Darkmoon (The Witches of Cleopatra Hill Book 3) Read Online Free
Author: Christine Pope
about was whether he’d attempt to force the issue, but he knew better than to try that. One thing about Adam; he was patient. I just didn’t know how to tell him that he could wait a hundred years, and it still wouldn’t change the way I felt about Connor.
It would’ve been easier if I could have hated him.
I distracted myself with planning the remodel of the kitchen, and consulted with Terri, the decorator who’d done the rest of the house, as well as an architect she recommended. It was going to be a massive project, since we’d decided to expand the kitchen another five feet into the side yard. I had to assure Margot and the other two elders that the exterior of the house would be restored so you’d never know the difference, and they still didn’t look thrilled by the prospect. All right, Ruby had barely touched the place all the years she’d lived there, according to them, and I suppose they wanted me to follow in her footsteps. Still, it was my house, and my remodel. I’d do it the way I wanted…and hope it would be enough to distract me.
Because of ordering tile and appliances, and having to wait for the architect’s preferred work crew to be available, construction wouldn’t actually get started until almost the end of May. That was good, because when I roused myself from my catalogues and blueprints and paint samples, I realized more than a month had passed since I’d left Flagstaff.
See? I told myself. You can do this.
What Sydney thought of my latest distraction, I didn’t know for sure. That is, I could tell she guessed I was over-compensating, making massive plans because that way I wouldn’t have to think about Connor. Fine. I didn’t have a problem with distracting myself by whatever means necessary. It wasn’t as if he’d been calling or sending me pleading texts or anything like that. Not one word since that horrible night when I walked out of his apartment. Not a single word.
In fact, I’d let everything pass by in such a blur that it wasn’t until I was looking at the calendar I had hanging in the library and putting a big star on May 27 th — the day the contractors were going to start work — that I realized it had been more than six weeks since I’d come back to Jerome. Good, that had to mean I was healing, right? That so much time had gone by without my hardly noticing?
So much time….
And then a stray thought passed through my mind, followed by, Oh, shit. Oh, shit.
Six weeks, and no period. I should’ve gotten one at the beginning of April, and then again a week ago. I wasn’t like Sydney, who was so regular you could practically set a clock by her. Sometimes I was late by a week or two, or even three, and then things would reset. But not like this. Not two months in a row, and nothing.
My hands started to shake so badly that I dropped the pen I was holding.
Get it together, I told myself. It could just be stress. You were almost three weeks late when you were studying for your AP exams. And you’ve been under way worse stress than that.
That sounded sensible enough. I didn’t really believe it, though.
Only one way to find out. Drive down to Cottonwood, go to the closest drugstore — Walgreens — and get a pregnancy test. I could do that. In fact, it would be easier than ever, since a few weeks earlier I’d decided I needed to have my own transportation, and went with Syd to the local Jeep dealership, where I made the salesman go bug-eyed when I calmly wrote a check for the entire cost of a brand-new Cherokee. Actually, Syd went kind of bug-eyed, too. Yes, I’d told her that I’d come into a good sum of money when Aunt Ruby passed away, but I don’t think she really got it until I paid cash for a thirty-thousand-dollar SUV.
Anyway, I’d been coming and going on my own for several weeks now, so no one would think anything of me going down the mountain for a shopping trip. And I knew I had to do it now, before I lost my nerve.
After gathering up my
It would’ve been easier if I could have hated him.
I distracted myself with planning the remodel of the kitchen, and consulted with Terri, the decorator who’d done the rest of the house, as well as an architect she recommended. It was going to be a massive project, since we’d decided to expand the kitchen another five feet into the side yard. I had to assure Margot and the other two elders that the exterior of the house would be restored so you’d never know the difference, and they still didn’t look thrilled by the prospect. All right, Ruby had barely touched the place all the years she’d lived there, according to them, and I suppose they wanted me to follow in her footsteps. Still, it was my house, and my remodel. I’d do it the way I wanted…and hope it would be enough to distract me.
Because of ordering tile and appliances, and having to wait for the architect’s preferred work crew to be available, construction wouldn’t actually get started until almost the end of May. That was good, because when I roused myself from my catalogues and blueprints and paint samples, I realized more than a month had passed since I’d left Flagstaff.
See? I told myself. You can do this.
What Sydney thought of my latest distraction, I didn’t know for sure. That is, I could tell she guessed I was over-compensating, making massive plans because that way I wouldn’t have to think about Connor. Fine. I didn’t have a problem with distracting myself by whatever means necessary. It wasn’t as if he’d been calling or sending me pleading texts or anything like that. Not one word since that horrible night when I walked out of his apartment. Not a single word.
In fact, I’d let everything pass by in such a blur that it wasn’t until I was looking at the calendar I had hanging in the library and putting a big star on May 27 th — the day the contractors were going to start work — that I realized it had been more than six weeks since I’d come back to Jerome. Good, that had to mean I was healing, right? That so much time had gone by without my hardly noticing?
So much time….
And then a stray thought passed through my mind, followed by, Oh, shit. Oh, shit.
Six weeks, and no period. I should’ve gotten one at the beginning of April, and then again a week ago. I wasn’t like Sydney, who was so regular you could practically set a clock by her. Sometimes I was late by a week or two, or even three, and then things would reset. But not like this. Not two months in a row, and nothing.
My hands started to shake so badly that I dropped the pen I was holding.
Get it together, I told myself. It could just be stress. You were almost three weeks late when you were studying for your AP exams. And you’ve been under way worse stress than that.
That sounded sensible enough. I didn’t really believe it, though.
Only one way to find out. Drive down to Cottonwood, go to the closest drugstore — Walgreens — and get a pregnancy test. I could do that. In fact, it would be easier than ever, since a few weeks earlier I’d decided I needed to have my own transportation, and went with Syd to the local Jeep dealership, where I made the salesman go bug-eyed when I calmly wrote a check for the entire cost of a brand-new Cherokee. Actually, Syd went kind of bug-eyed, too. Yes, I’d told her that I’d come into a good sum of money when Aunt Ruby passed away, but I don’t think she really got it until I paid cash for a thirty-thousand-dollar SUV.
Anyway, I’d been coming and going on my own for several weeks now, so no one would think anything of me going down the mountain for a shopping trip. And I knew I had to do it now, before I lost my nerve.
After gathering up my
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