I said, ready to tell her no.
“Please, please, please,” she begged. “Hastings will be so much more comfortable with all of us around.”
My brows rose. “You mean, with all of us around, your brother won’t want to ask you questions about anything baby related.”
“I’m just… I won’t be able to hold my tongue,” she admitted. “He’ll say something, and I’ll reply, and the next thing I know I’ll be telling him which donor I chose.”
I rolled my eyes. “You’re going to have to tell him eventually.”
“And I will,” she agreed. “But only after I get myself knocked up.”
I snorted.
“You’re like the worst person ever when it comes to telling your family things. Remember Mark?” I asked.
Mark was an ex-boyfriend of hers who’d treated her like crap.
To this day, I didn’t think that her parents knew just how badly he’d hurt her emotionally.
Sure, they likely knew that they had a bad breakup. But being bad and bad were two different things.
She snorted. “How could I forget? I asked him to have a baby with me, and he responded by basically leaving me.”
“It’s just that, I think that it would be best for your family to know what you’re doing. They’re going to ask questions. How will you explain this?” I asked.
She scrunched up her nose. “I was just going to end up pregnant and say ‘whoopsie.’ I am an adult, you know.”
I’d believe it when I saw it—or heard it.
Sierra was going to tell them everything.
I groaned and looked at my watch as Hastings suddenly appeared in the doorway of the bathroom, looking slightly green.
She hustled over to us with money already in her had. “I have to go. This place is making me want to puke.”
Sierra and I both stood and put our own cash down, covering our portions of the bill.
“Hastings, tell Reggie that she needs to go tubing with us,” Sierra ordered.
Hastings turned to look at me over her shoulder as she pushed through the front door.
“Please?” She rolled her lip over, pouting beautifully. “It was so much fun last time. I really think that you’d enjoy it.”
I sighed.
“Fine,” I grumbled.
Hastings laughed all the way to her car.
Hell, I was fairly sure that she was laughing as she got into her car.
I found myself grinning despite wanting to kick both of their asses.
I was such a sucker.
The grin on my face stayed in place, though.
At least until I arrived at our floor with Sierra next to me and ran right into none other than Eerie the asshole.
My hand went into my pocket and I groaned. I felt the ring that I’d slipped there before leaving for work and took comfort by turning it over and over again in my pocket.
Sierra cursed and dropped her phone at my groan, causing me to bend over and pick the phone up
Which, of course, was when Eerie decided to acknowledge my presence.
“You,” Eerie sneered. “I heard that you worked here.”
I would’ve rolled my eyes had I not known that it would just make this situation worse.
Eerie hated my guts.
With good reason.
Nathan used me as an excuse to end things with Eerie. And though I hadn’t actually been dating him at the time of his defection, Eerie still thought that I was the reason that Nathan had ‘fallen out of love’ with her.
I wasn’t.
But she didn’t need to know that.
“That’s a little excessive.”
My brows shot up. “What is?”
She gestured to the ring with a curl of her lips.
“That.” She jerked her chin at it as if just the existence of it pissed her off. “Can’t believe you wear that out of the house. Especially here.”
I frowned.
I looked down at my finger to see the ring in place.
“I don’t usually wear it,” I admitted, hating that she was judging me. “In fact, I had it in my pocket until about two seconds ago.”
I hadn’t even realized that I’d been fingering the stupid ring, or that it’d made it onto my ring finger, until she’d brought it to my attention.
“Did you wash the ring?” she countered. “It could be contaminated.”
I gritted my teeth. “Actually, no. But only because I’m not in the NICU yet. Which I would’ve done the moment I was needed.”
Eerie rolled her eyes. “I’m not sure I’m comfortable with you working on my child.”
I smiled serenely at her.
“The good thing is, I’m not your child’s nurse. Sierra is.” I grinned even though that hadn’t been the case. We hadn’t actually seen our patient assignments yet. But Peyton, our boss, likely wouldn’t care