Nickolas-1 (22 page)

“Morgan? Are you there?”

She wiped furiously at the tears. It seemed as though every little thing set her off nowadays. His voice was gentle and caring.

“Yes. I have an appointment soon. I have to...just email me with the place to have the dead refrigerator taken. I...good-bye.” And she hung up before he could say anything else.

Twenty minutes later, she had a cheap replacement being delivered tomorrow. And they had agreed to take the old one and set it in the garage for her. Life was suddenly all right.

She was running late. Something she detested more than anything else. But she’d had a slight accident with her blouse and she’d had to change. She didn’t think puke down the front of her would leave a good impression on her

“husband.” The taxi driver had been sweet; he’d even kept the car running so it would be cool when she came back out to get in.

By the time she’d paid him and was headed up in the elevator, she was thirty minutes late and had to be sick again. It was all the rushing around, she thought, and being off her schedule. Hurrying into the office, the nurse took one look at her and rushed her past the other patients and right to the employee bathroom.

She didn’t have anything left in her belly so all she was doing was heaving when someone knocked on the door.

“Morgan, it’s Nickolas, let me in.”
Great, just frigging great
. She’d not seen him in five weeks and now that she was sicking up her breakfast, he wanted to chat.

“I’m a little busy right now. How about we meet later when I’m not quite so preoccupied?” Reaching over to the little sink, she turned the water on full blast.

That did help with drowning him out, but now she had to pee. Again.

Nick was standing on the other side of the door when she opened it five minutes later. She supposed it was too much to ask that he go sit in the waiting room. Ignoring him as best she could, she went to the front desk and asked Tansy where they wanted her.

“I would like a word with you, if you don’t mind? You look like hell. And I want to know why you aren’t returning my calls.”

“I do mind. I don’t want to speak to you. But I will answer you. If I look like hell, it’s none of your business. It has no direct correlation to the babies, so it’s not anything to you. As for calling you back, you can ask me questions through my lawyer. Now, if you don’t mind, I’m tired and hot and I want to sit down.” She brushed past him and into the room that she was to be examined in.

Morgan had just put the paper gown on when Damon and Nick came in the room after a brief knock. Damon was smiling and Nick looked ready to bite a nail in two.

“Morgan, how are you doing? Need help getting up on the table?” Damon always asked her the same thing, and she never answered. It was getting harder to “hop” up on the table, but she just managed it. Pulling the sheet across her waist, she watched as he measured her from groin to the top of her mound. Laying down like this, she felt like Mount Everest. Probably looked like it too. He measured, took notes, and made funny noises in the back of his throat.

Nick watched everything he did like there was going to be an exam later and he didn’t want to fail.

“You’ve gained six pounds this month. Not bad, not bad. I want to start having you come in weekly now. You’re due date will change because of you carrying twins. I’d like to say you’ll deliver around the tenth or eleventh of August. But as stubborn as you are, I’ve no doubt those boys will be too, so we’ll shoot for then. I don’t want you to go much past that because of your size and theirs. I’d also like you to curtail your standing time. How long would you say you’re on your feet now?”

“I guess about ten hours at day. Sometimes more, but not much,” she told him.

“Why are you on your feet so much? You should be sitting down or lying down as much as possible with your feet up above your heart,” Nick interjected.

They both ignored him.

“I’d like you to try to get that number down to half. Your due date is in less than six weeks, so I’d also like for you to carry a cell phone or be with someone whenever you’re over a mile from home. I don’t think anything will happen, but with twins, it’s hard to know. Okay, Tansy will come in and help you to x-ray and we’ll do that today. I’m a little concerned about the swelling, but we’ll discuss that later.”

She could hear Nick saying something to his brother as the door shut, but she wasn’t really paying attention. Less than six weeks to go.

Tansy came in a few minutes later with a smile and a Snickers. Morgan nearly wept with happiness. It had become a ritual with them. She would get weighed and examined; Tansy would slip her a candy bar. This time, the chocolate was like ambrosia to her. Her stomach was empty and Nick was here.

Morgan waddled down the hall clutching her sheet around her like a toga.

