Til Debt Do Us Part (Married At Midnight #4)

Chapter 2

Two

Talia

“I really can't thank you enough for the ride.” I swallow, looking at the young man that helped me escape from the party. He takes off his chauffeur’s cap and scrubs a hand through his hair, looking aggravated.

“You didn't say why you needed to leave. And I am not asking you to tell me. I just want to know that you're safe.” He peers out the windshield at the random block of houses I've had him stop the car at. “Are you sure that this is where you want to be dropped off?”

I nod and pull my wallet from my purse. It's a tiny thing, just large enough to accommodate my ID and debit card and a little bit of cash. I take the forty dollars that I have and offer it to the driver.

“I'm sure. Please take this.”

He shakes his head and glances out the windshield again. It's fully dark and the houses on the street are a little run down.

“I don't feel right leaving you here. And I won’t take your money.”

Giving him a smile, I put the money on the seat between us and open my door. “It's for the best. Trust me, when my husband comes looking for me, you don't want to know where I am.”

“Your husband?” He asks. “But is he really going to track me down?”

I shrug and get out of the car. “Maybe. I can't say. Thank you for the ride, though.”

Before he can protest anymore, I slam the car door and turn away, walking quickly down the cracked sidewalk. The college where Olivia works is only a few blocks away in the other direction, but I need to be cautious. Even though the chauffeur acted as my white knight just now, who knows how he will behave under the pressure of Dare Morgan. My heart speeds up as I think of just how angry Dare is right now.

Rushing along the unkempt sidewalk, I swallow and try to hold my head high. My husband will no doubt be furious when I disappear. But he has lied to me and deceived me for most of the time that I've known him.

Dare Morgan deserves what he gets.

I take the long way around, doubling back and retracing my steps several times before I walk up to the college campus. It's late on Wednesday night and the campus is hushed, only a few students rushing to and from late-night studies and their respective dorms. In the daytime, I know that this small college has several sets of multistory red brick ivy-covered buildings. I rush past the brick and stained glass chapel and the looming administration building with its great dome looking down on the rest of the campus. I have to get to the massive science complex, the place where I know Olivia will be working late. She always works late on Wednesdays and Thursdays. I approach it from the back, heading straight across the immaculately trimmed grass and up the steps to a white marble building.

There are a few lights on in the building. I make a note as I climb the stairs that the lab that Olivia runs is definitely one of them.

I try the door and find it open. Inside, my footsteps echo on the white marble floor as I head up the stairs, straight to Olivia's lab. I make it all the way to the door of the lab before I find a locked door. I peer inside through a long rectangular window, knocking on the door. Olivia is bent over a lab table, carefully pipetting a liquid from a beaker to a small tray of samples.

At the sound of my knock, she snaps upright, her blonde head turning toward the sound, her eyes wide. I give her an urgent wave and she pulls out a pair of earbuds from her ears as she sets the science equipment down. She rushes over to the door and opens it, her puzzlement clear on her face.

“Talia! What are you doing here?” She looks at her watch, squinting. “It's after ten p.m. I was just about to wrap up my experiment and head home.”

I glance behind me, licking my lips. “Can I come in?”

“Of course.” She steps back and waves me through the door. I glance around at the table in her lab and the desk with everything neat, tidy, and extremely organized. Olivia is a little bit of a neat freak. Perhaps it was a necessity in her job as a researcher in this lab.

I close the door firmly behind me and then turn to her. She reaches out to me, rubbing my bare arm.

“God, are you cold? It's freezing outside!”

“I didn't have time to grab my coat. I sort of ran away from the Morgan estate and Dare. I…”

My eyes well up with tears and I inhale a shaky breath. Olivia looks a little horrified and guides me over to her desk, where she plucks a navy cardigan off the back of her chair and hands it to me. I take it thankfully and swallow against the lump in my throat.

“Talia, what's going on? Why did you run away from Dare?”

“Because… Because he's a liar!” I spit out. “He paid someone to break into Aunt Minnie’s store. And he paid them to make it look like Aunt Minnie was being threatened by the sketchy guys that she took her loan out from. But that’s not all… Then Dare paid actors to come into the restaurant where I was working and mistreat me. He's… he's horrible.”

