We came to the clinic, and Adrianne put her head down when she went through the door. As promised, it was completely free of other patients, and the doctor called her into a private office right away. “What seems to be the problem today?” he asked as he shut the door.
Adrianne took her sunglasses off. “I got a few positive pregnancy tests,” she said. “I need some confirmation.”
The doctor’s eyebrows shot up for a second before he was able to smooth out his expression. It probably wasn’t every day that an A-list celebrity came to his clinic for a pregnancy test. “Obviously, this conversation is private,” I reminded him. “But I could have a quick NDA drawn up if that would help.”
He glared at me and shook his head. “I have no desire to sell her business to the tabloids, son. There’s no need to threaten me. Relax,” he said. “I’m too old to be mixed up with all of that.”
Adrianne touched my arm. “Foster, it’s okay. We came to get a definitive answer, right?”
“A definitive answer in medicine is kind of like asking for a miracle,” the doctor said with a little chuckle, as if he’d told some kind of joke.
“You can tell me that I’m pregnant for sure, though, right?”
“How many tests did you take?” he asked.
“Three,” Adrianne replied.
He clapped his hands. “And they were all positive?” She nodded. “There you have it. Sounds pretty positive to me.” At our blank expressions, he explained, “Barring a blood test or an ultrasound, the at-home tests and the ones we have here are exactly the same. I would recommend a blood test if you hadn’t gotten somanypositive results, but I don’t think it’s necessary. I’ll put together a list of dos and don’ts for you, and you’ll need to see your primary doctor when you go home, but there’s not much to be done in the early stages.”
“I have a contraceptive implant in my arm,” she told him before he could dismiss us entirely. “I couldn’t even begin to tell you when it stopped working or when my last period was. It’s been too long.”
Now, the doctor frowned. “Well, we’ll need to remove that immediately,” he said, “and I’ll get the ultrasound set up. We’ll want to make sure that everything is where it's meant to be.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
“Ectopic pregnancies are more common if a woman gets pregnant with an implant or an IUD,” Adrianne murmured to me. “That was explained to me when I got it put in.”
“Ectopic? That means a medical emergency right? She’d have to have surgery?”
The doctor waved me off. “I’m sure it’ll be fine,” he said. “Let’s just go take a look-see. If we can’t get a good picture on our ultrasound here, I’ll send you to the hospital for one.”
Five minutes later, Adrianne was lying on her back with her shirt pulled up, and an ultrasound tech was spreading goop on her stomach with a wand. For a moment, they weren’t finding much of anything. Dr. Greene said something to the effect that it just might be too early to tell, but the tech was persistent.
Adrianne sucked in a breath when the tech pressed the wand against her belly more tightly. “There it is,” she said, pointing to a tiny peanut-shaped thing on the screen. “Not much to look at right now, but everything looks pretty good.”
I looked at that fluttering bean, and it felt like my world shifted beneath my feet. “There’s really something in there,” I breathed out. Looking at the tech and the doctor, I asked, “Can we have a few moments?”
She nodded and saved the image on the screen before giving us the room. Adrianne waited for the door to shut, and then she took my hand. “What are we going to do now?”
I pulled out my phone and took a picture of the screen. “We’re going back to the hotel to show Callan and Ethan this,” I said. “I don’t think they’ll believe me otherwise.”
“And then?”
“And then the four of us will talk about what comes next.”
18
ETHAN
The picture of the sonogram on Foster’s phone was... haunting. Callan had fallen over his own feet when they’d come home with the confirmation that Adrianne was, in fact, pregnant, and he and Foster said all the right things about supporting her the whole way through, and I felt like a clod who couldn’t come up with anything to say.
Growing up, I was in and out of foster care until I joined the Navy. Having a family and children never crossed my mind. I wouldn’t know what to do if I had one.
“Ethan?” Adrianne asked. “You haven’t said much. Are you okay?” She was looking to me to make things okay, and I didn’t know how. “Ethan?”
I met her eyes, and something inside me snapped. I crossed the room and took her beautiful face in my hands. “I’m here, Princess,” I said. “I’m here for whatever you need.”
Being this close to her, it struck me that I hadn’t touched her,trulytouched her, in days. A wave of desire washed over me, and I brought my mouth to hers. Adrianne sighed into it. Her body practically melted against me, and she looped her arms around my neck.