Read Online Sister's Choice by Emilie Richards - Free Book Online Page A

grandmother’s long-abandoned cabin, in search of answers, and she had found them in the peaceful countryside and in her friendship with Elisa and Sam. She still had very few people with whom she felt comfortable sharing her innermost thoughts, but she knew she could be truthful with Elisa.
    “Well, first and foremost—and not yet answered—is the big zinger. Is my sister pregnant with my child?” She put a finger to her lips. “It seems so odd even to say that out loud.”
    “And if she’s not?”
    Kendra shrugged. “Then it’ll be up to her what we do next. I can’t make her try again.”
    “And that worries you.”
    “I’ve trusted her with my dreams, Elisa. And I hardly know her, because we were estranged for so long. I’d given up hope of having a baby, and now I’ve opened myself up to heartbreak again.”
    “Or wonder. Wonder is the other side of that coin, isn’t it? A baby of your own? The baby you and Isaac created together?”
    Kendra tried to send her mind down a more productive path. There were signs that Cash had been here. A nearly finished playhouse existed in the woods just beyond the cabin. He was building it where Jamie could keep an eye on the girls without appearing to, which Kendra approved of.
    Alison was daring and imaginative. But what would happen if Jamie didn’t keep her eye on her? The little girl might take it in her head to go down to the river on her own. Last summer, a child just about her age had fallen in near the bed-and-breakfast where Kendra and Isaac stayed now whenever they visited the Valley. Gayle, the innkeeper, had told her the story, which luckily had a happy ending. But now Kendra worried that history might repeat itself.
    “I’m a mess.” She turned back to Elisa. “Apparently I’m eaten up with anxiety. I look at that wonderful playhouse Cash Rosslyn is building the girls, and all of a sudden I’m worried that Jamie won’t keep a good enough eye on Alison and she’ll end up in the river.”
    “Why don’t you just put all your fears out to air?”
    Kendra didn’t have to think long or hard. “Will the girls be happy enough here that Jamie will stay where I can share in the pregnancy? Will the neighbors understand and support what we’re doing? Will Jamie’s pregnancy—if there is one—be problem free? If we have to try in vitro again and again, will Jamie be willing? Or is this a one-time impulse, something she’ll grow tired of quickly?”
    “What makes you think the last might be true?”
    “Jamie’s always been flighty.” Kendra shook her head at her own words. “But that’s not really true. Jamie was flighty as a child, but aren’t all children flighty? And after a disastrous adolescence and beyond, she did pull her life together.”
    “You don’t say that like you believe it’s true.”
    Kendra was ashamed, but she couldn’t pretend otherwise. “Of course that’s the real question, isn’t it? Everything comes back to that. How much of what I see in my sister is really just the normal difference in our personalities, the kind sisters everywhere have to deal with? How much is my own unwillingness to believe that Jamie really cleaned up her act? And how much is my profession? Investigative reporters aren’t trained to believe what we see on the surface. I’ve been suspicious since the moment she reentered my life. I know I have to trust her now—not just for the sake of the baby she might be carrying, but because trust’s the only way to keep Jamie and the girls in my life.”
    “But if you do trust Jamie, how will you survive if your trust is betrayed?”
    “You do know how to get to the heart of the matter.” Kendra tried to smile, but it was a weak attempt. “But other than that, life is simple, huh?”
    “You’re making a start just by admitting your mind is running wild. That’s a step. And I’m glad to see you can still smile about it.”
    “I think I’m going to need my sense of humor in the next months. Add