With that, I dissolved in tears. Olivia quickly wraps her arms around me, rubbing my shoulder.

“Oh, Talia.” She inhales sharply. “I had no idea. Really. If I had known that he would do something so horrible, I would never have advocated for you to accept his marriage proposal. Honest.”

I let myself cry for a full minute, great gasping sobs as I lay my head on my best friend’s shoulder. But after that, I control myself, wiping at my face and struggling to voice my thoughts.

“I don't know what to do,” I admit. Olivia grabs a handful of tissues from a box on her desk and hands them to me. I blot at my face, which is hot and wet from crying.

“But it's okay. You're going to be okay. You are with someone that loves you and cares about you,” she says soothingly.

I give her a one-armed hug and then separate from her. “I need to think. I need to be alone and figure out my next step. Where can I go so that Dare won't find me?”

Olivia looks pensive. “What about my grandfather's old cabin up in the woods near Ketchum mountain? I know we haven't been there in ages. But my mom still rents it out on occasion. It's not really the warm summer season, so I'm pretty sure that the cabin will be deserted. And there's no way to find you if you're out there. I mean, it's hard enough to find the cabin on a map, much less know that you're there.”

I inhale, blowing the breath out as I nod. “I hadn't thought of that. It's been so long since we even went there… I was probably fourteen the last time I laid eyes on that place.”

“Well, since Grandpa passed away, my mom has put a little money into fixing his old cabin up. She's made sure that it is fortified against the cold as long as whoever is staying there runs the wood stove the entire time.”

For a moment, I picture the two of us as teens, laying in the grass by the cabin and giggling about our crushes. It almost makes me smile, despite the dire circumstances I'm currently facing.

“You really think that I could use the cabin?” I ask anxiously.

Olivia grabs her cell phone off her desk and starts to text her mother. “I am like ninety nine point nine percent sure. You can also take my car. I have to be back here in a few hours, but in the morning, but that doesn't stop you from going. And depending on how long you decide to stay out there, I can join you on Friday evening.”

I feel a little bit sick, a wave of nausea washing over me. I pull out the office chair from Olivia's desk and sit down, trying to breathe deeply.

It's nice that my best friend has some place for me to run to. But the very fact that I am already running away from the man I married onlyearlier today is almost enough to make me want to throw up. The deception… The lies… How Dare fucked me and then looked me in the eye and promised that there were no secrets between us…

I grip the desk and try to breathe in deeply through my nose and exhale slowly through my mouth.

Olivia perks a brow, peering at me over her cell phone. “You okay?”

I shake my head. “I am very much not okay. I can't believe that I fell for Dare's lies. He just completely blindsided me. And I was willing to be his pretty little wife. Honestly, I blame myself as much as Dare. I knew he was a snake when I met him. But I never thought he would turn his fangs on me.”

She frowns deeply and then puts her cell phone away in her pocket. “My mom says that no one is staying at the cabin. So we are all good there. I think you'll need to stop at a convenience store on the way there for firewood. But other than that, the house is clean and ready for guests.”

Nodding my head, I swallow. I try to push the idea of Dare out of my head. Right now, I have to focus on what's right in front of me. I can't be worried about how angry he will be when he finds me gone.

If he hasn't already, that is.

Olivia grabs a coat and slides it around my shoulders, then urges me to follow her. She passes me her keys, pointing out the key to the cabin as we walk down the echoing halls of the science building.

“What am I going to do for clothes?” I ask aloud. Not really addressing Olivia, more just wondering.

“Well you can have whatever I have in my go bag.” Olivia pushes the door open and I step out into the icy night air. She hustles me down to the back of the building, where I see a mostly empty parking lot. Her car is at the back of the lot and I walk across the newly paved parking lot. “What do you mean go bag?” I ask.

She eyes me skeptically as we approach her car. “You don’t have a go bag? What about if there is an emergency?” She reaches over to my hand and grabs a key, popping the trunk of her car. We walk up to the trunk and she opens it further, lifting a duffel bag from the car. She unzips it and shows me the contents. It looks like a few clothes, a bag of toiletries, and a big heavy blanket. She lifts the blanket and shows me that there is a box of protein bars underneath and a few bottles of water.

