Chapter 20: Dante and Ashlyn

When I wake, I hear voices.

It takes me a moment to remember where I am and how I got here. I roll over in the giant bed, reveling at how smooth and silky the sheets feel against my skin. My hand finds my belly.

"Good morning, sweet one," I say softly to my baby.

The morning light peeks in around the wooden blinds on the window, casting long, warm sunbeams across the bed. I want to stay beneath the covers a while longer, hide from the rest of the world. In here, my baby and I are safe and secure. For the time being, anyway.

But try as I might, I can't ignore the voices outside my room. They're not particularly loud, and half the words are muffled, but I can hear enough to make out Ashlyn's voice. And the male voice, I'm assuming, belongs to Dante.

I sit up, trying both to hear and not to hear their conversation.

"He should know," Ashlyn says.

"I agree," says Dante, "but you know how Rafe can be. We need to figure out what happens if he continues to be stubborn."

"Which he will.