Chapter 39

I openmy apartment door and let out a squeal.

Marci barrels into the room and throws her arms around me. “I missed you so much! Oh my god, girl, you have got to tell me everything. There is something fishy going on here, and I want to know what it is.”

I’m so nervous, my stomach turns, and I swallow bile.

Marci frowns at me. She’s tan from her honeymoon and practically glowing, but I’ve been feeling down and under the weather all morning. I don’t care, though, because she’s here! She’s finally back. And just in time.

“What’s going on?” she asks. “You said you need to tell me something?”

I shut my door and guide her to my comfy sofa. I’ve already put out the coffee pot, filled to the brim with steaming hot coffee, and two mugs.

“Where’s Belle?” Marci asks.

“Busy babysitting Leo. Those two are fighting like cats and dogs.” I pour Marci a cup of coffee then make one for myself. But the scent is seriously making my nerves and nausea worse, so I set it aside and watch Marci drink hers instead.

“I have to get all the details about that later,” Marci says. “What’s going on with you?”

My palms are clammy. “Don’t worry about me,” I say. “Let’s talk about your honeymoon. Was it everything you dreamed?”

“If you mean did I eat a whole bunch of pasta, make love, drink wine, and see Rome, then have to look after my sick as a dog husband on the way home,” Marci says. “Then yeah.”

I grimace.

“Oh, don’t worry.” Marci raises a hand. “It’s not contagious. I think he just overate.”

“That sounds like Jesse. Let me guess, concessions stand at the airport?”

“Pretty much,” Marci says, with a laugh, and then she sweeps her gaze over me. “What’s with you? You look different.”

And then I break, because I can’t not tell one of my best friends that I’m leaving Heatstroke in literally a couple of days. Or that I’m having a sordid, amazing affair with the man of my dreams. I tell her everything while she listens with wide eyes, coffee mug forgotten in her grasp.

Afterward, she puts down her mug and takes my hands. “Holy crap, that’s sweaty.” She lets go of them again.

“Sorry,” I say. “I was super nervous to tell you.”

“What did you think I would say?” Marci asks. “No, don’t leave. I want you to stay and watch me be happy while you slowly waste away?”

“Gee, thanks.”

“You know what I mean. Han, I will always want what’s best for you. And I know you. You’re always prepared to take on the world. You’ve been ready for this for ages, and you deserve happiness. Which brings us to the next part… Savage? Are you serious?” She pinches my arm.

“Ow!” I rub the sore spot.

“How could you not tell me? We’ve been waiting for this to happen forever.” Marci’s older than me, but she’s got a young soul, and I’m half-convinced she’s also my soul mate. Just like Belle’s my soul mate. And June.

And… Don’t even think about it.

“I didn’t want to overshadow your trip. Can you really say you would’ve been entirely focused on your honeymoon if I’d dropped that little nugget of information? I know you. You would’ve blabbed to Jesse instantly.”

“Guilty as charged,” she says. “But still. I resent that.” She sticks her tongue out of the corner of her mouth. “So? How was it?”

Nausea nearly overwhelms me at her words.

I suck in a breath and try to calm myself down. Why am I so stressed about this? I swipe my hand over my forehead.

“Han?” Marci tilts her head.

“I’m fine,” I say, waving a hand. “Maybe I’m coming down with something.”

“Not it.” Marci unties her auburn locks then scoops them back into a bouncy high ponytail again. She smells lightly of coconut and sunscreen and it’s making my nausea worse. “So, you were telling me how Savage was in?—?”

I can’t keep it in any more. I get up and sprint to the bathroom. I burst into it and make it to the toilet just in time.

What feels like five meals later, I look up and find Marci leaning against the door jamb, gnawing on her lip. “That bad, huh? I’ll be sure not to tell him.”

“Marce.”

“Han, do you need me to take you to a doctor? I’ve never seen you like this before.”

Another wave of nausea hits me, and I cling to the toilet.

“Han?”

I fight it down, my eyes watering, and look up at her.

“When last did you get your period?” Marci asks.

“My periods are irregular,” I say. “So, I don’t really keep track of them. Why do you…?” And then it hits me.

“This is not happening,”I whisper. “It’s not happening.”

We sit on the edge of my tiny bath-shower combo, the shower curtain mocking me in the mirror over the sink with its happy, vibrant yellow ducks.

“Not happening,” I repeat.

“It’s possible, isn’t it?” Marci asks.

