Because He Watches Me (Because He Owns Me, Book Nine) (An Alpha Billionaire Romance) (51 page)

“Nobody I know personally. Red has always played it close to the vest. There’s no one I can think of to call that would know where Red is. You’d have been the one that came to mind, but clearly he’s treated you badly as well.”

“I just…I wonder if there’s a place that he might retreat to. Maybe somewhere away from the media,” she said. “Some people say he’s on a tropical island with a new face, drinking and fishing and living like a beach bum.” Nicole tried to laugh.

“You know, there is a place, come to think of it.”

Nicole’s face lit up. “There is?”

“I have no idea if he still even owns it, so take this for what it’s worth.”

“Anything, anything!” She cried, grabbing a pen and piece of paper. “Tell me.”

“A few years back, he took me for a weekend getaway to this tiny little ramshackle cabin out in the middle of nowhere.”

She felt the shorthairs on the back of her neck stand up as he said it—knew that this must be the place. “Where exactly was it?”

“Somewhere in Vermont. Let me think…” he hummed. “I think the town was Bristol. Bristol, Vermont.”

“If you were me, how would you find the cabin again?” she asked him. “Do you know what road its on?”

“God, it was so long ago.” He thought for a while. “It was way off the beaten track, but I do remember that there was a beautiful lake close by, and a little farm that had apple picking and that sort of thing. It was called Beaumont Farms, I believe.”

Nicole wrote everything down as fast as she could. “There can’t be too many cabins in that area, right?”

“Right.” He didn’t sound as excited as her. “Nicole, please don’t take this the wrong way.”

“I won’t,” she said, anxious now.

“Just be careful with your expectations. Like I said, I don’t even know if Red still owns that cabin. And even if he does, that’s just one place he happened to bring me years ago. He’s a very wealthy man who could just as easily have flown to Australia and be doing a walkabout right now.”

She nodded. “I know, I know.”

“If you’re lucky enough to find him, the chances are low that he’ll greet you with the kind of reception you’re hoping for. I know my brother, and if he’s trying to get away from all his pressures and disappointments—then I imagine you might be the very last person he wants to see right now.”

Nicole nodded but couldn’t bring herself to respond to his comments. They hurt. She was scared, pregnant and alone. And now one of the people who knew Red best was telling her that this was a fool’s errand.

“If you need to call me for anything,” Jeb said, “just let me know.” And then he gave her his personal cell number, once again asking her to call him for anything, at any time.

Grateful for his kindness, Nicole thanked him profusely before they got off the phone.

Once she’d hung up, Nicole studied the piece of paper with her chicken scratches on it. It looked like pure desperation; nothing on that paper would lead her to Red.

Vermont. Beaumont Farms. Cabin near a lake.

This was all she had, her only hopes of finding the man she loved, the man who’d left her, a rich man who had the ability to fly anywhere in the world on a whim. What were the chances he’d gone to this one place—this silly shack stuck out in the middle of nowhere?

Nicole decided she was going to find out.

***

P
acking
a small overnight bag with toiletries and some clothes, Nicole left a brief note for Danielle saying that she was going home to her parents’ house for a day or two. This was another lie in a steadily growing list, but who was really keeping track anyway?

After leaving her apartment, Nicole went to the nearest Hertz location, and rented a red Ford Fiesta.

It was a five-hour drive to Bristol, Vermont. The day was warm and dry, the sky blue and almost cloudless. Nicole missed driving—in New York, there was little reason to have a car, and flying down the road at her own speed made her feel a little more in control.

She kept her windows down, put some cheesy pop music on, and sang along with the songs—even the ones she hardly knew.

It was important to get to Vermont as early in the day as possible, so Nicole stopped only once at a rest stop, where she got a couple of cheeseburgers from McDonalds and went to the bathroom.

Finally, she was just a few miles outside of Bristol. The landscape had changed to one that was very familiar to her from her childhood in upstate New York. She was used to seeing long stretches of farmland, trees, barns and tiny houses, pickup trucks parked in the driveways.

