Taken: A Kept Novella (4 page)

Then maybe Hannah really had disappeared off the face of the earth.

Cam had offered to pick Jordan up after he got off work Monday afternoon, but Jordan declined, not knowing exactly what the evening would hold. She’d meet his sister, yes, but everything else seemed so vague. So secretive, when she couldn’t imagine any terrible secrets a sister might hold. Right now being able to leave at any time was an option worth having.

Jordan parked in Cam’s driveway, next to his Altima, and he opened his front door as she stepped out of the car. “Hey, there,” she said, smiling up at him, pretending and hoping that everything was fine.

“Hey.” He met her at the bottom of his front steps. “Thanks for coming.”

It was tempting to reach out and touch him, but she kept her hands to herself. “No problem. I’m just curious to hear what this big secret is.”

His gaze was serious. “I’m glad I finally get to tell someone.” He gestured toward the front door. “You ready to go in?”

She followed him, scanning the neighborhood with its signs of summer about to burst. Birds chirped in a neighbor’s tree, and warm sunlight cast shadows across front yards. A few cars parked on the street, and farther down the road a handful of kids on bikes chased each other.

Everything looked normal. Seemed normal. What she would hear might change all that.

Cam held the door for her. “After you.”

Inside, the sounds of someone working came from the kitchen.

“Have you eaten?” he asked.

“No, actually. Is your sister making something?”

“Yeah. If it’s okay with you, we’ll get her kids eating in the kitchen and take our food in the dining room so we can talk.”

Whatever he needed.

Cam led her into the kitchen where a woman in her mid-thirties with medium brown hair the same color as Cam’s stirred something in a pot on the stove. She turned as they entered, her attention locking onto Jordan. Her smile wasn’t strong, but it wasn’t scared either. The woman dried her hands on a dish towel. “You must be Jordan. I’m Anna.”

Jordan took the hand Anna offered. “It’s nice to meet you, Anna.”

The woman’s features relaxed. “I’ve heard a lot about you. It’s great to finally meet you, after all this time.”

And yet she’d heard nothing about this sister, about any of his family, really.

“Need any help?” Cam asked Anna.

“Just call the kids, if you don’t mind.”

He headed for the sliding doors off the family room.

So there were more children than just Sophie. And, somewhere, there had to be a father. Maybe he was at their home? His and Anna’s? “Do you live nearby, Anna?”

She hesitated. “I’m actually living here with Cameron right now.”

Why did his sister live with him? Where was the father? Jordan pressed her lips together.

Anna must have read her curiosity. “Jordan, I promise there’s a reason for everything, and we’ll explain it all. I don’t think there’s anything Cameron wants to keep from you.”

“I’m glad to hear it.”

“Me too.” Anna filled plates with salad and what looked like arroz con pollo from the pot on the stove.

The fragrant smell of the flavored chicken and rice woke Jordan’s taste buds.

“It’s been a very long time since he’s talked about a woman the way he talks about you.” Anna sent Jordan a grateful smile. “He’s been the best brother I could ever have, and it makes me happy to think that he’s found you.”

Either Cam was far more confident in their relationship than Jordan realized or Anna was spilling more than he’d be comfortable with. “Cam’s always been so quiet about his life, almost like he didn’t have one before a few years ago. I don’t know what to make of this.”

The sliding glass door in the family room beyond the kitchen cut the conversation short. Two elementary-aged kids, a boy and girl about ten and eight, ran in. Both seemed to have the same hair and coloring as Anna.

Cam followed and closed the door behind them.

Neither child was the girl from the picture.

Where was this Sophie?

The kids were almost to the kitchen island before either noticed Jordan. They both pulled up short and stared at her.

The boy, the older of the two, pushed a pair of glasses higher onto his nose. “Who’s this?”

Jordan fought a smile.

“Logan,” Anna said, her voice hinting her displeasure at his lack of manners. “This is Jordan, a friend of Uncle Cameron’s.”

Logan’s serious expression vanished, and a smile lit his features. “Hi,” he said with a small wave.

“I’m Avery,” his younger sister said. “Are you Uncle Cam’s girlfriend?”