My brows rise and I look at her with some surprise. “Prepared for anything, huh?”

Olivia shrugs and gestures around us. “For emergencies, just like this one.” She presses the keys into my hand again and jerks her chin toward the driver side door. “Let me give you the address of the cabin. You need to get it now while you still have cell service, because there isn't much when you get up into the mountains. The same thing goes for food and groceries and anything else you get in the convenience store. You need to get it like twenty miles from the cabin, because when you get closer, there is just nothing out there. And don't forget the firewood.”

I give her a hard hug, surprising her a little. She hugs me back and then lets go. Olivia moves to open the driver side door and looks at me expectantly. “Get moving. If I know anything about the Morgans, I know that they have unlimited resources. And when Dare figures out that you're gone, he will undoubtedly use those resources to find you. The sooner you go, the sooner you'll be out of the range of his reach.”

“Thank you, Olivia.” I give her a small, sad smile. “I will drive back into the range of cell phone service Friday morning just to check and see if you left me any messages. Okay?”

She gives my hand a squeeze and then steps back. “Okay. Everything that I hear, I will send along via texts. Just be safe, okay?”

“Thank you, Olivia.”

She gives me the same reserved smile. “Of course, Leah. I would do anything for you. That's what sisters are for.” Nodding, I gather myself up and start the car. I close the door and back out of the parking space. Olivia waves to me once, standing in the parking lot. I wave back at her and then drive away.

* * *

It's almost two AM by the time I turn down the bumping, gravel road in the pitch black darkness. There are tall pine trees on either side of me, covered in a thick blanket of snow. About twenty minutes ago, the snow started to fall, obscuring the view from the windows. It started off a light snowfall but has increased until now, when I'm driving five miles an hour, the brights on the car flashing, bouncing wildly off the newly fallen banks of snow that have fallen on the ground as far as the eye can see. I'm determined to make it to the cabin itself. But at this point, I have both hands clenching the wheel, leaning forward to peer out the window as I go.

I squint and try to get closer to the windshield. It's only a little about six inches from my face at this point so I'm not sure how to see the road any better. My GPS on my phone tells me that I have arrived but I just keep crawling forward until the cabin seems to appear right before my very eyes, solidifying in the burgeoning snowstorm. I slam on the brakes and my heart jumps into my throat. Putting the car in park, I unclench my hands from the steering wheel. As I shake out the tension that has been building in my fingers, I look at the cabin.

I can make out the front porch just fine, a window beside the rustic front door. But I can't see the lines of the roof. There's too much snow in the air to gauge the true size. I remember this cabin being pretty small when I stayed here last but I just suck in a deep breath and blow it out.

Taking the keys out of the ignition and turning off the car's lights, I open the door into a blast of freezing cold air and immediate dampness as snowflakes hit my bare skin. I grab the keys and my cell phone and drop them in my pocket, then try to head around the back of the car, opening the trunk and wrestling the gray gym bag free. I run towards the porch, my teeth starting to chatter already. I pile the gym bag by the door and go back to the trunk for several stacks of firewood and two small paper bags of groceries.

It takes me three more trips to wrestle the firewood and groceries onto the porch and close the car trunk. It is blindingly cold, my fingers feel numb and I scrape my whole right hand up on the rough raw logs. It's everything I can do to manage to fish the keys out of my pocket and find the front door key.

To my relief, the door opens without much fuss. It creaks open and I drag my bag inside first, then the groceries, then the wood. I barely get a glance at the little two room cottage cabin before I close the door and lock it. Beginning to shake all over, I wrap my arms around myself and look around the room. Here directly in front of me is a small sitting area with a couch and the wood burning stove. There is a small kitchen, a tiny bathroom, and a closed-door that I remember leading into a bedroom. The place has been jazzed up, all the windows cheerfully decorated in red gingham, the couch a basic gray corduroy but relatively new and clean. There is a huge pile of blankets and sheets and pillows on the couch.

Blowing on my hands, I decide that the first order of business is to start a fire in the wood burning stove. It takes me a couple of minutes and a lot of discarded newspapers from a box labeled fire starters. But I manage to get the fire going and I leave the door open wide, enjoying the heat that it immediately brings to the room. I hold my fingers out and the fire warms them quickly. Sliding my gaze around the room, I try to decide what to do next.

