EMBER - Part Three (The EMBER Series, #3) by Deborah Bladon Page B

realizing that it had been my mom calling hours before. She'd left messages imploring me to call her back so we could choose a day for her to visit me and see my new apartment.
    After I'd retrieved the portrait, I had taken it to the spare bedroom. I'd carefully placed it back on the easel and before I turned to leave the room, I'd given one last backward glance. Then, I'd shut the door behind me, knowing that the wooden door was not a strong enough barrier to ward off everything the drawing represented.
    I'd climbed back into my bed then and somehow had tossed and turned in my sheets until sleep overtook me once more. When I opened my eyes again it was just past six. There was no return call from Dane and after I had a mug of hot coffee to awaken not only my body, but also my mind, I'd pulled in a deep breath and had called him again. This time, as the phone rang over and over again, I cursed each chime, wishing he would pick up.
    I rest my thigh against the crib. "I tried last night and then before I came over this morning."
    "Beck said you got here right before he left for his studio." She tips her chin in the direction of the ornate silver clock that hangs on the wall in Vane's nursery. "He's usually out of here around seven. What time did you get up?"
    I don't need a reminder that losing sleep over a man isn’t good for me. I know Zoe and right now, there's a lecture sitting on the very tip of her tongue. I didn't come here for that. I came here to escape the suffocating knowledge that the man that I'm falling in love with, neglected to mention to me that he's about to be a father.
    "I got up early," I say in an effort to steer the conversation in any direction where the final destination isn't going to be Dane. "I went to bed right after you and Vanessa left."
    "We left before eight," she points out. "You went to bed then?"
    I couldn't face the world so I had done the only thing I could think of. It was the same thing I'd done when I was a child and I'd heard my parents contemplating the end of their marriage. The mention of my name had pulled me from the quiet solace of my bedroom and into the hallway. I'd listened intently as I'd stood out of their view near the corner that leads to the kitchen.
    My father cried as he begged my mother to stay.  There was no other man she'd told him. Her heart was empty and the passion that she once felt when she looked into his eyes was replaced with a friendship that was too quiet and comfortable. As I heard him beg her for another chance, she had broken down too and they'd sobbed in that small little house.
    Neither of them ever mentioned separating again and just a few weeks ago, as they were both helping me recover, I'd caught them in a tender embrace in the hallway of my apartment. The storm cloud that had threatened their marriage had passed, and apparently, the bond they had forged after they faced the mutual realization that they may lose one another, was enough to cement their marriage.
    "I wasn't feeling well," I mutter under my breath because I know in the scope of excuses, it's a lame one.
    She bends down to pull Vane into her arms. "Vanessa didn't say a lot about Dane after we left your place. She doesn't know him as well as you do."
    The irony of the statement isn't lost on me. I'm not going to assume that I know Dane better than anyone, including Vanessa. The tangible proof of that isn't just in the fact that up until last night, I didn't have a clear understanding of the depth of his connection to Maisy. It goes well beyond that.
    Our relationship grew from a chance meeting in a restaurant when he was rushing away from a promised future while I was trying to find one. We haven't taken the time to discuss our deepest wishes and life goals. Up until yesterday, the thought of Dane being a father was a foreign concept. I certainly had never given it a moment of consideration in terms of what our future together might hold since we haven't even defined whether we're dating