Chapter 1: Homecoming
"Thank God you are here."
Nolan Ross wasn't a religious man, but that could have easily been true when he looked at me adoringly as I lay in a deck chair by the pool at his Hamptons house.
As Nolan caressed my arm his eyes turned to my belly, the pregnancy was showing already. We hadn't seen each other for a couple of months. Back then he had appeared to my New York apartment, where I had escaped the news of his marriage. He had been showing off annulment papers. He had insisted that he regretted deeply his marriage to Louise Ellis, but I still hadn't been ready to forgive that.
And how was I supposed to forgive and forget? Nolan was engaged to me but married someone else, out of the blue! It didn't matter that the reason for the marrige wasn't love, the real reason behind it being just Louise's financial mess. Even though I knew that there was nothing more than friendship between Nolan and Louise, his sudden marriage had been a huge shock for me nonetheless.
As it happens, on that very same day I had been waiting for Nolan to come home, to tell him the joyous news: I was pregnant. Again. My previous pregnancy had ended in a very early miscarriage.
And now, today, I had surprised Nolan by coming to his house unannounced.
"Are you here... to stay?"
I couldn't answer to Nolan's timid question because I didn't know the answer yet. The silence between us lasted for a long time, until Nolan seemed to wake up from his ecstasy and the loving caretaker kicked in.
"Are you hungry?"
Upon my arrival I had raided Nolan's fridge, he always kept there something for me. But the long day by the pool, waiting for him had of course been mildly exhausting in my current state and had taken its toll.
"Do you wanna stay at home or go out?"
Nolan was an excellent cook, but we decided to dine in the nearby restaurant, owned by him.
When I was going to the shower Nolan came by to whisper something to my ear. "Ookay", I said, unsure.