Outside, the heavy snowstorm becomes a downright blizzard. I can't see anything at all and the entire world just looks like a blank white screen. That's definitely not a good sign. Or maybe it is… If I find it difficult to get my car out of the road and back to Harwicke, Dare will certainly have trouble finding me.

Wishing that I were wearing a pair of comfy sweats instead of this fancy dress, I spend the next few minutes putting the firewood in a pile by the stove and putting away my meager groceries. I realize that most of the power in the tiny cabin isn't on. But that is easily enough remedied because there is a large sticky note over an electrical box with a set of switches. When I slip them on, the whole cabin lights up at one time. That's good to know. Especially because I was just wondering about using the tiny bathroom and thinking how cold it was going to be in there. I turn the tiny heat lamp on in the bathroom for a minute and then go check out the bedroom. It's barely more than a tiny room, a double sized bed built into the far wall and a bookshelf full of aging paperbacks stuffed in it.

The bedroom has a tiny space heater, too, and I crank that on, more worried about how freaking cold it is right now that I am about conserving any kind of power. Grabbing my bag, I rifle through the contents and change into a pair of yoga pants and a basic black sweatshirt with the name of the college that Olivia works at on the front. Olivia, God bless her, remembered to stick thick socks in the bag. I hustle into my new outfit and then hurry to the bathroom, thinking all the while about how badly I have to pee. I do my business and then wash my hands in the freezing cold tap water, leaving the tap running just a bit.

Thinking about the fact that I should leave the kitchen sink running as well, I move to the door. There is a rectangular mirror on the door, one of those cheap ones that you can find at any dollar store. I catch a glimpse of myself and stop, staring at my reflection. I turned to the side, slowly shaping my stomach with my hands. I swear, I didn't notice it before. But there is decidedly a noticeable little poof right below my belly button. And I don't mean it looks like I had too much to eat…

I have a baby bump. Lifting the sweatshirt, I move my body side to side, trying to figure out if I am going crazy or whether I could be showing so soon. By my calculations, I am only 9 weeks pregnant… That's way too soon to be showing, isn't it?

I drop the sweater back over my stomach and smooth it down, swallowing hard.

As if I needed another reminder that I carry the child that the Morgan clan would kill each other for. I definitely don't want to think about the lengths that Dare and Burn will go to if it means ascertaining their victory with their awful grandfather.

I make it out of the bathroom just in time to hear the sound of falling snow hitting metal. Padding over to the front window, I look out. I realize that I can't see anything at all. But I hope that sound was simply the snow falling off the roof and hitting the hood of the car. My mouth pulls down at one corner. I am definitely stuck here, whether I like it or not.

I head over to the groceries and make myself a peanut butter sandwich, scarfing it down once I realize how starving I am. At one point, I pause my sandwich making to check out a noise I heard that sounded like the house breaking and splintering in the corner. But when I go to check, it's just a noise.

It's funny, I have lived in the Northeast for my entire life and yet I don't think I've ever been so freaked out over every little noise as I am today. Maybe because I'm so keyed up, maybe there are just more odd and unexplained sounds now.

Moving the sheets and blankets to the bedroom, I sit on the couch and eat my sandwich. All the while, I am just coming to terms with the fact that I am leaving Dare. Leaving a Morgan man will not be easy. He will definitely demand repayment of his two hundred and fifty thousand dollars sooner rather than later. And then I will be on my own again, all alone, pregnant and not a little bit frightened. Aunt Minnie and Olivia made it clear enough to me that I wasn't choosing between marrying Dare or homelessness. But having a roof over my head won't really pay Aunt Minnie’s loans. And I am not sure how well her loan shark will take it when I tell him that I need him to give the money back.

Do they even do that? Frankly, I don't know.

My eyelids grow heavy. The wood stove is putting off quite a bit of heat now and I’m quite certain that this is the first moment that I have not felt cold all night. Closing my eyes and resting my head on my arms, I drift off to sleep. As I fall, I can only think of how I am stuck between a rock and a hard place in my life.