Helen R. - The Pregnancy Plan / Hope's Child

“It’s an experimental drug to help alleviate the symptoms of endometriosis. I’m part of a clinical trial at Richmond Pharmaceuticals.”

“I didn’t realize …” He wasn’t sure what he meant to say, what was the right thing to say. He’d had no idea that she had to endure what he knew was a painful and chronic condition for a woman, and he hated to think of her suffering.

But Ashley just shrugged. “It’s not something that comes up in conversation.”

“It should have been noted in your file,” he said.

“Eli knows—I talked to him before I was accepted into the test group, but I haven’t had an appointment with him since.”

Cam believed there still should have been a note in her file, but right now he was more concerned about her current situation. “Is your sister running the trial?”

She nodded.

He picked up the cordless phone on the counter. “Call her.”

“Why?”

“I want to know if you can take the medication I prescribed or if I should write a scrip for something else.”

“Look, Cam, I appreciate your concern, but I took some Tylenol when I got home and I’m okay.”

She wouldn’t have cried out in pain if she was okay and since he figured they were both aware of that fact, he only asked, “Why don’t you want to call your sister?”

“Why won’t you back off?” she countered.

“Because I care about you.”

Maybe he was surprised by the admission, but not by the feelings. He did care about Ashley. He’d always cared about Ashley.

She turned away from him, but not before he saw the glint of tears in her eyes.

“You have no right,” she said, her tone laced with both hurt and anger. “No right to barge into my life after twelve years and make such a statement as if it gives you the right to interfere.”

It was true. He’d given up any right he might have had when he’d ended their relationship a dozen years earlier. But his feelings for Ashley had never been rational, and even when he’d gone away, his feelings for her never had.

“I’ve always cared about you, Ash, and I always will.”

She turned away to wrap up the leftover pizza, struggling a little because of her bandaged hand. “Thank you for your concern,” she said, not sounding thankful at all. “Now go away.”

He knew he should. But instead, Cam scrolled through the list of numbers stored in the memory of the phone still in his hand.

“What are you doing?” she demanded.

He found “Megan & Gage” and pressed the call button. “Calling your sister.”

She stared at him, as if she didn’t really believe he’d do it.

“It’s ringing,” he warned her.

She grabbed the phone with her uninjured hand. As obviously unhappy as she was about making the call, she seemed to accept that he would talk directly to Megan if she continued to refuse and had likely concluded that her sister would have fewer questions for her than she would for him.

After a brief conversation, during which she reassured her sister numerous times that she was fine and didn’t need anyone coming over to check up on her, Ashley said goodbye and disconnected.

“That’s why I didn’t want to call her,” she said.

“Because you knew she’d be worried about you?” he asked, wondering why her sister’s concern should be a problem for Ashley.

“Because she’s spent too much time worrying about me, and even more over the past four months.”

“Since the broken engagement,” he guessed.

She nodded, making him suspect that she might be more distressed over the end of that relationship than he wanted to believe. And though he was undeniably curious about the ex-fiancé, he forced himself to focus on more immediate concerns.

“What did Megan say about the medication?”

“She said it’s fine. I just have to make sure that I inform the admin clerk of the dosage when I go in for my blood work.”

“Except you didn’t get the scrip filled, did you?”

“No, because I didn’t plan on taking it.”

He glanced at his watch. “I’ll call it in to Brody’s.”

“I’m capable of taking my own prescription in.”

“I know you are,” he agreed. “I’m just not convinced that you’ll actually do it.”

“Fine.” She thrust the phone at him. “Call it in and then leave me alone.”

He dialed the familiar number, spoke to the pharmacist and made arrangements for the medication to be delivered, throughout which Ashley continued to glare at him.

“It should be here within twenty minutes,” he told her.

“Do you plan on hanging around until it gets here?” she challenged.

“I don’t have anywhere else that I need to be, and I have no intention of letting you push me out the door until we’ve had a chance to talk about what happened in the kitchen.”

“There’s nothing to talk about,” she denied, but the flush in her cheeks told him otherwise. “It was a moment of insanity, that’s all.”

“The only insanity is in trying to pretend it didn’t mean anything, trying to pretend that we aren’t still as attracted to one another as we were twelve years ago.”

She folded her arms over her chest as she lifted her gaze to his. “I’m not going to deny that there’s an attraction, but I’m not looking to get involved with anyone right now.”

A personal relationship was the absolute last thing he’d been looking for when he’d decided to move back to Pinehurst, but then he’d kissed Ashley, and he’d realized that getting involved with her wasn’t a choice. But he understood why she was wary.

“You can’t close your heart because of what your ex-fiancé did,” he said gently.

“This had nothing to do with Trevor,” she denied.

“I’d say the picture in your trash can suggests otherwise.”

“You’re right,” she decided. “This has everything to do with Trevor. Because if he hadn’t chosen to send that picture to me, I wouldn’t have sliced my hand and you wouldn’t have needed to stitch it up, and you definitely wouldn’t be here right now.”

“Then maybe I should thank Trevor,” he said.

She glared at him. “In any event, I have no intention of picking up our relationship where we left off just because it’s convenient for you now.”

He felt his own anger stir. “My feelings for you were a lot of things,” he told her. “But convenient was never one of them.”

As soon as her prescription was delivered, Ashley took the requisite pills and sent Cam on his way.

From the moment she’d returned from her shopping trip earlier in the day, nothing had gone according to plan. Coming face-to-face with Cam had been unexpected, but it had also been unavoidable. Especially since he would be moving in down the street.

So while their meeting was inevitable, she’d been confident that when they did meet, they would simply exchange a few coolly polite words and go their separate ways. She certainly hadn’t expected anything like the kiss they’d shared in her kitchen.

Because while Cam might have made the first move, there was no denying that she’d been an equal—and willing—participant.

Yeah, that kiss had definitely been a mistake, because now she was dealing with the aftermath—a jumble of feelings that she hadn’t been prepared for and didn’t know what to do with.

It had only been one kiss. Nothing that should have the power to turn her world upside down. But it felt as if that was exactly what had happened.

He’d been absent from her life for twelve years but somehow, after only a few hours, he’d managed to churn up all kinds of feelings and desires that she’d buried a long time ago. Or so she’d thought.

She sorted through the mail, opened the cupboard under the sink to drop the flyers into the recycle box and saw that a new bag had been put in the garbage can. Cam must have taken out the other bag for her—the one with the broken picture frame and her engagement photo in it.