Hard No: Secret Baby Enemies to Lovers Romance by Hazel Parker (fun to read txt) 📗

on the side. I open my mouth to speak, but suddenly no words will come out. It is as though my throat is frozen solid. I can’t even breathe.

I try again. Nothing. The words won’t come. I can’t manage so much as a squeak.

Tira notices this and frowns. Her eyes are hidden behind the great, flat black lenses of her sunglasses, and I can see myself reflected in them, one hand at my throat while my mouth wobbles open and shut.

“Say something!” she urges.

I shake my head.

“Say anything!” Tira says.

I can’t, I mouth to her. She huffs and returns her attention out the window of the cockpit.

“Then send him a message,” she says, tossing me a large, laminated card. I scan it. It’s a key to the system of Morse code signals.

Still unable to speak, unable to breathe, and becoming frightened, I use the talk button in a series of short and long clicks. I mean to tell Trent that something’s wrong, for him to come and get me, that everything will be all right if I can just see him again.

After a minute, I realize that I’m repeating the same message, over and over in intervals—dot, dot, dot, dash, dash, dash, dot, dot, dot.

S.O.S.

The sky is darkening around us, or is it my own sight dimming from lack of oxygen? The sound of the helicopter’s engine is fading as well.

“Send him a real message!” Tira commands. “A text, a voice mail, an email, something!”

I try to tell her to watch where we are going rather than keep her eyes on me because the nose of the helicopter is dipping downwards. My throat is still locked.

The water, stormy with whitecaps, is rushing up to meet us. There is a thunderous thump as the helicopter impacts, the agonized scream of metal shearing away as the rotors plow into the surf. The windshield blows in, and with it comes the rush of water, cold and jarring, filling the cockpit as the entire craft begins to sink.

I find myself strapped to my seat with an intricate system of buckles that I have no hope of figuring out.

I look frantically over at Tira. She’s removed her sunglasses, and I can see that she has tears in her eyes.

“I told you so,” she says sadly.

Then the water is above her head and above mine. The helicopter is completely flooded. It groans as it sinks further below the surface of the water, the light rapidly failing. Soon, I am surrounded by cold and darkness.

I do not sit up abruptly in bed in a cold sweat, clutching at the sheets. Instead, I come to on the couch. Daylight is not streaming dramatically in through the windows. My watch tells me that it’s just after one in the morning. My tongue feels glued to the roof of my mouth. This is the most unglamorous emergence from a nightmare that I can imagine.

I get up and stumble into the kitchen for a glass of water. It tastes like minerals. I realize that it’s not the water; it’s the inside of my mouth. I haven’t brushed my teeth today.

I feel a weight in the pocket of my bathrobe. It’s my phone. I check it. No messages. I check the text feature. No outgoing missives there, either.

“Send him a real message,” Tira tells me again, echoing from my dream. “A text, a voice mail, an email, something!”

I can’t.

I can’t call him, can’t hear his voice. I’m not angry anymore, but that’s not it.

I can’t text him, either. I would have no idea what to say, how to begin.

How do I tell him how I’m feeling?

How do I tell him how much I miss him?

How do I tell him I think I may be pregnant?

Chapter 22 - Trent

The weather in England has been one big stereotype. It has been overcast and drizzling rain since I arrived. The entire city seems to be a study in wet gray cement and pollution-smudged windows.

That’s just fine. It suits my mood perfectly.

I’ve been in London for the better part of two weeks now, and now I’m just staying on to torture myself, it seems. I’ve already done all the business I can do with my English associates. If I try to press myself on them anymore, I’ll probably come across as some kind of nut job.

Maybe that’s why I chose England over any other country to sulk in. Its people are too polite to tell me to go home.

As my cab moves slowly through London’s West End, I stare moodily out the window. Piccadilly Circus is lit up cheerily just like always, but foot traffic is down due to the rain. The only ones out voluntarily are the most die-hard—or waterproofed—of tourists.

I tell the cab driver to take me back to my hotel. He politely tries to engage in some small talk on harmless subjects, then just as politely falls silent when I respond with monosyllables and grunts.

Amusingly, the façade of my hotel across from Hyde Park resembles the White House, topped with France’s Arc de Triomphe. If it’s not the best hotel in London, it can’t be far off, not at four thousand dollars a night. The only downside is that it comes with a king-size bed, which is a lot of bed when you’re lonely.

Everything about my hotel suite is spacious, though, from the size of the bed to the bathroom, which could easily accommodate a half a dozen people at once. Three could comfortably fit into the shower. The living room area sports not one but two white luxury couches.

Unfortunately, all this roomy splendor only serves to remind me that I’m the only one around to enjoy it. This becomes all the clearer as I make myself a drink and sit down in an armchair