Her last two bites of her candy bar were the closest thing to happiness she’d had in a while. Nick popped out of the door just in front of her and nearly knocked her over. As he made a grab for her, the sheet slipped and he got a handful of her breast. Her very full, very tender breast. She moaned before she could stop herself.

Without waiting for the sheet to be pulled all the way back in place, she darted around him and into the room. She’d never been so mortified in her life.

The rest of her doctor’s appointment was made in silence. Neither of them spoke to each other nor to Damon. When Morgan went to the front desk to make her next appointment Nick, was going in Damon’s office.

“Morgan, are you okay? You seem...I don’t know, distracted,” the nurse making her next appointment asked.

Well, duh
, she wanted to snap at her, but only nodded and left. She was married to a man who despised her, having his twin sons, living in his house, and had six weeks left in the only home she’d ever known. Nope, not distracted at all.

~~~

“Should she be that puffy?” Nick asked his brother as soon as the door shut to his office.

“Puffy? I don’t know what you’re referring to. Her ankles are swollen because she’s carrying around extra weight and it’s hot. The babies are fine. I don’t see any problems with the delivery. Boy one is head down and in a good position. Boy two is up, but that’s nothing to be concerned about. He can flip or not.”

“Is she going to be all right?” Damon looked at him for a long time. Nick had seen her belly—it was hard to miss—during the ultrasound. She was so big.

“The babies are fine, Nick. She hasn’t done anything to harm your sons.” He wanted to scream. No one would give him any information about her.

Not even her nurse and he was paying.

Nick left the office a short time later. He was no closer to knowing if she was going to be all right than he had before. She was his wife, for Christ’s sake, and not one person would tell him anything about her. He glanced up in time to see someone who looked like her get into a cab. A cab. Why would she…? It would be just like her to not use the car he’d given her. Damned girl probably sold it.

A week later, he was back in his office and in a foul mood. He noticed that his receptionist was out to lunch. He thought she was out to lunch even when she was there, but he’d not replaced her yet. He’d been busy.

Nick picked up the phone to call Devin just as he walked in his office. He had Byron with him.

“Hi, did you know that your receptionist is a moron? I called up here earlier this morning to speak to you and she didn’t have a first clue as to who I was asking about. I think you should fire her and find someone else. Soon.” Devin plopped down in his chair.

“Yeah, I was just thinking the same thing. Want to go and get some lunch?

I’m starved and I need a break.” It was nearly one now, and he knew he was free the rest of the afternoon.

“Yeah, but I gotta...why don’t I meet you there? I have something I have to do later and it’ll be easier if I drive my own car.” Devin was hiding something.

He’d always been bad at lying, which was the same as evading.

“Nah, we can go together. I’ll wait for you while you take care of business.

It’s getting later all the time,” he told him.

“Nicky, I have to go see Morgan. Something happened to the fridge last week and I didn’t get a bill yet. She said she had to replace it and I wanted to make sure she’s had one delivered. It’ll be much smoother if you don’t go.”
Well,
why don’t you just be a little more blunt
? he thought.

“You talk to her? How often? And what do you mean you haven’t received a bill? There’s money enough on the credit card I set up for her; have her use it.

That would generate a receipt you can use, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, there’s plenty of money on the credit card for that and anything else, but, as far as I can tell, she’s never used it. None of the money we’ve set up for her, as a matter of fact. I just want to go see if she got one, or do I need to be all manly and order her one?”

Nick looked at Byron when he snorted at them. “She wouldn’t use it if her life depended on it. Just like she won’t tell you any personal information. Just like she won’t let you run her life.”

“She is stubborn, I’ll give her that. I’ve never met a more pigheaded person…well, never a more pigheaded female. The only other person I can think of who’s more pigheaded is you.” Devin pointed at Nickolas and smirked before continuing. “Probably why she thinks you hate her so much, I guess.” That stunned Nick. Hate her? Did she really think he hated her? She aggravated him most of the time to the point where he wanted to spank her, but hate her? He didn’t hate her.