Behind them, Cam narrowed his eyes a bit and sent Jordan a faint smile. “She’s a good friend. Don’t you two scare her off.”

Logan gaped over his shoulder at his uncle, his expression showing how funny he found it that his uncle might have a girlfriend. Any second now, the kid would probably break into that chant about the two of them in a tree.

Jordan couldn’t resist. “I need you two to tell me every good story you’ve got on him so I’ll know if I should stick around or not.”

Instead of the laughter and teasing she expected, both kids gave her serious expressions. “Uncle Cam’s the best,” Avery said. “And he needs someone to marry and take care of him. Just like you do, Mommy.”

Anna’s smile was sad. “Why don’t you two sit at the island and eat your dinner? We adults are going to eat in the dining room.”

Jordan swallowed the lump in her throat. She’d expected joking, teasing, something lighthearted. But the sadness and seriousness of Avery’s words… She was just a child. Why would she react like that?

What had this family gone through?

Cam’s fingertips nudged the small of Jordan’s back as Anna carried the main dish into the dining room on the other side of the kitchen wall.

Dinner started out normally enough. They made small talk while they ate, Anna asking questions about Jordan’s college experience, how her job search was going, about her family and growing up in the Chicago suburbs.

“What about you?” Jordan asked when her plate was almost empty. “Where did you guys grow up?”

Anna pushed back her plate and folded her arms on the table. “Kentucky. Our parents raised horses, raced them, did really well. Still do, we hear.”

She
heard?
Jordan glanced across the table at Cam.

His elbow rested on the table, a hand cupped over his mouth. He stared vacantly at the tabletop.

Evidently the story had begun.

Anna linked her hands together and studied them. “My husband was a Marine. He was stationed at Camp Pendleton in California when…” She circled her hand in the air. “When all of this began.

“I worked at a hair salon in the area and had some pretty wealthy civilian clients. One of them, Joelle Peterson, and I became good friends. Her husband was an infertility doctor, and ironically they’d been trying forever to have kids, but it just wasn’t working. I knew how badly she wanted a child, and I really thought she’d be a great mom. I was a fairly new Christian—”

“Which was not how we were raised,” Cam interrupted.

“Right. We weren’t, and Joelle and I would talk about God, about having kids, raising a family. Anyway, Avery was just a baby at the time. Joelle had been my client throughout the entire pregnancy, and she knew how easy pregnancy had been for me. One day she came in and started talking about how she and her husband were looking into surrogacy so they could have a child of their own. And as we talked, I just felt like I should do it for her. I should be her surrogate.”

A surrogate mother?
Jordan clenched her fingers together on her lap. What a decision.

“So I volunteered. And come to find out, that’s exactly what she’d hoped I would do. I’d had two easy, no-complication pregnancies back to back. Two healthy babies. Easy labor and delivery. Plus being a surrogate would almost double our income for the year. And she was a friend I felt deserved to be a mom.” Anna met Jordan’s eyes. “Why wouldn’t I volunteer to help her have a baby?”

“Did you do it?”

“I did. I met her husband. They met my husband. We had long talks about it, about the procedures, the medication, the timing. Tony, my husband, needed some convincing, but the money finally did it.” She smiled. “We started the process.” Her smiled faded. “The first embryos didn’t take. Joelle was heartbroken of course. But we tried again, and lo and behold, it worked. I was pregnant with their baby.”

Cam shot her a smile. “Which was the craziest thing.”

Anna laughed. “It was. You visited me right after we found out the embryo took, and you were pretty weirded out by it.”

“Definitely. Even Mom and Dad were. They thought you were insane to go through with it.”

“Yeah.” Sadness colored Anna’s single word.

And then colored Cam’s face.

So there was more to the story.

“I was four months pregnant when Tony—” Anna faced Jordan, set her shoulders, and firmed her lips. “Tony was killed in a training exercise. An accident.”

Oh, how awful. Jordan’s hand flew to her lips. “I’m so sorry.”

“Thank you.” Anna swallowed. “It’s been over five years now, but…”

Jordan glanced at Cam. How awful to lose a husband. To be alone and responsible for children like that.

