The Girl Next Door - Emma Hart Page 0,21

it was. It went without saying that we were attracted to each other, but were there feelings?

At times like this, when I was alone, I didn’t think there were.

Then he hugged me or fussed over me or pulled me against him in my bed when I told him to go away and I wondered if I was losing my mind.

I really didn’t think I could trust myself right now, though.

It’d only been, what? Two days? Since I’d seen the little thing on the pregnancy test, and that meant my doctor’s appointment was tomorrow.

I had no idea what to expect from it, and honestly, I was a little scared.

Except I wasn’t sure what I was scared of anymore.

Was it the baby? Of having this baby?

Or was it the fear that this could still all go wrong?

Was this it? Had it sunk in? Had I really accepted that I was going to be a mom this quickly?

I stuffed the last piece of toast in my mouth and pushed the baking tray away. I wasn’t interested in either the orange juice or the other slice of toast—one slice and some water was pushing it this morning, apparently—and lay down on my back.

Nausea rolled through my stomach.

I closed my eyes.

Yes, I had. I’d accepted it. This was happening. It was real. I was having a baby.

I slid my hand over my stomach, resting it at the very bottom so my fingertips brushed my hip.

Somewhere, under my hand, through the layers of the skin and tissue and muscle that made up my body, there was a growing baby.

My baby.

Holy.

Fucking.

Shit.

CHAPTER EIGHT – IVY

“Well, that wasn’t a waste of time at all.” I slid into the only empty booth at Bronco’s and sagged against the plush back.

Kai moved the empty coffee cups to a nearby table and sat opposite me. “What did you expect?”

“I don’t know. Something more than the pee test I did myself?” I huffed, dropping my hands on the table. “I didn’t need my doctor to tell me I’m pregnant, Kai. I know I’m pregnant. So help me, Sophie, take that coffee around those tables before I vomit half a gallon of water over the floor,” I said to one of our servers who always worked the lunchtime shift.

As a mother of six, Sophie was more than acquainted with the symptoms of pregnancy, so she simply laughed and diverted around a table. “I’ll tell everyone the volcano has landed.”

“The volcano?” Kai quirked a brow.

I sighed. “Because I’ll erupt at the barest scent of coffee. They coined it last night. I was so mad I cried for five minutes.”

He looked like he didn’t know whether he wanted to laugh or not. “I’m… sorry?”

“No, you’re not,” I said dryly. “You’re trying not to laugh, you asshole.”

“It is kind of funny.”

“It’s not funny.”

“It is.”

“It really isn’t,” I insisted, grabbing a menu to read. Like I didn’t already know it off by heart.

Kai picked up a menu with far less fervor than I had and perused it. I glanced over the top of mine, but he had his gaze firmly focused on the card in front of him.

That was so annoying.

God, I was so annoyed.

With a huff, I slammed my menu card down and stormed off to the restroom where I knew I could be irrationally annoyed by myself in a toilet stall.

I shoved the door open and let it slam behind me then locked myself into a stall. The clink of the toilet seat reverberated off the empty restroom when I shut it, and I dropped myself onto it with a heavy sigh.

And buried my face into my hands.

I couldn’t believe I’d just paid my doctor to tell me I was pregnant.

Seriously.

I’d already dropped, like, forty bucks on pregnancy tests that had done just that. It really was a waste of my time, because she’d admitted that she couldn’t do anything right now because it was too soon, so bye, and she’d see me in three weeks.

Of course, she’d sent me home with a whole list of things I couldn’t eat, like sushi, and things I couldn’t do, like use a hot tub—as if those were available in our apartment building—and probably a whole bunch of other stuff that would just piss me off right now.

I buried my face in my hands and took a deep breath. I knew this was irrational, but I was tired, I was hungry, and my head was aching like crazy.

All I wanted to do was go home and curl up into