Once she entered Bristol, Nicole felt a pang in her chest. It was a beautiful little town, like something from a Norman Rockwell painting.

The first thing she thought when she drove down quaint little Main Street with its Cup a Joe café, and Danny’s Barber Shop with the spinning pole out front:

This would be a wonderful place to start a family.

And then the tears were in her eyes and Nicole let them stream down her cheeks. She was being silly again, but her hormones were probably going crazy after all.

She pulled into the tiny little two-pump gas station and a girl that looked around seventeen or eighteen with strawberry-blond hair, jeans and a halter top, came over to the car. “Hi,” she said to Nicole with a simple smile.

Nicole noticed the girl had one of those tribal tattoos on her left bicep.

“Hi. Could you fill up the tank with regular, please?”

“Sure.” The girl started the pump and then stood beside it, whistling an unrecognizable tune, until the tank was full. She put the nozzle back in the pump and came over to the window. “That’ll be twenty two, thirty.”

Nicole gave her twenty-five bucks. “Keep the change.”

“Thanks! Much appreciated,” the girl said.

“Do you happen to know how I can get to Beauford Farms from here?” Nicole asked her.

“Sure,” the girl said. “Keep on going up Main Street, when you hit the third light from here—you go left on Dawson Street. Follow that all the way down to the end. Then you go right on Wilmington Road. And then you’ll see the signs.”

“Would you happen to know of a small cabin right around that area, near the lake?”

The girl laughed. “Sorry, there’s got to be at least a dozen cabins that fit that description,” she said.

“Oh, okay. Thanks again!” Nicole said, her heart sinking. A dozen cabins? Would she even be able to find them all? And then even if she did—what would she do? Would she walk up to each and every cabin, knock and hope that Red would come to the door?

Still, she tried not to let herself get discouraged. She had about two or three more hours of daylight and maybe she’d get lucky. If not, she’d have to find the nearest motel to hole up in and start looking again in the morning.

A few minutes later, she arrived at Beauford Farms and a store that sold all kinds of stuff; canned jams, apple cider donuts, fresh produce grown on the premises.

There was a sprightly white-haired lady standing next to a register. She greeted Nicole with a very friendly smile and asked if she could help her find anything.

“Actually, yes. But not something in this store.”

The older woman’s eyebrows rose slightly. “Oh?”

Nicole began describing the cabin and its possible location, but the woman stopped her mid-description. “Hold on a sec. Let me get my husband, he knows everything within fifty miles of here.” And she waddled off to a door that led to a back room.

A moment later, she reappeared with her husband, a tall man—though the years seemed to have bent him over. He wore brown slacks, suspenders, and an off-white collared shirt. His whole body was browned from years toiling in the sun, but his light blue eyes were kind. “My wife says you’re looking for someone in a nearby cabin.”

Nicole went through all the details she knew about the place from what Jeb had told her—which admittedly wasn’t much.

The old man nodded. When she was through talking, he shook his head. “There are a few cabins it could be. A lot of cabins by the lake, and a few that border this farmland too. Could even be one or two I don’t know about.”

“Maybe you’ve met the man who’s staying there?” Nicole said, grasping at straws now. “He’s definitely not from around here. He’s in his early thirties, curly dark hair, kind of exotic looking—“

Suddenly the old man’s eyes lit up in recognition and he clapped his hands. “Oh, shoot—I know exactly who you mean. I must be losing my mind after all, I should have thought of him right away.”

Nicole’s heart was galloping again, practically pounding through her chest.

The old man continued. “He came in here about a week ago and asked about getting himself a fishing license. We talked a little about that, I gave him the lay of the land. He seemed to be growing a new beard.” The old man chuckled about that. “He kept scratching at it like it was bugging him.”

“And he told you where he’s staying?”

“I’m sorry, us old folks get sidetracked too easily,” he said, putting a gnarled old hand on her shoulder. “Yes, he mentioned that his cabin’s over near our apple trees, just on the outskirts of our farm. I can show you how to get there.”

