. I craved to feel what it would be like to be under him, if only for a night. It was incredible. More intensely electric than anything I’d felt before, as though our bodies were hardwired with the same cables.

I wanted more, and I got it … a few times. Until he ghosted me. For weeks. And I was left with nothing more than the memory of his weight settling over my core and butterflies that slowly started to die with his lack of contact. It still haunts me, pulling at my gut and beating against my heart.

His nonstop messages now won’t make up for the utter drop off I experienced then. Sure, he was fun and had all these little ways to show me that he cared, but I was only in it for the mind-blowing sex anyway. At least that’s what I’ve been telling myself these past few weeks.

“When will the owner stop accepting offers?”

A cheery couple bursts into my line of sight as they skip through the wide-open front door. They stand too close, fingers looped together as they bounce on their toes, no idea of the bubble around them. The one that’s sure to burst.

I don’t believe in everlasting love, not anymore.

I swallow down the lump that’s been sitting in my throat all day. “A few weeks, I think. But my understanding is that they are ready to sell as soon as possible. It’s safe to assume they will sign as soon as they get the right offer.”

As soon as they get Callum’s offer, that is.

A fresh wave of nausea rushes over me. My immaculate posture softens, and I throw my hand onto the doorframe to steady myself. I haven’t eaten since breakfast, that’s all. And I haven’t had anything to drink the whole time I’ve been standing here. This opening was supposed to end an hour ago, but if I don’t get food soon, I might pass out. Or vomit, oddly.

The couple takes a card, promising to email through their offer. Ignoring the twisting in my stomach, I bid them farewell before turning my attention to the final group wanting to check out the property. I check my watch after they pass me. If they can be in and out within twenty minutes, I won’t be late to pick up Maisie from kindergarten.

My phone buzzes with a string of messages in my pocket.

“Maisie?” My boss asks from the other side of the front porch. His head gestures towards my hip, where the lit phone screen shines through my dark linen pants.

“Probably not. They would call, not send a barrage of texts.”

I don’t need to pull my phone out to know it’s Michael. As if his almost daily attempts to win me back weren’t annoying enough, the man doesn’t know how to compile his thoughts into a single message before hitting send. It’s infuriating. Especially while I’m trying to remain professional.

My career in real estate is finally taking off. It stalled, as so many mother’s careers do, when Maisie was younger. Stalled again when my marriage fell apart and I took some extended leave. Now that Maisie is in kindergarten, and the custody agreement is properly underway, I’m back. I can focus more of my time and energy into selling the kind of homes I wish to buy for myself one day.

In a few short months I’ve climbed the top seller ranks, even if my boss is struggling to give me the credit I deserve. When I chose this career, I never imagined making the top ten realtors in the area, let alone being number two. But that’s where I am. If I can sell this house with a big enough return, I might even hit the number one spot. I just have to get through this open first.

Regardless of how much I believe I’ve found the perfect buyer, ethically I need to do the right thing here. Other buyers have the right to look through the property, and however slim it might be, there is always the chance that some other rich hot shot will swoop in and make a better offer than Callum does.

I know it’s wrong to judge books by their covers, or in this case, a buyer’s bank account by their appearance, but my instinct on these things is rarely wrong. I doubt any of the families or so-called investors that walked through today have the same bargaining power as my ex-husband.

My stomach lurches again as my boss bids farewell to the final couple.

“Are you okay?”

I swallow down a lump of bile. “I’ll be fine.”

“I’ll lock up here, you get some food before you get Maisie. You look pale.” He huffs, a smug look on his face as he dismisses me.

I nod, unsure if I can get any words out without heaving. I hate the thought of leaving my boss to do my work and giving him ammunition for his crusade against working mothers. More than that, though, I hate myself for not being about to handle the constant juggle. I was starving earlier, but the hunger pains have been replaced by an utter emptiness that has left me feeling ill.

More ill than I’ve felt since I was pregnant with Maisie. It was more than five years ago but I can still remember the tightness that would start like hunger but rapidly shift into a pain that made me heave. I haven’t felt anything like it since. Until this.

Shit.

The thought slams into me as I step into my stuffy, sun warmed car. I turn the car on with the door still open, waiting for the air conditioning to blow cool air before closing myself into the hot box. That can’t be why my stomach is in knots. But I’m left scrambling through my thoughts, counting backwards, sifting through my memory. I can’t remember the last time I had my period, but I always skip the little yellow sugar pills, so it’s impossible to figure out if I’m late.

Besides, Michael used a condom. Every time. Except, shit , that one time it broke.

Broke.

