Waking Up As Mrs. Grant

chapter 4

When Natalie called Reid "little auntie" it sent chills down her spine, but it was worth it to see his mouth hang open in disbelief.
Caleb glanced sideways upon hearing her.
Natalie still wore a light smile, her arms tightly embracing his firm, warm jacket. He stopped pulling away and indulged her, looking towards Reid, "Your little auntie is right."
Reid was shocked!
Natalie's fingers trembled a bit.
Caleb's voice was cool and pleasant, sounding very close. She quietly looked up and saw his stern jaw, feeling like her bluff had been exposed. Reid was the most shocked. In the two years since Natalie and Caleb got married, she had rarely come back. He had never called her "little auntie" before, and they had never shown such intimacy. To him, they had always seemed distantly polite at best.
What was this now?
It must be the accident that messed up her brain, or Natalie wouldn't have done this.
They lingered at the door for a while. Rhonda, hearing the car but not seeing them, came out and saw Natalie and Caleb arm in arm. She smiled warmly, "What are you doing at the door? Come in."
As she spoke, she looked at Natalie.
Natalie's smile stiffened a bit. Having already confronted Reid, she thought, and relaxed her grip on Caleb.
Her arm felt empty.
Caleb looked down.
In the next second, Rhonda took Natalie's arm, and they went inside. Caleb started to follow, but Reid stopped him, swallowing hard and pointing at his head, "Is she alright up there?"
Caleb gave him a sidelong glance.
Reid quickly became alert, "I'm going in too."
He dashed inside, and Caleb followed. Inside, the Grant family was nearly all present. The eldest, Clayton, had been in business early on but later turned to landscapes and antiques. His wife, a college classmate now a traditional painting teacher, and he were both quiet types, a stark contrast to the boisterous Reid; the second child, Claire, had a sharper business sense, ran several subsidiaries, and married a childhood friend from another prestigious family. They had a daughter in high school and a son born two years ago, now asleep in the nursery. Caleb had another older brother who had passed young, leaving him to inherit Elder Mr. Grant's business acumen.
Seeing all these people made Natalie's head spin, but thankfully, they all knew about her amnesia and were friendly. After Reid came in, he handed his luggage to the nanny, Aunt Fielding, and sat on the arm of the sofa watching Natalie, who ignored him entirely, her attention entirely on Caleb.
He was the only familiar one.
Though they had just met today, their marriage lent a semblance of intimacy. Caleb stood by her, "The doctor said she needs to rest. I'll take her upstairs, you guys chat." See, he spoke flawlessly. Natalie smiled.
Rhonda nodded, "Go ahead."
Claire and the others didn't insist, and Aunt Fielding put down the luggage and came down from upstairs. Caleb glanced at the still dazed Natalie, chin lifting slightly, his voice slow, "Let's go."
Natalie snapped out of it.
She followed Caleb's steps, aware of several unavoidable stares. As they turned at the stairway, Natalie caught a glimpse of white and heard a sweet voice, "Brother Caleb!"
Soft and gentle.
Natalie looked down to see a woman in a white dress, long black hair, fair-skinned with subtly red lips—innocently beautiful. The woman also saw her and covered her mouth, seemingly surprised by her presence, "Miss Parker, you were discharged today? Sorry, am I disturbing you?"
"..."
Natalie didn't recognize her and as Caleb continued upstairs, nodded to the woman and followed him.
They went right to a room. Caleb opened the door, stepped back, "Rest well."
His implication was clear.
He wouldn't come in.
Natalie could hardly hold back her gratitude, her expression much relieved, "Thank you."
Caleb politely responded, "You're welcome."
He nodded genteelly to Natalie and walked away. Natalie watched his tall, broad-shouldered figure with appreciative eyes.
She went inside.
The room didn't seem lived in, quite stark, lacking any elements she liked. The window was open. Natalie heard voices and looked down to see the Grant family's backyard, Claire and her sister-in-law photographing flowers, Derek heading to the lake with a fishing rod.
The atmosphere was nice.
Natalie turned around, touched the bandage on her head, and pulled out her phone to call Oliver.
"Are you at the Grant family's?" Oliver asked.
"Big! Brother!" Natalie fumed, "How could you leave your eighteen-year-old sister to strangers!"
"That's your husband."
"And you're twenty-three this year."
"..."
"Even if you've lost your memory, you're still twenty-three," Oliver stated firmly. True big brother style! Natalie hung up in frustration, then called her friend Sophie to vent her anxiety and fear.
"Ugh, scared."
"All these strangers, and that annoying Reid."
"Oliver's ruthless, leaving me at the hospital with a husband I've never met. Where's the justice!"
"Who can save an amnesiac girl."
Sophie sat in front of her computer, editing photos while listening to Natalie's endless complaints, empathizing with the discontents of an eighteen-year-old. She responded affirmatively and reassured her, "No worries, just think of the Grant family as cabbages. Tomorrow, I'll take you out to play."
"...I have to go to the office tomorrow."
Natalie pummeled the pillow beneath her, replying, "Zoe wants me there, said there's a stack of contracts to review."
"Poor kid."
Natalie wished she were still unconscious.
Natalie was lying on the bed, swinging her legs back and forth.
After a while, someone knocked at the door with a sweet voice. Natalie recognized it as the voice of the woman who had called for Caleb in the living room earlier. She sat up and rubbed her neck.
Natalie opened the door and faced a smiling face. "You probably don't remember me," the woman said.
"Indeed."
"I'm Yolanda." The woman extended her hand, her smile friendly. "I grew up with Brother Caleb."
