“Can we not talk about him, please?” She blows a slow, heavy breath. “Oh, these are picking up. Nikki, can you go get someone please? I think I need to be checked again.”
Her friend rises slowly, her dark gaze firing at me still, and treads out of the room. A moment later she returns with a nurse, who takes a seat on the edge of Eva’s bed and places a gloved hand under the sheet.
“You’re at a six, Eva. That’s great. We’re making progress. I’ll check again in a bit. Hit the call button if you need anything, okay?” The nurse pads away.
“I didn’t know you were pregnant.” I take a seat in a chair and pull it up to her bedside.
“You stopped returning my calls,” she sighs. “I tried sending letters. Those came back each time. You blocked my emails. Julie would never patch me through. And then the restraining order came.”
“Eva, you were stalking me. I had to do something. You’re lucky I didn’t have you arrested.”
She ignores me. “I tried, baby. I tried to tell you.”
Eva reaches for my hand. I don’t want to take it. I don’t want to send her the wrong sign. But her face is pinched, her eyes watering. She’s in physical pain. I hesitate before offering my hand, and she clenches it tight.
“We can finally be together again, mi amor. We can be a family. I love you so much.”
An alarm chimes behind us, sending Eva’s friend upright in her chair. I glance at the elaborate machine set up behind me, squinting at a flashing number on the lower left side of a computer monitor.
“What is it?” Eva’s expression is washed in panic, tears forming in the corners of her dark eyes. “Baby, what’s wrong? What does it say?”
Two nurses run in, shouting orders for us to clear the space. They lower Eva’s bed, and one of them mumbles something about the baby’s heart rate dropping too low with each contraction.
“Can’t you try giving her oxygen?” Nikki’s hands fly to her hips, her demeanor unnervingly calm. “That’s what we did with my fourth.”
Another nurse hurries in carrying a set of blue scrubs. “Are you Daddy?”
Fuck. I don’t fucking know.
I take them from her, following her to a changing area. She tells me I have exactly one-hundred twenty seconds to change or I won’t be able to go into the operating room with Eva.
When I woke up this morning, my biggest problem was the morning wood that wouldn’t go away unless I thought of Odessa again. My second biggest problem was choosing which tie to wear to the office.
Nothing about this moment feels real, but here I am, rushing out of a changing room tying a scrub cap and chasing after a nurse so that I might not miss the birth of a baby girl who may or may not be mine.
They point me to a little stool at the head of the operating table. Eva’s arms are strapped down.
“Hold my hand, mi amor,” Eva smiles. Her dark hair is covered and a blue sheet hides everything lower than her chest. I take the hand of a woman whom I currently have a restraining order against, and swallow the lump that forms in my throat the second I hear the cries of a newborn baby.
Chapter Sixteen
ODESSA
“I’m glad you’re back early.” Carly plops down on my sofa, mindlessly flipping through the pages of one of Jeremiah’s old cooking magazines. “So your boss had a baby?”
“He’s not technically my boss. And I don’t know. He didn’t want to talk about it. I’m not sure he even knew what was going on.” I collapse next to her, pulling a throw over my feet and curling into the overstuffed cushions behind me. “It was so weird, Carly. It all happened so fast. I guess if you want to scare the hell out of a playboy you tell him he’s going to be a father.”
“Serves him right.” She chuckles. “You talk to Jeremiah lately?”
“We texted a little this morning.”
Carly sits up, reaching for one of my old bridal magazines. “Oh, yeah? What’d he say?”
“You told him I was in Utah with a guy,” I say.
“Was it a secret?”
“No.” I swat her arm. “You didn’t tell him it was for work. I think he thought it was a romantic thing. He was acting kind of jealous, asking a ton of questions about Beckham.”
“Interesting.” Carly’s shoulders fall and she nibbles on a fingernail between her front teeth.
“I don’t know if you were intentionally trying to make him jealous,” I say. Carly is a mastermind at relationship manipulation. I could see her thinking she was doing me a favor. “I don’t want him thinking I’m running off with other guys when I’m doing all I can to prove that I still want to marry him.”
“Right.” Carly’s hands fall in her lap. It’s not like her to be this mum.
“Have you talked to him lately? Has he said anything about me? About the wedding?”
My fingers cross. My toes too. If Jeremiah’s opening up to anyone, it’s her.
“I mean, we talk sometimes, but he’s so busy shooting the show,” she says. “We don’t really talk about the engagement. I figure that’s between the two of you. And besides, if he did confide in me, you know I couldn’t repeat it. Just like anything that you say to me stays between us.”
“I appreciate that,” I say. “As much as I’m dying to know what he’s thinking. I told you he came over last Friday, right?”
Her brows meet. “No. You didn’t. Last Friday, you said?”
“Yeah, he showed up here. Cooked me dinner. Stayed the night.”
“Stayed the night?”
“Yeah,” I laughed. “Is that shocking or something?”
Her head cocks to the side, and she grabs a second magazine, flipping to the middle. I’m not convinced that she’s reading the words on the page.
“Carly.” My stomach drops. “You know something about him, don’t you?”
She nods no, curling a magazine page between her fingers and concentrating on an ad for engagement rings.
“Is there someone else? Oh. God. You have to tell me.” I sit forward, my hand grasping her arm. “I don’t want to sit around like some clueless idiot if he’s stringing me along.”
It’s all starting to make sense. All along, I was convinced I was the problem, when maybe someone else came into the picture when I wasn’t paying attention. I’ve been so focused on planning the wedding. Maybe something got past me?
“He’s testing the waters, isn’t he?” I ask. “Seeing what else is out there before he settles down with me. And, God, I’m waiting around like a moron.”
“I don’t know what the hell he’s doing, to be honest,” Carly sighs. “He’s lost his damn mind. He should be with you. You guys belong together.”
“I mean, he’s allowed to screw other women. He’s technically single. I just need to know if I’m being strung along.” I don’t hear her. My mind is going a million miles a minute.
I pull out my phone, hands shaking.
“What are you doing, Sam?” she asks.
“Calling him.” I’m sunk. Carly can deny it all she wants, but I feel it in my bones. I need to hear his voice. Ask him to come over.
And then I’ll ask the hard questions. If he’s lying, I’ll know.
Carly grabs my phone from my hand and ends the call after two and a half rings. “Don’t do it. Don’t go there. You’ll scare him away.”
“Fighting for us will scare him away?” I can’t believe she just did that. “Or demanding the truth?”
“You know how he is,” she says.
“I’m calling him again.”
Carly hides her head in her hands, turning away. “Bad idea, Sam. I wouldn’t do it.”
My gut aches. It’s not like Carly not to fight harder for us. She’s been our biggest cheerleader for the last six years.
My corner feels empty without her in it.
The call goes to voicemail, and for a second it seems the whole universe is conspiring against me.
“Jeremiah, call me back. It’s important. We have to talk.”
Chapter Seventeen