“I had to go on, though, you know? My parents, of course, came out for the funeral, and I started the process of moving on with my life. I decided to stay there in California because of the pregnancy. Then the Petersons wanted to do some testing on the baby, right about halfway through, just to make sure everything was okay. I didn’t think anything of it.” Anna paused.

Jordan almost couldn’t stand the suspense. “And?”

“Sophie had Down Syndrome.”

Sophie was the child? The Petersons’ child?

“They wanted to abort and try again.”

Oh no. “Obviously they changed their minds.”

Anna glanced at Cam, who sighed and pushed himself against his chair back.

He shook his head. “Jordan, they didn’t change their minds.”

All of a sudden so much fell into place. The secrecy, never talking about his family, never talking about the past. “What happened? Did you run?”

“Eventually. I fought it as long as I could. I was a firm believer—still am—that every life is a gift from God, that it’s his decision to decide when life ends. Not ours. But California law didn’t give me a voice because I wasn’t the actual mother. The law there says that before the child is born, the intended mother—Joelle—is the natural and legal parent. Same with her husband. I had no say.”

Cam cleared his throat. “The husband was really the one who wanted the abortion. He convinced his wife that they could do this again. They’d either pay Joelle more for another go at it or find another surrogate. He didn’t care. He wanted a child, yes, but he wanted a perfect child. He felt they both deserved a ‘perfect’ child.”

Jordan shook her head, heart breaking for where this story had to be heading. “That’s terrible.”

“It was. Here I am, still reeling from the loss of my husband, dealing with my two children who are mourning their dad, all while I’m now visibly pregnant with a child the parents want to kill. And while Sophie wasn’t my child, she was the last big decision Tony and I made together. I refused to let them do it.

“So, yes, finally I ran. I’d been talking to a lawyer, working through my options since the contract I’d signed didn’t specifically mention abortion. Just medical tests and procedures. The only option I had was to give birth in a state that would recognize me as the mother instead of the Petersons as parents.”

There were states that would do that? “But you weren’t the mother.”

Anna laughed. “I know. It’s crazy, isn’t it? Michigan is one of those states that doesn’t recognize surrogacy contracts. There, whoever gives birth is the legal mother. So that’s where I went.”

“And they let you go?”

Cam and Anna eyed each other.

“We’re not sure if they let her go or just couldn’t find her in time,” Cam finally said.

“The nurse who always assisted Dr. Peterson when I was in his office called me—”

“Wait, the guy whose kid you were having did the procedure? Is that legal?”

Anna shrugged. “It was what he did for a living, and he was one of the best. I always assumed it made perfect sense for him to do it. He didn’t have to worry about expenses and such because it was his practice, his time.”

Interesting.

“Anyway, the nurse called me, left a message on my phone, and asked if we could meet. And then she was killed in a car accident the next day.”

Shivers crawled down Jordan’s spine.

“I thought it was more than a coincidence that this nurse wanted to talk to me when the Petersons and their lawyer were pressuring me to have an abortion. It scared me. I packed up overnight and left.”

Jordan leaned back in her seat, letting the details sink in. Anna was pretty tough to fight for an unwanted child when her whole world was dangerously close to imploding.

“The Petersons knew already, though, that I was not only determined to give birth to Sophie but then raise her myself. I wasn’t going to give her life and abandon her, you know? So while I don’t think they ever found me in Michigan, I also don’t know that they didn’t just say, ‘Fine. Let her have the baby and raise her.’ I just don’t know.”

“Wow.” It was quite a story. “Then Sophie was born and did have Down Syndrome?”

“She did. She’s just been an angel, though—” Anna seemed to choke on her words.

Cam laid his hand over Anna’s, squeezed it once. “Sophie has leukemia now. She needs a bone marrow transplant.”

Jordan closed her eyes. “I am so, so sorry. How’s she doing?”

Cam shook his head. “She needs that transplant soon. We’re still looking for the right match.”

“How hard is it to match?”

Anna seemed to stuff her emotions away and straightened in her chair. “In Sophie’s case, it seems like it’s very difficult. I’ve been tested, Cam’s been tested—although we haven’t heard results yet—but a best match tends to come from full-blooded brothers or sisters, because they have the same parents, which leads to a better chance of having the right match. Sophie doesn’t have any brothers and sisters.”