AudreyI breathed a sigh of relief as I closed the front door behind me. I hated that I’d had to rush out of Jesse’s place like that. He had no idea how much I wanted to have breakfast with him and then tumble back into bed until work dragged him off again. I had woken up that morning with a smile on my face for the first time in so long. Even though he wasn’t right there next to me in bed, I felt like I was surrounded by his presence. That presence let me know that everything was going to be okay.The trouble was, I still hadn’t told him that I was pregnant, and I wasn’t sure how long I could manage to hide that from him while I was there in his presence. I could already see the concern on his face, could see the way that he was trying to puzzle things out. He knew that it wasn’t food poisoning that was making me feel this way.It was only a matter of time before he figured out just what it was. I needed to tell him first.It seemed like the more I psyched myself up to tell him, the
Audrey“It’s good to see him,” I said honestly. “Better than I expected, even.”“Does that mean you told him about the baby and everything went well?” Annabelle asked. “Wait, he didn’t propose to you or something already, did he?”“No,” I said, shaking my head. I bit my lower lip. “No to both of those things, actually. He didn’t propose, but I also didn’t tell him about the baby.”Annabelle groaned. “Audrey,” she said. “You know you have to tell him at some point. He has a right to know his own kid. Besides, this is Jesse that we’re talking about. What’s the worst that he could do?”“Marry me out of a sense of duty,” I suggested.Annabelle snorted. “That’s ridiculous. That man is head over heels for you, in case you hadn’t noticed.”“What if he doesn’t want a kid? The timing of this just isn’t right,” I said, shaking my head. “I don’t want him to feel like I’m trapping him.” I paused. “I don’t know, when you really think about it, all of this is so crazy. Sure, we used to be best frie
JesseWith the way that Audrey had rushed out of my place on Sunday morning, claiming that she had to get home to help her mom, I had been worried that I had somehow messed things up between us already, after just one night. I couldn’t put my finger on anything that I might have done, but I could tell that there was a lot going on in her head at the moment.She still wasn’t sharing any of it with me, but she had swung by the shop on Sunday evening as Chance and I were closing up and had come home with me. We had spent every night together since then, but curiously enough, the more mornings that I woke up beside her, the more I felt those dreams from the first morning, those hopes for domestic bliss, slipping further and further away from me.Mainly because she still wasn’t telling me what the hell was going on. I didn’t think that she had told me the whole story for why she had left Paris, and she definitely wasn’t explaining her health issues or any of the rest of it. I knew that the
JesseWe finished up breakfast, and I noted as I carried the plates over to the sink that she had barely eaten anything. Again. I was really starting to worry about her. She didn’t have a lot of extra weight to begin with, and this illness wasn’t going to make things any better for her. I didn’t know how to convince her of that, though.When I got to the hardware store, Joe immediately sensed that something was up. He made a show of looking at his watch. “Trouble in paradise?” he joked. “Thought you’d be running late this morning, not early.”I rolled my eyes. “We have a couple of big shipments coming in this morning, doofus,” I reminded him, as though that was the reason that I was here as early as I was. It was a lie. To be honest, part of me had been hoping that after breakfast, I could entice Audrey to come back to bed with me. By the time I had put the plates in the dishwasher and followed her upstairs, I had found her already dressed and pulling on her shoes.This in spite of th
AudreyJoe wrinkled his nose. “Sounds pretty gross,” he said. “She’s refusing to see a doctor about it?”“She says she’s got an appointment, but I don’t know.” I shook my head. “I don’t understand why she scheduled it for so far out.”“Maybe she’s just hoping it will be out of her system before she has to see a doctor,” Joe suggested. “Does she even have health insurance over here?”“I hadn’t thought about that,” I admitted. That could be it. She had just lost her job in France, and she probably didn’t know what she was going to do for money. Her family had never exactly been rich. Most families in Aberdeen weren’t any better than comfortably middle class, and doctor visits could be expensive.I wanted to believe that was the case. If it was, though, I wished that she would just talk to me about it. We could have figured something out. Nothing, especially not some amount of money, was worth her poor health and unhappiness.“Or maybe she’s doing drugs,” Chance piped up.I stared blankl
AudreyI kicked my feet and drummed my fingers nervously as I waited for it to be my turn at the clinic. “Hey, relax,” Annabelle said, giving me a smile. “I’m sure it’ll be fine.”“I know,” I said, managing to stop drumming my fingers on the armrest. I kept kicking my feet, though. I just couldn’t seem to sit still.My first ultrasound. I was nervous as anything, but I couldn’t help being excited too. There was no longer any doubt in my mind that I was pregnant. I had done the two tests back in France that Trish had insisted on, and by now, I had reconciled things in my head. With Annabelle’s help, I’d done a ton of research over the past week while I waited for this appointment to come around.I was pregnant. Would I be able to see the little peanut-sized embryo growing inside of me already? Would I be able to hear its heartbeat?There was a part of me that wished that Jesse were there with me rather than Annabelle. Oh, Annabelle was looking forward to her niece or nephew. I had no d
Audrey“What I will say is, you’ve listed here that you kept a pretty strict diet as a ballerina. That may need to change while you’re pregnant,” the doctor added, consulting the forms that I had brought in. “You’ll probably find yourself having cravings for foods that you wouldn’t normally eat, and you’ll need to up your calorie intake as well.”“Yeah,” I sighed. “I just wish the thought of food didn’t make me want to hurl.” I was feeling a little bit better that day. I had to hope that maybe there was a light at the end of the tunnel and that my morning sickness would fade as I got further along. I was running out of ways to explain it to everyone who didn’t know I was pregnant.Although I knew there wouldn’t be much more hiding that fact. If I was already eleven weeks along, then it was only a matter of time before I started to show. I swallowed hard, realizing that all of those nerve-wracking conversations that I had been putting off, with Mom and with Jesse, were going to have to
JesseI was surprised when Audrey didn’t want to go to Gabby’s on Friday night. Granted, it wasn’t really my favorite venue either, but it was one of the few places to go out in Aberdeen, and I had thought she might welcome the change of scenery. I loved having her back at my place, but I kind of wanted to show her off a little too.“Are you in a fight with your sister or something?” I asked jokingly, sure that wasn’t really it. She probably just didn’t want to deal with the noise. She wasn’t much of a drinker, and Friday nights could get a little rowdy sometimes, especially when there was live music in there. She still looked tired, and that was probably all there was to it.To my surprise, though, Audrey stiffened, and I had to wonder how close I had hit to the truth. I blinked in surprise. I couldn’t remember her ever being in a tiff with her sister before. The two of them had been thick as thieves when they were younger. Then again, it had to be difficult to go back to sharing a r