Together We Rise From Ashes

, eight months pregnant and with a flat tire, wh

g to avoid us. It

ous pain ripped through my pregnant belly, I called

he baby... something' s

is stepsister, Florence, whining i

de' s voice,

You probably just bumped a

r me, over his sister-in-law

orld-renowned pianist, would never play again. And our

ust collateral damage

to find out we w

pte

Carpent

o. On the third, as the headlights grew into blinding suns pin

iage wa

nvy of every woman who dreamed of a fairy-tale ending. We had married the Conrad twins, Kade and Carlisle, heirs to a corpor

peeled back to revea

ear that mirrored my own. Her hands, those gifted, insured-for-millions hand

in my throat, completely unrelated to the eight months of pregnancy that made my movements clumsy.

e. Please, j

ing, his mind was an open book to me, full of reassurances and a fierce, possessive love I mistook for devotion. But lately, especially since

wasn't swerving to avoid

lisle again," I urged Charl

hite. "I did. He said the same th

yfriend. Kade' s voice from his last brief, irritated call echoed in my ears. "For God' s sake, Glor

isis. And my husband, and my sister' s husband, treated her trivial dramas as matters o

. There was no time to get out, no time to do anything but brace for the inevitable. Charlene screamed my n

un, and then everything was just a symphony of destruction-the shattering of glass, the groan of twisting steel, and

low and deep. It was a cramp of such imp

flying to my stomach. It was as ha

aturally still. A dark stain was spreading across her sleeve, and her bea

sped away into the darkne

one. Bleed

d' s end of our mental bond wa

he screen was cracked, but it still glowed. I hit Kade' s numbe

g once

oria, I told you I' m with Florence. What is

dent... we were hit... Charlene' s hurt, I think she' s unco

aive part of me expected to hear panic, to hear him shouti

nd, a pathetic, manipulative whimper. "Kade, my h

ust breathe." He came back on the line with me, his voice like ice. "Look, stop being so dramatic.

felt like another blow. "Kade, the car is destro

? Florence is fragile. Unlike you. Handle it. And don

ne wen

d hun

. Over his sister-in-law.

is wasn' t just neglect. This was a deliberate abandonmen

, so still and silent, and then down at my rigid belly where the frantic fluttering h

ld I had loved with every fiber of my being, was

ene, to do something, anything, but my body felt like it was filled with

my sister, and my life, I made a vow. If I surviv

child I was losing. My little boy. A silent scream for him e