Save Me: A dark romantic thriller (Novel) Read Free Page B

talking about a human life?” She indicated her stomach. “This Peter, what is growing inside of me, our baby, is already alive.”
    He sighed. “First of all, hun, I understand that. And second of all, they’re still my parents, so I’d appreciate it if you didn’t bad mouth them.”
    “That’s just swell. Now you’re defending them, huh? Your parents who refer to me as ’that Ashley.’ Like I’m some kind of loser. Why would you even listen to them? Your mom and dad live in Florida. They‘re barely a part of our lives. Don’t you get it, they‘re using this as an excuse to try to break us up? They never liked me and they never will.”
    “Look,” said Peter. “I’m not defending anyone. You heard me, they said they think we should either do that or put the baby up for adoption.”
    “Yeah whatever.” Appalled, Ashley pushed his arm away. “Isn’t your rich conceited mother lovely to suggest, as another alternative, we put the child up for adoption? I will admit it’s a step up from having the kid sucked out of my stomach with a vacuum cleaner.”
    Was Peter having second thoughts? Was he suddenly not thrilled at the prospect of becoming a daddy? Oh Lord, Ashley hoped not. If he was having doubts, she didn’t know what she would do.
    Peter’s parents had a home in Fort Lauderdale, and were part owners of an exclusive country club. While growing up, when his family had lived in New Jersey, they had a share in another golf course, not far from Wichita.
    Nowadays, because he had chosen to be with Ashley, Peter was cut off from his family’s resources. They didn’t like Ashley. Someone from a middleclass background was not what the Ferguson’s had wanted for their son. Rather than become a blue-collar worker, they had wished Peter would have gone to college to become a lawyer or a doctor like his older brother.
    “You know. I’ll never leave you, Ash. I don’t care what my parents think. I know I made the right decision.”
    “And I’ll never leave you either,” she declared, caressing Peter’s hand. “But why are you telling me that? You suddenly saying ‘you’ll never leave me makes me scared.”
    “Because some guys, especially guys my age, once they have a kid, start to feel trapped.”
    “Oh my God! You feel trapped?”
    “No! That’s not what I’m getting at. What I’m trying to say, is I don’t view what we have as a starter-kit marriage. I also want you to know Ashley; you’ll always be my number one girl. And I promise I’m going to work even harder than I already do, to give this child whatever he or she is going to need.”
     
    ***
     
    However, just one month later, those optimistic plans for the future would be altered forever.
    In August, Peter’s window washer company had been cleaning a building in Atlantic City near the Trump Plaza, when one of the fiercest thunderstorms of the summer had rolled into southern New Jersey.
    Peter was not wearing his safety harness. He had just taken it off. Therefore, when the gust of wind, estimated to be upwards of seventy-five miles per hour, had hit that part of the tall structure, there was nothing to prevent him from falling.
    When Ashley had learned of her husband‘s tragic death, she was shaken to the core, and had cried hysterically for days.
    Emotionally, those tears had yet to dry.
     
     
     
     
    PART THREE
     
     
     
    THE FIELD
     

     
    CHAPTER 3
     
     
     
     
     
    October 17, 2003
    Crown Jewel Supermarket
    Wichita, N.J.
    9:49 P.M.
     
    “So you’re not gonna tell us who the baby‘s daddy is?” the guy with the beard asked, still kneeling down beside Ashley, flicking the Bic lighter near her face. “Is that how it’s gonna be Christina?”
    Although terrified, there was no way Ashley intended to answer this lunatic’s question. The memory of Peter was too painful. His closed-casket funeral had left her numb. In addition, Peter’s parents had seemed to blame Ashley for what had happened, as if she, and not