Total pages in book: 115
Estimated words: 113473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113473 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 454(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
He’d lived a hard life.
She only lived a hard year.
He was still standing after whatever he went through.
She needed to do the same.
And to survive, to show the Shirleys they hadn’t broken her, she needed to eat. She needed to find herself again.
To find that good life she lived over a year ago.
To find Autumn once more.
Or even a woman named Red.
Chapter Seven
Autumn sat on the examining table in one of those blue gowns. She had been told to tie it in the front.
A knock on the door preceded it opening and a female voice calling out, “Hello! I’m Dr. Bryson, but you can call me Carly.” The doctor came around the curtain with a wide smile and stopped. The smile faltered as she took Autumn in. It wasn’t hard to see that she had to force it back in place as she continued, “My office is very informal. Stella called and told me... Well, that you needed a checkup because you’re pregnant and haven’t had any proper prenatal care. Is that correct?” Her eyes fell to Autumn’s stomach. “Well, that was easily answered. She didn’t say over the phone you were that far along.”
The doctor put her chart down on a nearby counter and stepped up to the examining table. “You can go ahead and lie back.”
Autumn adjusted her position, the paper cover under her making a sharp crinkling sound as she did so.
“Do you know how far along you are, Autumn?”
“No.”
“Oh... Uh... When was the last time you had sex?”
Autumn frowned up at one of the tiles in the drop ceiling. “I don’t know. Months. He stopped once I stopped bleeding.”
“Bleeding?”
“My period stopped and he stopped not long after that.”
“He? The man outside in the waiting room?”
“No.”
“Then who? Your boyfriend? Husband?”
How did she answer that? Should she lie?
“I don’t know his name.” She decided to lie, though she didn’t know why since it would only make things messier.
“You didn’t know him?”
Autumn squeezed her eyes shut and cursed. This doctor was going to examine her. She was going to figure out everything soon enough. And she wasn’t sure how much Stella told her already.
“Just a man I know.”
“A man you wanted to have a baby with?” The doctor grabbed a rolling stool and moved it to the end of the table, then pulled out the stirrups. “Slide down to the edge, please, and put your feet in the stirrups.”
She didn’t want to. She really didn’t.
“I just want to check you to see if you’re okay... To make sure everything is... okay.”
Autumn already knew that answer. Nothing was okay.
She ground her molars as she slid her butt to the very edge of table and plugged her feet into the stirrups.
“Drop your knees and relax.”
Relax. Right. She knew the deal, it just had been a while since she did it.
And now one more person would soon know what happened to her.
“I’m going to exam you now. I want to make sure nothing is... That everything looks normal. Okay?”
No, it wasn’t okay. “Yes,” she whispered. She promised Stella she’d do this.
“Have you had any spotting?”
“Sometimes.”
“Cramps?”
“A few.” She had figured most of them were from hunger.
When the doctor was done down between her thighs, she rolled back and removed her gloves with a snap. “I’m going to measure your stomach next and then call in the tech to do an ultrasound. Is that okay? This way we can try to figure out a due date and see if everything is on track.”
Nothing was on track. “I can’t pay for any of that.”
“I... I think that’s been covered, so don’t worry about that right now. Let’s just worry about you and the baby.”
“Seed.”
Suddenly, the doctor was standing at her side, peering down at her and wearing a confused expression. “Seed?”
“Yes. What he planted inside me.”
Carly’s surprised eyes flashed to Autumn’s face and her frown deepened. “You mean when you got pregnant?”
“When he planted his seed.”
Her brow dropped low and her eyebrows pinned together. She quickly grabbed her chart off the counter and glanced at it. “Autumn, how old are you? I just want to make sure my chart is correct and there wasn’t a typo.”
She had to be a year older than what she was before she was taken. “What month is it?”
“It’s... uh, October... October third.”
“I’m twenty-five.” She had missed her birthday. Not that there had been anything to celebrate.
“Autumn,” Dr. Carly said softly, like she was talking to a three-year-old. “What’s the highest level of education you’ve completed? You marked college on your form.”
College seemed a lifetime ago. When her future seemed bright and shiny. But why would the doctor ask her that? “I finished my degree...” Not long before... “A while ago.”
“So, you should understand how a baby is conceived.”
Of course, she did. “Yes.”
“And that the baby inside you shouldn’t be... isn’t considered a seed.”