I want to believe she’s right, but it’s hard when you don’t know what you’re dealing with.
“Will you come with me?”
“Where?”
“To my dad’s. His attorney needs to meet me there to handle his estate and assets. I’ve been putting it off. If I’m going to find any answers, it would be there.”
“Of course,” she says with a soft smile. “Why don’t you see if he can meet us after work?”
“All right, but before we go to work, there’s something we need to do.”
Her brows dip in confusion.
“Sav, you’ve been wanting a baby for years. How is it not killing you not knowing if you’re pregnant?” It’s been in the back of my mind every other damn second since I put the pieces together.
“I told you why. Plus, I think I wanted you to be there. I really thought I was broken. It feels like it’s almost too good to be true.”
“Or…” I bring her hand up to my lips and kiss each of her knuckles. “It was meant to be.”
“If you’re not pregnant, it’s no big deal,” I tell her as I watch her nervously pace the bathroom. It turns out Brianne had already bought tests, so finding out was as easy as her peeing on a stick. Once she did, she began pacing. Back and forth. Back and forth. And when I saw how nervous she was, it hit me. What if I’m wrong and she’s not pregnant—and I just put it into her head that she is. She’s going to be devastated, and it’s all my fault.
Shit.
“Sav, did you hear me?”
“Oh my God!” She grabs the stick and waves it in the air. “I’m pregnant!” She thrusts the test toward me so I can see the word PREGNANT, then throws herself into my arms. “Thank you. Thank you. I can’t believe it.” She steps back, tears flying down her cheeks. “I’ve wanted this for so long, and now I have it, and it’s all thanks to you.”
Jesus, this woman. She’s actually thanking me for mistakenly knocking her up when I should be the one thanking her.
“Sav, you’ve got it all wrong,” I tell her, palming her face and wiping away the liquid from her cheek with my thumb. “When I met you, I was broken and hanging on by a thread…” I finger her necklace—the one with the love knot. “I was going through life, but not actually living. Until I met you. It’s me who should be thanking you.”
“No.” She shakes her head and kisses me softly on the lips. “It’s like you said when you gave me the love knot. We were both broken, hanging on by a thread. But together, those strings formed a strong knot that will withstand the test of time.”
She presses her lips to mine again, this time deepening the kiss, and I thank whoever was responsible for that annoying fucking treadmill. Had it not driven me nuts, I might never have given this Southern-accented, coffee-loving, weird T-shirt-wearing woman, who holds my heart in the palm of her hand, a second glance.
Epilogue
Savannah
Three Months Later
“That’s the head…and the hands…those are the feet… and oh! It seems your baby is not at all shy. Those little legs are spread wide.” The doctor laughs, glancing at Ben and me. “Are we finding out the sex?”
“No,” I say, giving her the answer Ben and I agreed on. Life only has so many surprises, so we decided to wait until our little alien is born to find out—yep, you read that right, our baby’s nickname is Alien. Brody took one look at the ultrasound pics, having never seen any before, and said it looked like I was carrying an alien. Of course Ben thought it was hilarious, so, for the past three months, we’ve called our precious little miracle an alien.
The doctor goes about taking measurements, explaining the baby’s right on schedule growth-wise, then we listen to the heartbeat.
Ben squeezes my hand, knowing I get choked up every time I hear it. He surprised me with an at-home doppler so I could listen to it any time I wanted. The fear of this being my only pregnancy, since it was so hard to conceive the first time, has me enjoying every step of this pregnancy—from weekly baby bump pics to journaling how I feel, I’m not leaving anything out.
“Everything looks good. Here are some pictures.” She hands us a strip of black and white images. “And you can view the video on the portal. You can check out and schedule your next appointment for four weeks from today.”
“Thank you.”
After I get dressed and check out, we head out. I scheduled the appointment late in the afternoon so we could take the rest of the day off.
When Ben tells his driver a different address, I look at him confused. “We’re not going home?”
“We are.” That’s all he says before he pulls his phone out and goes about checking his emails. I’m a little annoyed that he’s being so short with me, but I chalk it up to him being busy, so I use the time to track my progress this week and then look up some more baby names. We can’t seem to agree on a single one, so I like to make lists and send them to Ben. He then goes through them, commenting on each one and why that name isn’t good. Some of his answers are actually kind of funny—like Luke for a boy reminds him of Star Wars, and apparently, he’s traumatized from when he read Charlotte’s Web as a kid and the poor spider died, so Charlotte was also nixed.
Twenty minutes later, we’re out of the city and going down a less congested area. The longer we drive, the bigger the houses get and the farther apart they sit.
“Hey, Ben. Did you plan to stop somewhere?”
He glances up quickly and looks around. “Yep.”
I wait for him to elaborate, but he gives me nothing. “Care to share where?”
“Nope.” He goes back to looking at his phone, and I snatch it from him.
“Hey, where are we going?”
He chuckles at my annoyance. “Patience. You’ll see.” He leans over and kisses my cheek, and I sag against him.
A few minutes later, the driver stops in front of a gorgeous two-story colonial-style home with cute country-style shutters, a large wraparound porch, a decent-sized front yard with actual green grass, and a white picket fence.
When I see a for sale sign in the front, my heart pounds in my chest. “Ben…”
He smiles and opens the door, edging out and then taking my hand to help me.
“I believe I promised you a white picket fence,” he says, walking us up the U-shaped drive.
His words, confirming what I was thinking and hoping when I saw the sign, cause me to choke up with raw emotion. I’m engaged to a man I love, and we’ll soon officially be a family. My hand that’s not entwined with his goes to my belly—we’re adding to our family. And he’s gotten me my white picket fence.
Ben grabs the lockbox, types in a code, then pulls the key out, unlocking the door. We step inside, and it’s completely empty, like the most beautiful blank canvas. I can instantly imagine Brody and Ben laughing with each other in the living room while they play video games, family meals at the dining room table. I glance to the left and see the massive kitchen, and thoughts of making homemade pizza with Brody—and one day our little alien—come to mind.