The men had a great dinner at Max and Erma’s downtown and had enjoyed teasing each other for nearly the whole late afternoon. Devin’s phone rang a couple of times, but once he looked to see who it was, he simply put the phone away.

While Nick was paying the check, it rang again.

“Grant.” Nick smiled at that. He knew it wasn’t his mother this time. She hated when they barked their names in the phone. As he moved to go outside, he realized Devin was no longer with him. Just as he turned to go back inside, he came out.

“Where did you...what’s happened?” Devin was visibly upset and tense.

“There’s been a break-in at your house. The police can’t tell me anything because they can’t contact the owner. They’ve taken a female away in an ambulance, Mrs. Puck, I told them. He said that she wasn’t pregnant, but... Nick, they can’t find Morgan. She’s not there. They can’t find anyone else in the house.

And Mrs. Puck is in surgery.”

They were running to Nick’s car as Devin filled him in. When they got to his SUV, he realized he couldn’t drive. His body was going ninety miles an hour and he knew he couldn’t get behind the wheel. He handed the keys over to Byron and slid in the front seat. Devin was still making calls.

They were only about twenty minutes from the house, but it seemed an eternity. When the vehicle pulled into the drive, Nick was out and up the front steps before either of his brothers were out of the car.
Morgan, Morgan, Morgan
kept running through his mind.

Nick tried to enter the kitchen, but was stopped by a young beat cop before he got within ten feet of the room. Devin and Byron were right behind him.

“I need to find my wife. Please, I need to see if Morgan is in there somewhere,” he begged the cop.

“No one else is in there, buddy. We looked everywhere for her and she’s not there. I’ll go get my captain. He wants to talk to you. Just don’t go in there; it’s a crime scene and we can’t have civilians walking all over the place. All right?” Nick nodded. Crime scene. He couldn’t mess up the crime scene. He sat down heavily in one of the chairs near the fireplace. His legs suddenly couldn’t support his weight.

“Dr. Grant, are you all right?” He looked up at the man who was speaking to him. He didn’t know who he was, but he was dressed like the policeman who was guarding the door.

“Morgan, my wife, have you found her yet? She’s eight months pregnant with our twins. Please tell me she’s all right.”

“No, we haven’t found her. I don’t believe she’s here. The woman, the nurse, she couldn’t tell us anything yet. We received a nine-one-one call to this address from the security firm who monitors it. They couldn’t get an answer when they received the alarm. Mrs. Grant has apparently set the alarm off once or twice since moving in, but they’ve always made contact with her right away. Someone forced their way in the back door and broke the glass. Mrs. Puck looks like she tried to fight her assailant, but he over powered her and broke her arm and her leg. Does your wife have a cell phone we could call? Maybe she’s over at a friend’s or something and doesn’t know what’s going on here,” the policeman said.

“She doesn’t have a cell that we know of, yet. She was to get one soon, though. I...the doctor told her she should carry one in case she was out and went into labor.” The door behind them crashed open and in came his mom and Spencer, followed closely by Damon and Meggie. He reached for her and she wrapped her arms around him.

“Have they found her yet? That poor girl. I wonder what happened to her.

She’ll be fine, Nicky, you’ll see. She’s just out and will be coming through that door any minute wondering what all the fuss is about. Why, she’ll be yelling at you for being here and all the mess...oh, Nicky, I want her here.” She started sobbing in his arms. He looked up at Spence and he came and pulled her into his arms and shuffled her to the couch.

The police went over every inch of the house, then when they were finished, they started over. Nick had followed them both times.

Nearly three hours later, his cell rang. He nearly ignored it, but answered the payphone call anyway.

“Grant. I don’t really have time to talk right now, but I’ll—”

“If you tell me that Mrs. Puck is all right then I’ll hang up. I’ve been out of—

” Morgan said, interrupting him.

“Where the fuck are you? You know that we’ve been trying to...she hung up on me.” Nick looked at his mother as he said it. He’d been worried about her all day and she had the nerve to hang up on him.

“Yes, imagine that. If you were that snarky to me, I would have hung up too,” his mom said to him.