Wrong Question, Right Answer (The Bourbon Street Boys #3) - Elle Casey Page 0,106
How dare he be such a chickenshit? It makes me worry that he’s not up to the job of being a father, let alone a partner.
This crap isn’t just about us; it’s about his sister, too. Lucky’s like me in that he hasn’t moved on. He doesn’t have closure yet, and he’s weighed down by the guilt. The difference between him and me, though, is that he’s feeling terrible over something that wasn’t even close to being his fault. She was a sad girl for a really long time, and there was nothing anyone could’ve said to change that. We all tried, many times. Even Lucky tried, but he’s conveniently forgetting that so he can blame himself.
Maybe I should be more forgiving of his attitude, but I can’t right now. This is my life, and I need to get it straightened out. The urgency of the situation strikes me like a fist in my gut. I have a wedding to go to in a few days, and then I’m going to be too far along in this pregnancy to do anything about Charlie. It won’t be safe or smart to execute my plan so obviously pregnant; as it is, I can barely cover it up with a big shirt. This is my last chance to put things right.
Maybe if I can get this closure for myself, my bad luck will stop rubbing off on the father of my children and he’ll get his shit straight, too. My fear that happiness will only come to us if I can find a way to show Charlie’s mother how sorry I am has grown tenfold. Time is running out. I have to get this done.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
All of my research and recon has panned out. I know where Charlie’s mother Eunice is living, I know what time she gets home from her job, and I know that she’s alone most of the time. Sunday night she was tucked in front of her television with a TV dinner by six o’clock. It’d be pretty convenient if she eats at that time every night; this way, I can catch her before Lucky’s finished making our dinner. I assume we’ll go back to our normal routine starting Monday night.
I don’t see him all weekend or before I leave for work Monday, but he knows I don’t hate him. I brushed off his texts asking me to hang out and talk over the weekend, but I left him a note on the counter this morning that said, I’m not mad anymore. Let’s talk after work.
Lucky wants to apologize to me, but I’m not ready to hear it or discuss his seriously misguided proposal yet. I need time to get the specter of Charlie out of the house and out of my head. When Lucky came home drunk, it brought back a lot of bad memories, but I’m okay now. I have a plan and it’s going to fix everything. Until that happens, I feel like I’ll never be able to move on with my life and accept anything good Lucky might be offering.
A long weekend of slacking off and thinking about how far Lucky and I have come together has convinced me that he deserves a break. Everyone is allowed to make mistakes in a relationship, especially one as complicated as ours. Hell, we don’t even know what our relationship is. Lord knows I’m not perfect, and I’m bound to screw a bunch of stuff up. I’m going to want his forgiveness when that happens.
I spend part of Sunday at the mall, returning the dress that didn’t fit. Jenny was a little too enthusiastic the other day about my figure and apparently didn’t notice how big my belly is getting, even though she had her hand all over it. I suppose I should take it as a compliment, but all I’m doing now is mourning the loss of my waistline. It used to dip in on both sides, but this morning in the mirror I noticed that it goes straight down from my armpits to my hips. And the baby-pooch in front of me seems to be getting bigger by the day.
A blog written by a mother of twins keeps me busy reading for several hours on Sunday. It puts me in the loop about a lot of things I should be expecting, one of which is the rapid growth of my waistline. Most women are barely showing in their first pregnancy at twenty-four weeks, but I look