doesn’t live in Florida.” How the fuck had I been so spectacularly blind?
“Okay, okay, okay,” she chanted, rocking slightly as her gaze darted back and forth. She was in her thinking phase. “Well, I’ve got nothing.”
“Me, either.” The dresser bit into the back of my thighs, but I welcomed the slight sting. It kept me grounded in reality. Let me know this was really happening and not just one of my more fucked up dreams. “So, let’s talk about this like the rational adults we are.”
See? Look at me not flying off the handle and going broody when shit wasn’t going my way.
“Okay. Let’s try this all over.” She swallowed and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. The rest was piled on her head in one of those knots I loved to watch her twist. Then she met my gaze. The excitement was still there, but it was banked behind something that looked a hell of a lot like wariness. “Nixon, I got accepted for my dream internship.” A wide smile spread across her face. “It’s with Breaking Boundaries, which is a medical organization dedicated to bringing world-class health care to areas decimated by war or stricken with poverty. Spending my internship in this remote part of Brazil will give me priceless research for my dissertation as well as allow me to bring mental health care where it’s desperately needed.”
“So, you’re taking the internship.” I breathed in through my nose and out through my mouth. Where the hell was my prized control? My stone-hard heart? That belongs to her, you dumbass. You handed it over on a silver platter.
She glanced back at the backpack before raising her brows. “Well. Yes. My plane leaves first thing in the morning.”
My jaw locked. How the hell was I supposed to stand here and even remotely think this was okay?
Her eyes widened, and she stood. “Nixon, it’s not as bad as what you’re thinking. The location is accessible by boat. It only takes two days to get there, and it’s not like it’s in a war zone or anything. It’s just a remote site—”
“Not in a war zone? Is that supposed to make me feel better?” I snapped.
“Yes.” She nodded once. “Look, I know you worry, but I’ll be fine.”
“Liberty, it’s not just you!” I gestured to her belly, where our daughter was currently safe and warm and growing perfectly, according to the doctors. “You’re what? Three weeks away from entering the third trimester?”
“Four. And so what? I can still fly.” She cradled her belly protectively. “Didn’t you hear the first part of what I said? Breaking Boundaries brings world-class healthcare. You don’t think they can handle delivering a baby?”
My heart hit the fucking floor. A second passed, then two, before I could manage to draw a breath. “Are you telling me that you want our daughter to be born in Brazil?”
She drew back slightly. “Why not? I think she might even have dual citizenship when she’s born,” she mused, her forehead crinkling.
Whatever little string that had been holding my temper at bay snapped like a twig. “Are you out of your fucking mind?”
“I’m sorry?” Her chin rose a good couple inches.
“Why the hell would you put her in danger like that?” I didn’t care how state-of-the-art their healthcare was. I’d seen the pictures her mother had sent via email. The hospital was made up of tents. Fucking tents.
“Put her in danger?” Liberty scoffed in disgust. “I was born in the middle of an African village, and I turned out just fine! God, Nixon, are you really so hung up on your first-world extravagance that you can’t fathom wanting to help others who don’t make thirty million a year?”
I made more than that, but I wasn’t getting into semantics. “If you want to go help people, then knock yourself out. It’s an awesome program, and I respect the hell out of your mother for doing it, but you having our baby down there is a completely different story.” I gripped the edge of the dresser, my knuckles turning white.
“Okay, so you respect my mother for doing it, but not for her choice to have me while she did it?” Liberty threw her hands in the air and spun around, heading back to her pile of clothing.
I wasn’t touching that argument with a ten-foot pole.
She was really doing this. She folded the shorts, then two more shirts as the silence grew so tense between us that I knew it was bound to shatter.