Like something out of a movie or a teenage nightmare. I hadn’t thought it would matter, I kept taking the pill long after my ex and I stopped needing it, so when I did need it again there was no doubting its effectiveness.

But there was that day when Maisie was sick. And then I was sick. Was that before or after the broken condom incident? Does that make a difference? Surely I can’t be that unlucky. Can I?

As I continue to spiral, the twisting and nausea in my stomach falls lower. Despite the heavy heat that still lingers in the car, I wrap my cardigan around my middle, curling in on myself. Cramps erupt over my lower abdomen. I just know . Like I just knew with Maisie.

Only then, it was planned, even if the timing threw us by surprise. And I had Callum to calm me down, to reassure me, to promise me everything was going to be okay.

I don’t have anyone now.

Fifty-one … fifty-two … fifty-three …

The chill from the bathroom tiles numbs my toes and I bounce side to side with each count. I track the seconds against the faint tick from my watch, too scared to leave the bathroom for my phone so I can time the test properly. It sits beside the sink, blinding me. Pressing my palms to my eyes, I will myself not to look early until I count out the instructed three minutes. But it calls to me like a siren, singing a song I know all too well.

I reach for it, pulling the plastic stick into view. A glance is all it takes to confirm what I’ve known since this afternoon.

Two pink lines.

Maisie is going to be a big sister. I’m having a baby.

The test shakes in my hands. I drop it onto the counter at the same time my knees buckle and I fall to the floor. The plastic tube rattles around the sink, as sporadic and uneven as my now hasty breaths.

Unprepared for the iciness of the ceramic to permeate through my leggings, I tense at the chilling sensation when my butt hits the floor. Wriggling on the spot, I heave in oxygen. Every muscle cramps inside me, tears clump at my lashes. I taste the salty liquid as it trickles over my cheek and into the corner of my mouth.

I can’t do this.

A thud sounds from down the hall, echoing through the house. Maisie, most likely rolling in her bed and kicking into the wall. I hold my shaky breath, listening for any signs the collision may have woken her. Instead, only silence follows, broken only by my hushed sobs and Maisie’s loud, sniffly inhale.

The air I was holding in escapes my lungs.

One by one, I stretch out my aching limbs, scrambling to stand like a baby giraffe. My body lurches out of the ensuite and I collapse onto my bed. Sobs muffle against the pillow until it’s wet from my tears and sticking to my cheeks.

Somewhere below me, my phone vibrates. I let my arm flail around me, finding the cool brick of my years old phone near my thigh.

The screen is lit with messages from Michael. All the ones I haven’t answered over the past week and the string of new ones from today. The latest one is short, but it tugs at the muscles in my heart.

Michael: Please Audrey. I miss you. I miss us.

I close my eyes, dropping the phone onto my chest. I can’t remember the last time someone other than my daughter missed me. If it wasn’t for the thirty-seven messages that came before this one, it might have been nice.

Besides, Michael and I had nothing in common. I have a career, a daughter, and a house. I have, by all considerations, a successful adult life. Minus the long-standing relationship. Michael, on the other hand, has none of those things. Instead, he has a job he refuses to progress in, a dog that follows him everywhere, and an apartment that screams ‘bachelor pad’.

At first, the only thing that worked about us was the way our bodies moved so well together. And it was fun, God was it fun, but I wanted more. Little by little he showed me pieces of himself, and I started to think that with Michael I could have more. I wanted to fall, I was ready to fall, head over heels for him. I wanted a man who was sure of himself, and his place in life, and I wanted him to fall head over heels for me too. Michael might have still been working on the first part, but I thought he might be ready to fall for me. For a while it seemed like he was. We were good. No, more than good. We were golden.

Then he got a glimpse into what a lifetime with me would be like and ran for the metaphorical hills.

First he ghosted me, now he haunts me.

So, after a failed marriage and a fling that turned into nothing, I no longer believe in the love I somehow still crave.

Especially not with Michael. Not with the way he had no idea what he was doing with his life, still riding on the coattails of his father’s business. Not with the way he shrunk at the thought of being a parent or how he shied away from Maisie. Not with the way he ran as soon as he realised that waking up next to me also meant waking up in the same house as my child.

Oh God , I have to call him. Despite how I feel about him, I have to tell him that I’m pregnant. With his baby. That we have decisions to make that will change our lives. I’m not ready for those decisions, how on earth can he be?

This man, who spends more time at the gym than at his house, who told me he loved kids but wasn’t sure about babies. I might not be ready to be a mother again, but he sure as shit isn’t ready to be a father.