Total pages in book: 151
Estimated words: 142976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 477(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142976 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 715(@200wpm)___ 572(@250wpm)___ 477(@300wpm)
Fern Lambert is everything Cade has never wanted in a woman—timid, sheltered, shockingly inexperienced, and—after a night of uncharacteristically bad choices—pregnant with his baby.
She is also the key to securing an elusive business contract that Cade has been after for nearly a year. Marrying her means giving up three years of his life, it means acknowledging a child that he never planned on having… it means complications and disruptions to his well-ordered life.
But Cade knows it’s the right thing to do. It’s the only thing to do. That doesn’t mean he has to like it.
And—inexplicable fascination with her lush upper lip notwithstanding—it certainly doesn’t mean he has to like her
*************FULL BOOK START HERE*************
Prologue
In a grand ballroom full of colorful, flamboyant butterflies, she was a small, pale decidedly drab moth. Niall Caden Hawthorne—Cade—shouldn’t have noticed her. He wasn’t sure why his restless gaze had snagged on her, not when she was doing her damnedest to fade into the wallpaper behind the large potted plant in the furthest corner of the massive room.
The huge space was teeming with brash, overconfident people. They were all talking and laughing a little bit too loudly. All putting on a damned good show of having a fabulous time. And why wouldn’t they? Invitations to the Hawthorne Trust Annual Charity Gala were coveted by celebrities, royalty, and powerful politicians the world over. Scoring an invitation to this event represented the pinnacle of making it.
Cade had never seen the appeal, honestly, but as he’d been obligated to attend since he was thirteen, he was hardwired to resent it. Even more so these last few years, when it seemed liked neither of his brothers gave a good goddamn about appearances and familial obligations, while Cade still tried to be the Good Son.
His younger brother Gideon—until recently—had happily skipped the gala and all other family-related events, since his late teens. While Nox, their middle brother, had been MIA for the last eighteen months because he was going through some shit.
That left Cade and his youngest sibling, McKenna, holding the bag. Kenny, of course, lived for this shit. She loved dressing up, partying, and she was the one who picked the recipient charity every year. The gala was her pet project, a responsibility she’d shouldered since their mother’s death eleven years ago when Cade had been twenty-three and Kenny only eighteen. But even Kenny seemed peaked and out of sorts this year. He’d caught a glimpse of her earlier, looking beautiful as always, but also pale, too thin, and definitely not happy.
Cade absently lifted a champagne flute from a passing tray, as his restless gaze left the peculiar little gray moth in the corner to sweep the grand ballroom for his sister. He’d been meaning to corner her and find out what was wrong. He’d never seen her look less than radiant at one of these shindigs but she’d appeared frazzled enough earlier for him to make a mental note to ask her if she was okay.
He didn’t see her. Instead he spotted his youngest brother, Gideon, slow dancing with his wife Elizabeth. The couple had been together for eighteen months now and married for the last six months. The woman was undoubtedly the one who’d encouraged Gideon to come to the gala tonight.
Those two were so wrapped up in each other that, as usual, they appeared oblivious to the rest of the world. Cade rolled his eyes and skimmed over the rest of the glittering, sophisticated crowd before coming to a stop on the fragile moth again.
He supposed—if this were regency England—she would’ve been considered the quintessential wallflower. She was wearing a silvery ball gown. Cade had dated enough wealthy, sophisticated women to recognize that it was clearly an expensive designer dress.
But the silver-gray color washed out her already pale complexion. There was a subtle sheen to the fabric that reminded him of rain-soaked spiderwebs on a crisp winter morning. He snorted in self-derision at the uncharacteristically whimsical thought.
The dress—a long sheath which skimmed over barely-there curves—was almost prudish. Long sheer sleeves, an empire waist, and a modest, elegant boatneck, combined with a floor length skirt in fabric so lightweight it seemed to move with every breath she took.
Her hair, piled atop her head in a complicated series of twists and braids, was blonde. No… blonde was an entirely too simplistic a word for that remarkable silvery moonlight shade of platinum. Cade doubted the color was natural and with the entire mass balanced on top of her head like that, it looked like too much weight for her slender neck to carry.
While her hair was remarkable, the rest of her was decidedly not. She was so pale he wondered if she was anemic. And then also wondered why someone so colorless would choose such a light-toned, monochromatic dress.
As he drifted closer to her lonely corner, he conceded that she wasn’t entirely without color. He noted the faintest blush of pink in her cheeks and on her mouth. The somber soft misty gray—almost the same shade as her dress—of her large wide set eyes. Her long, thick lashes and delicately arched brows were startlingly dark in contrast with the paleness of her skin and hair, adding an intriguing depth and sultriness to her lovely eyes.
She had an appealing mouth, with a full, cupid’s bow upper lip, which overshadowed the less full curve of her lower lip. He’d never seen a mouth quite like it before. Upside-down and interesting, on a quiet, plain face. His eyes drifted up from that captivating mouth, set above a narrow, pointed chin. Then moved on to her small, straight nose, high cheekbones, and back to the big, gray eyes that widened as they made contact with his.