“Thank you so much,” Nicole gushed.

“Glad we could help.”

Nicole and the old man went outside the store and he told her how to get to the cabin. It was just back up the road about half a mile, and then she was to turn right onto an unmarked dirt road next to the big red barn.

The whole thing was like something out of a movie, she thought.

She gave the old man a hug and he smiled at her, told her good luck.

Then Nicole was back in her car, driving faster than she should have been, her hands gripping the steering wheel as if it might decide to fly away. Her stomach was tight with anticipation, and fluttering. The fluttering reminded her of what was inside of her, and Nicole slowed down a little.

I’m going to be a mother, she thought. For the first time, the notion didn’t completely terrify her.

Soon, she found the turnoff onto the long, dirt road. It was wide and relatively well maintained, surrounded on both sides by forest. Through the trees on the right side, she could still make out the farmland, and as the road curved, she thought she could even catch a glimpse of the lake in front of her.

As told to her by the old man at the farm store, the road would start to snake off to the left, but just before that, there was another small turnoff. This small turnoff, he’d said, should take her to the cabin in question.

Nicole’s mouth was completely dry, like it had been the first day she’d met Red in his huge top floor office.

She was leaning forward, her face practically touching the windshield as she drove the last ten or twenty yards down the more narrow, bumpy road that took her to a small one-story cabin.

The cabin was surrounded by trees on all sides, and right behind it, the beautiful blue lake, which stretched magically out into the distance like some desert mirage.

The whole area was so peaceful. Nicole parked the car and turned it off, heard almost nothing but the engine ticking loudly for a long moment.

And then she heard something else.

It was a loud rapport, like someone clapping. Except the clapping, clopping sound was rather slow and rhythmic. Occasionally it would cease and then resume once more.

It was coming from just behind the cabin, Nicole thought. And she had a feeling she knew who and what it might be.

She got out of the car, almost delicately, as if her feet might break. She felt unsteady and trembling, but forced herself to be brave.

The thought of Red screaming at her to leave was a strong image, and she tried desperately to shake it from her mind. If it was really even him back there. Truly, it could be anyone.

And then she was approaching the house.

The sound was getting louder. Occasionally there would be pause, and you could hear something being thrown, clattering into pieces. And then the thunking, clopping sound would resume.

When Nicole finally reached the backyard, she knew she’d been right all along.

Red was standing there in blue jeans and no shirt, chopping wood. There was a huge stack of logs nearby—cords and cords of them. He’d obviously been at it for a long time, from the looks of it.

His back was facing her and he was covered in sweat. She could see, even from this angle, that his thick, curly black hair had grown out a little and wasn’t styled at all. Pausing for the moment, he wiped sweat from his forehead and took some deep breaths.

The axe was gripped in one hand. With his free hand, he reached down and grabbed a huge piece of wood and placed it on the ground in front of him, then in a single motion, swung the axe in a high arc and split the wood with one slice.

CHUNK.

The pieces fell to the side. Red picked them up one a time and threw them into a pile, presumably to be stacked like all the rest at some later point.

Nicole knew she had to get his attention, but her throat didn’t seem to be able to emit sound.

“Red.”

He was in the midst of grabbing his next piece of wood.

“RED.” She forced herself to scream his name, but in her nervous state it came out barely loud enough to reach his ears.

Still, he must have heard her, because he turned around and saw her. His expression was stunned. And then his lips clamped together and his brow creased. “What the hell are you doing here?” he said, finally.

It was the worst possible reaction. Nicole reeled, turning and running back toward her car, blubbering like a little kid.

She couldn’t really help it. In that second, the look on his face and the tone of his voice had been exactly the opposite of what she’d been hoping for, what she’d been praying he might do.

She was pregnant and he wanted nothing to do with her. That was all she could think, and she just wanted to get the hell away from him and that cabin and the entire town.

Nicole ran as fast as she could to reach her car.

Red was calling her name now. “Nicole! Wait!”