Prognosis Christmas Baby - Amy Andrews Page 0,29

street and it all came crashing back.

‘Well, I’m going to get something to eat before I throw up,’ she announced, the horrible nausea persisting.

Would this night never end?

‘I’ll join you,’ Linda volunteered.

Waiting in the kitchen for the toast to pop was torturous. It smelled amazing as only toast could do to a stomach under revolt. Maggie placed her hand on her belly. ‘Ugh. I think I really am going to throw up.’

As often as she felt like this on night shift, she’d never actually vomited.

Linda frowned at Maggie’s pale face. ‘Well, if I didn’t know all about your fertility problems I’d ask the obvious question. Tired. Nauseous. You haven’t skipped a period, have you?’

A surge of laughter bubbled up her throat. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

Linda quirked an eyebrow. ‘Have you?’

Maggie stared at her colleague like she’d just grown horns. ‘You can’t be serious?’

‘Sure.’ She shrugged. ‘Why not?’

‘Because,’ Maggie spluttered. It was preposterous.

Totally preposterous.

But the ruptured condom was suddenly all she could think about. Her fatigue vaporised. She squinted as she searched her memory for her last period.

‘You are late,’ Linda the Shrewd piped up.

‘I’m forty,’ Maggie dismissed, desperately trying to quell the stupid flutter of hope that had taken up residence in her heart. The toast popped and she removed it and started buttering it automatically. ‘My period’s been a bit all over the shop the last six months or so. Probably just peri menopausal.’

Linda looked at her dubiously. ‘If you say so.’

Maggie nodded and was pleased when Linda let it drop. Because she couldn’t. For the remaining hour of the shift it was there. Taunting her. Mocking her.

A baby. A baby. A baby.

And it didn’t matter how many times she disregarded it and told herself to stop being foolish, she was infertile —infertile, for God’s sake — it wouldn’t quit.

A baby. A baby. A baby.

It whispered its promise to her insidiously. Glowing like a candle in the darkness. Shining like a beacon of hope. Which was crazy.

Beyond crazy.

She’d been diagnosed with idiopathic infertility in the prime of her life. How on earth could she conceive at all, never mind in the dying days of her dysfunctional fertility cycle? It didn’t make any sense.

But she knew, as she grabbed her bag from her locker, that she was going to stop by the chemist’s and buy a pregnancy test. Not because she believed it but because she didn’t.

Couldn’t.

A simple test would tell her the inevitable in two minutes and then she could stop all these ridiculous thoughts and get some sleep.

‘Maggie.’

Maggie stopped short as Nash greeted her in the corridor outside the staff change rooms.

Nash. Oh, no. Among the maelstrom of thoughts in her head she hadn’t even considered Nash.

Nash checked behind him, making sure no one was within earshot. ‘I have something to do after I knock off so I won’t be around till about ten.’

Maggie, still dazed, her mind racing, didn’t notice the vagueness of his statement. ‘Oh, okay, sure.’

That was good. It would give her time to get the ridiculous test out of the way, quash the insane thoughts and have a couple of hours’ sleep before he joined her.

He looked over his shoulder again. ‘Do you want to give me your keys so you don’t have to get out of bed to let me in?’

His voice had dropped a couple of notches but Maggie barely noticed over the baby, baby, baby chant going on inside her head. ‘Sure.’ She rooted around in her handbag and handed him her spare set of house keys.

Nash frowned. Maggie, who had insisted on the secrecy, didn’t seem too cagey about handing over her keys to him. She usually got cranky if he so much as smiled at her at work.

‘Are you okay?’

Maggie’s head shot up. ‘Yes, why? I’m fine,’ she babbled. ‘Just fine.’

Nash chuckled. She looked tired but also wired and definitely a little spaced. She was almost delirious. Lord knew, he’d felt that way many a time after a long night. ‘Drive carefully, Maggie May.’ He knew she lived close but driving after night duty was a real hazard.

She gave Nash a tight smile, thinking about the location of a chemist’s that opened early. ‘See you later.’

Nash frowned again at Maggie’s back. Maggie May was a definite no-no at work.

What the hell was wrong with her this morning?

Maggie felt sick just looking at the test as she pulled it out of the pack. Sick and nervous. But was it a positive result that was making her feel that way or a