“I have POI,” I say. “There’s a remote possibility, but it’s tiny, and it’s wrong.”

“Wrong?”

“This doesn’t happen for women like me.”

“What do you mean, Han?”

I take a breath of cool air—I brushed my teeth and tongue while Marci ran to the drug store and brought back like twenty different pregnancy tests. “I mean, infertility is a serious issue. I get that people can sometimes get pregnant by accident, but usually, it’s a struggle. It takes years worth of hormone treatments, IVF failures, it’s rough. I looked into it when I was hoping that maybe I might be able to have a baby, but even then, the OB GYN said there’s like no chance for me. My best option would be adoption, which is really something I would consider if I met the right guy or I wasn’t about to leave forever but this is just… it’s just not happening. It’s not possible. It’s not fair to other women. It’s not?—”

“Hannah.”

“Yes?”

“You’re doing that thing where you panic ramble,” Marci says, stroking my back. “Do you need me to get you some water? Is there anyone you want me to call? The girls? Do you want Belle and June?”

“Maybe? I don’t know. I feel weird. It’s got to be the flu, right?”

“We’ll know in about thirty seconds.” She points to the first test lying on the basin. “And then in a minute. And then we can do like five more after that.”

What will I do if those tests are positive?

My heart swoops at the idea.

Of having a baby. Of it being my baby. And Carter’s baby. Of a home.

But I’m going to leave. Or I was going to leave, and I can’t possibly go running off to New York without telling Carter, or while I’m pregnant. He lost his child.

My insides clench. I am so confused about how to feel.

Guilty. Happy. Afraid.

I have to tell Carter, sooner rather than later.

“Han, no matter what happens, it’s going to be okay.” Marci draws me close, and I rest my head on her shoulder. “I promise you, it will all be good. You have an entire family who loves you, and all your friends and…”

“And Carter? I don’t know if I have him. He says he’s obsessed with me, and he’s been doing these amazing things for me, but that doesn’t mean he’s instantly going to be over the moon about having a baby.”

Marci is my tough love friend. She never sugar coats things, and she’s not like June with her optimistic streak. She takes me by the shoulders and gives me one of those sharp stares that are her trademark. “Yeah? Well, if he doesn’t want it, he’s a fucking dick. And you’ll have all my support. Also, I have a baseball bat in my closet, and we can totally beat the crap out of that stupid motorcycle of his.”

“Marce.”

“I’m just saying.” She shrugs then checks her watch. “Are you ready?”

“Yeah. I— Yeah, I guess so.” I squeeze my eyes shut.

The part of me that was sure I would never be able to have kids is overjoyed. The woman who’s in love with Savage doesn’t know what to think.

Marci lifts it off the counter and looks at it. She keeps her expression blank then hands the stick to me.

I take it and slowly lift it into view.

Two pink lines stare at me.

“But that’s just one,” Marci says. “We can check the other one in a minute.”

I swallow, my mouth dry.

I never thought this was a real possibility. My doctor said pretty much no. Absolutely not. No chance.

Another wave of guilt besets me, followed by that fear, the joy. I’m all over the place and it makes my stomach swim and my head hurt. I clutch my forehead, massaging my temples with my thumb and middle finger.

“Okay, let’s check the next one.” Again, Marci looks at the test, then hands it to me with a blank expression.

I lift it into view. “4 Weeks Pregnant.” In bold black letters on the little screen.

“Four weeks? Four weeks. Oh my God.”

“Yeah, it’s one of those early detection things,” she says. “But you must be pretty darn pregnant if the other test is showing it too.”

“Thanks, Marce,” I say, and pull a face.

“How do you feel?”

I take a breath and stare at the two tests.

“I mean, apart from grossed out ‘cos you’re holding those and you literally peed on them.”

I hand her the tests. “Can you call June and Belle? I—I don’t want to tell them this over the phone.”

Marci whips out her phone and calls them. She paces back and forth in the bathroom. “Ugh, neither of those bitches is picking up.”

“Oh.” My stomach sinks.

Marci drops down in front of me, and she looks so pretty in her strappy top with her new Italy tan. “You know what? I’ll run out and get them. You stay right here. I’ll be back in no time.”

“Okay,” I say, nodding. “Yeah. Thanks, Marce.”

“Of course.” She presses a kiss to the top of my head then dashes out of the bathroom. The front door clicks closed a few minutes later.