Over the last several months, she’d tried not to let this consume her, but it was getting harder every day. Each time they had sex, Honey hoped it would make a baby, and that was starting to be the only reason she wanted to be intimate with her husband. Once she realized their efforts were for nothing, the dread would fill her again, a level of disappointment that was beginning to own her.
“We’ll figure this out,” he whispered as he held her. His lips were still in her hair, both arms on her now. “I promise you, baby, you have nothing to worry about.”
Honey was silently counting the seconds, focusing on the numbers, ticking them off in her mind. With each one that passed, her chest tightened more. Her hands began to tremble. A churning started in her stomach, and it felt so strong that she had to put her hand on it, hoping the pressure would calm it.
“It’s time,” Andrew said.
Honey had been concentrating so hard on the numbers that she’d forgotten exactly what she was even counting for.
But it was for this—the result.
Except she couldn’t move. She couldn’t get off the bed. She couldn’t walk into the bathroom and see the result of something that was so far out of her control even if it was taking place in her own body.
“You go,” she said, trying to take a breath and not finding enough air. “Please … I can’t.”
He pushed down harder with his lips, this time really kissing her head. She felt him breathe her in, and he exhaled over her. He was giving her all the love he had and she really needed it, especially since he was pushing himself off the bed and going into the bathroom. Within a few steps, he was already inside. Honey had left the test on the counter by the sink. In the time that passed, she knew he was already there.
And that he was reading the result.
And that he knew whether they were pregnant.
She felt sick and tucked herself into an even tighter ball, rocking her feet over the ledge of the mattress. “Please,” Honey prayed quietly. “Please, please, please.”
As she swayed, she heard nothing from inside the bathroom. Silence wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted celebrating, shouting, an expression of joy at the very least.
Silence meant exactly what she’d feared.
Nausea was taking over her stomach. The eggs and coffee Andrew had made were threatening to come up.
She had known taking the test was a bad idea. She should have done it on her lunch break or gone to the doctor and waited through it alone. Because it was one thing to handle the disappointment, but the thought of seeing it on his face would be too much for Honey to bear.
She would never do this to him again.
Just when she didn’t think she could take another second of the silence, he appeared in the doorway. “It wasn’t fully processed yet.” He glanced down at the test he was holding in his hand and back up at her. “But it is now.”
“Andrew …”
“Baby, we’re pregnant.” He held the test up for Honey to see.
She felt her mouth open, but nothing came out of it. She was in too much shock. She hadn’t expected this result. She had been positive she knew what the outcome was going to be, and this certainly wasn’t it. That had meant another month of trying, another disappointment waiting at the end of it.
But that wasn’t the case, and she didn’t know what to do with herself.
“Pregnant?” she whispered when he knelt in front of her, his hands gripping her knees. “You mean, we’re really going to have a baby?”
He nodded, and she immediately fell into his arms. He lifted her into the air, and she wrapped her body around him, a contentment filling her like it had on her wedding day.
“Andrew,” she said so softly, pulling out of his neck so she could look at him. “I’m finally going to be a mother.”
He nodded.
And that morning, they both cried.
FORTY-SEVEN
JARED
IT DIDN’T MATTER that I’d left Billie’s apartment and showered and brushed my teeth because I could still smell her as I walked into work that morning. The effect it had on me was more than I was willing to admit to myself, and that scared the hell out of me.
Billie Paige wasn’t a scent I should have ever inhaled in the first place. But now that I’d had her, I couldn’t get enough. I wanted to be with her again tonight and tomorrow morning and every day after. And just as I was running my hand underneath my nose, getting the faintest whiff of her again, my phone vibrated from an incoming call.