Unexpectedly Expecting the Sheik's Baby - Elizabeth Lennox Page 0,49
grab another. But the smell in the kitchen made her stomach start to lurch, so she just poured her coffee down the drain and hurried away. She’d grab a cup at the corner coffee shop. They had better coffee anyway.
Unfortunately, as soon as she stepped into the coffee shop, she rushed out again, leaning against one of the light posts and gasping for breath.
“Are you okay, honey?” a kind voice asked to Cassy’s right.
Cassy could only nod, lying but not sure what else to do.
The woman didn’t go away. “Maybe you should sit down,” she suggested and took Cassy’s arm. “Come on,” she urged as she led Cassy over to one of the benches set up for the bus stop. “It’s always like this in the beginning,” she said softly, rubbing Cassy’s back as she leaned forward.
Cassy had no idea what the woman meant. She looked to be in her mid-forties with kind, blue eyes and slightly greying hair. “In the beginning?”
“Can’t stand the scent of coffee? Throwing up in the mornings? The morning sickness goes away around week fourteen but the coffee? Nope. I couldn’t stand the smell until well after my baby came. And since you’re wearing sports bra, I’m guessing your breasts are tender?”
Cassy had never discussed anything so personal as her breasts with a stranger. “I’m sorry, but what are you talking about?” she asked as politely as she could under the circumstances.
The woman only smiled, her gentle gaze making Cassy’s stomach clench even harder. “Uh oh. You don’t know? You haven’t taken a pregnancy test yet?”
Cassy started to shake her head but stopped when the movement caused her stomach to roil again. Pregnant? Impossible! She couldn’t be pregnant!
Cassy looked down at her hands, then at the sidewalk. Pregnant? “I’m not pregnant,” she asserted firmly.
At least…no, Nasir had used condoms every time during that weekend six…
Cassy’s mind stopped. “No!” she gasped. That one time. The first time! That first time when…. Oh no!
The woman nodded sagely as Cassy’s already pale features blanched further. “Yes. It happens.”
“But…” she shook her head. “We used protection!” she protested, more to herself than to the woman beside her.
The soft laughter that followed her statement was not comforting. Not in the least! “Only abstinence is one hundred percent effective, dear,” she said as she continued to rub Cassy’s back. She glanced at Cassy’s hand. “Is the father still in the picture?”
Cassy looked at her bare ring finger as well, her heart aching at the memories of Nasir. “No. He’s gone.”
The woman laughed slightly. “Well, it is a different world now. Women have children on their own all the time now.”
Not in her law firm, she thought with rising panic. Yes, women could have babies outside of marriage in the rest of the world, but her law firm would frown on that kind of “scandal”!
What would they do if she told them that she was pregnant and unmarried? They dealt with political clients all the time, heads of major businesses, international clients that wouldn’t tolerate a lawyer with less than stellar morals.
Of course, the men in her law firm didn’t have stellar morals. Nope, they were some of the biggest hound dogs in the city, she suspected. Not that she’d done a thorough evaluation of the promiscuity of the male London population. But…
She was getting off the subject, not wanting to deal with the possibility of an unplanned pregnancy.
Would they fire her? Was she going to lose her job?
No, they couldn’t fire her. Not legally. But she worked for the best law firm in the city. They would figure out a way to get rid of her. Or they would hide her away, give her the worst cases and block her from any sort of promotion, make her life miserable until she resigned.
“This isn’t happening,” she whispered.
The woman chuckled again. “Oh, it is happening, dear. It happens to the best of us. My husband and I got pregnant…” the kind woman went on and on about each of her five pregnancies…five! Cassy couldn’t imagine getting pregnant once, let alone five times!
She couldn’t be pregnant! It was impossible! They’d used protection! Every time! Except for that one time and, surely God wouldn’t be so cruel as to punish her for missing one time. They’d been so careful after that first time. She’d even helped him with that protection and it had become part of their foreplay!
Oh my.
She counted backwards, trying to remember the dates of her flight to Zurich and the last time