Total pages in book: 34
Estimated words: 33887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 169(@200wpm)___ 136(@250wpm)___ 113(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 33887 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 169(@200wpm)___ 136(@250wpm)___ 113(@300wpm)
I saw what I usually saw if Hale was home before me.
My handsome fiancé sauntering my way with a smile on his face.
For a moment, I lost my anxiety, because, from the time he ambushed me at my old studio in Brooklyn a year ago, the first time we’d ever had a face-to-face conversation, to now, this man walking toward me was a changed man.
When I first met him he’d been alternately pugnacious and flirtatious, but underneath, standoffish was always simmering.
The man who was coming my way was a man content, at peace with his life, his relationship, his work and his family, and he let that show openly on his face.
I’d had a hand in that, and I was a big-deal celebrity interviewer making seven figures before the age of thirty. Even so, that look on Hale’s face was my proudest achievement.
And…
Damn.
I was about to blow it to smithereens.
My phone in my hand vibrated with another text, but I was engaged with walking out of the elevator and tipping my head back to get my nightly kiss from Hale.
Though, as I did it, I noted we had surprise company.
Chloe and Judge were there.
And this was a big surprise, since they didn’t stop by from their place in Tribeca. They didn’t live in Tribeca.
They lived in Prescott, Arizona.
Therefore I got my kiss, Hale gave me his sweet, quiet, “Hey, baby.” I gave him the same in return. And only then did I turn my attention to Hale’s sister-from-another-sister-and-mister and his brother-in-law.
“This is a nice surprise,” I greeted, thinking, Actually, a nice reprieve.
But although I had a reprieve, I didn’t have relief, because, unlike being in denial and procrastinating on having the conversation I’d needed to have with Hale all those months ago about where our relationship was heading, which led to four of the worst days of my entire life when I thought he’d broken up with me, this one wasn’t one I’d be able to avoid. Eventually, it would make its presence known, and I needed to have tackled it way before that happened.
I walked in and threw my attaché on the couch just in time to get a hug and cheek touch from Chloe, and the same, but with a cheek kiss from Judge.
They were already drinking cocktails.
Hale, as was usual with Hale, noticed me eyeing the glasses on the coffee table.
“Judge and I are on martinis. Chloe, a cosmo. Want one?” he asked. “Or a glass of wine?”
Shit, shit, shit.
“I’ve got a nagging headache, nothing big, but I’m going to lay off the alcohol for tonight,” I lied.
And great.
Already lying.
My phone still in my hand vibrated again with another text.
I ignored it in order to bend and give love to Frosty, our cat, who’d come up to say hi.
Cheddar, our other cat, wasn’t to be seen, which meant, even if he no longer looked like a kitten, he was somewhere behaving like a kitten.
In other words, getting into trouble.
“Want some ibuprofen, or Excedrin?” Hale asked, his eyes narrowed on me in concern.
But I had my own concern.
Could I take that stuff anymore?
I had a bunch of leaflets in my attaché as given to me by my doctor. I also had a follow-up appointment next week to talk to her about what to expect the next seven months, an appointment she urged me to bring Hale to.
But in the meantime, as a priority, I had to find time to read them.
However, since I didn’t actually have a headache, just a percolating infant in my womb, I was forced to lie again.
“I took some earlier. It’s already working. I’ll be good soon.”
“I’ll get you some water,” he muttered as he moved toward the kitchen.
I shrugged off my coat, threw it over the arm of an armchair and collapsed into it.
I was about to ask what brought Chloe and Judge to New York, when I noticed something in all that was taking up my headspace that I hadn’t noticed before.
Something was off with Chloe.
And as such, something was off with Judge, but only in the sense he seemed to have a weird vibe that was emanating toward Chloe.
How I knew this, I didn’t know, because I was getting to know both of them more and more, but we weren’t best buds (yet).
Perhaps I’d honed it through my career that started when I interviewed my dad when I was in single digits and never let up. Perhaps it was from my habit of people watching. Perhaps it was a bit of both.
But…wait.
I kept studying them, and…
Oh my.
Maybe Chloe was pregnant too.
I loved that for the little tyke I was playing host to, a cousin their age would be awesome.
And I loved that for Chloe and Judge, who would be great parents.
I still had a mammoth hurdle to jump in my own situation.