"..."
Natalie shook her hand briefly.
Yolanda was there to call her down for dinner. Natalie closed the door, and as she walked to the dining room, she noticed Caleb was absent. Yolanda spoke up from behind her, "Brother Caleb has been in his study; I'll go call him."
As she turned to leave, Claire stopped her, "Let Nattie do it."
Natalie blinked, looking at Claire. Yolanda added, "Miss Parker probably forgot where the study is."
Claire gave directions, "It's the third door on the left."
With a smile still on her lips, Yolanda said nothing more, and Natalie awkwardly shuffled her feet. Calling someone down for dinner felt almost like a confrontation. Unfamiliar with these people and encouraged by their words, she decisively went upstairs and turned left to the third door.
She knocked.
No response.
Natalie knocked again and soon heard footsteps inside. The study door opened from within.
Caleb's stern face appeared. Natalie's pupils widened slightly, "It's, um, dinner time."
"Mm."
He acknowledged and went back to close his laptop.
Natalie waited outside, watching his deliberate movements. When he turned to leave, she retracted her gaze.
Caleb closed the door behind him, "Let's go."
His voice was calm and soothing, nearly celestial, making him feel both distant and close at the same time. Natalie pinched her ear.
As soon as Natalie arrived, Rhonda placed her next to herself, with Caleb on the other side and Yolanda and Reid across from them. Natalie wasn't much hungry, especially since Rhonda enthusiastically served her some broccoli, which Natalie thought tasted like grass.
She pressed on, obediently eating the other dishes.
Out of the corner of her eye, Natalie could see the clean, pale back of Caleb's hands, the tight cuffs giving a restrained feel. Suddenly, her eyes caught a small porcelain plate sliding towards her, touching his sharply defined jawline as she tightened her grip on her chopsticks.
She glanced around the table.
Good.
No one noticed.
Natalie discreetly shifted the broccoli she had buried in her rice into the white plate, quickly pushing it back.
After dinner, Caleb went to the balcony.
Yolanda followed, and Reid, ever mischievous, sidled up to Natalie, "You see?"
"What?"
"Yolanda," Reid nodded toward the balcony, his love for drama evident. "She and my uncle grew up together. I used to think Yolanda might become my aunt."
Natalie rolled her eyes at him.
Reid grinned, showing off his teeth, "Natalie, you really must have lost your memory. You never used to listen to me talk like this. You seldom came back for meals, let alone flirt across the dinner table with my uncle."
Natalie hummed, "Flirt?"
Reid saw it, "The broccoli grandma served you ended up in my uncle's stomach."
"..."
Natalie rubbed her forehead.
Shortly, Caleb came back inside, passing Natalie and emitting a faint smell of smoke, which made her cough uncomfortably. He paused, sniffed at his collar, and frowned slightly.
Natalie rubbed her nose.
Yolanda soon returned from the balcony as well, smiling, though her eyes held a trace of coldness—probably directed at her.
It was oddly upsetting. Natalie had slept three hours that afternoon, and when she came out, Claire and the others had gone home, leaving only Rhonda and Elder Mr. Grant. Caleb was still in his study. She hadn't eaten much dinner.
When she returned to her room later, Natalie went into the bathroom. Despite having lost her memory, she hadn't been resting well, occasionally feeling disoriented with the overload of new input. The bathroom was fully equipped with feminine products, and being careful not to wet the bandage on her head, she bathed meticulously. When she came out wrapped in a white bath towel, her wet hair draped over her shoulders and chest, and her legs gleamed. The toes visible were painted a sheer pink.
The door was knocked.
Without thinking, she said, "Come in."
Caleb pushed the door open, pausing when he saw her in just a towel, her wet hair spilling over her shoulders and chest, her legs glowing, her toes painted a translucent pink.
"!"
Natalie instinctively hugged herself.
Caleb's eyes dropped. He didn't turn away immediately, "With them here, we can't have separate rooms tonight."
Natalie then remembered this detail.
She hugged herself tighter and hurried to the wardrobe to change, while Caleb, holding the doorknob, his gaze lingered a moment longer.
In the dead of night.
Natalie, dressed properly for bed, clutched her phone, watching Caleb grab his change of clothes and head into the bathroom.
She contemplated the independent space.
Was she really going to share a room with Caleb? Natalie propped her chin, troubled, just as Sophie called, her tone incredulous but slightly thrilled, "Nattie, suddenly I remember, aren't you at the Grant family's? Doesn't that mean you have to sleep with Caleb?"
Exactly her thoughts.
Natalie responded weakly, that large sofa looked inviting; worst case, she'd sleep there.
And she faced a grave question.
Had she and Caleb... slept together?
Natalie's mind nearly blanked, her brow furrowed, "I don't know, he's in the shower right now."
"Oh~ a shower~"
Sophie's imagined expression crossed Natalie's mind. Though she hadn't experienced much, she and Sophie had read hundreds of thrilling novels together. But, Natalie gripped her phone, "Don't tease, how can an eighteen-year-old girl be with a twenty-eight-year-old man—"
She was cut off as the bathroom door opened.
The misty steam revealed Caleb in his home pajamas, dark-colored, the damp fabric clinging to his well-defined muscles. Water dripped from his hair, his eyes and brows softened by the moisture.
Natalie's lips parted slightly.
Sophie, hearing no continuation, asked, "Old what?"
Caleb looked over, his Adam's apple bobbing, Natalie instinctively went with the flow, "Old baby!"
Sophie: "..."