Things were okay with Erin, too. She had been shocked by Nora’s news, but she’d recovered quickly, and was currently at work trying to convince Nora that they should still buy a place together—but that it should be a cottage on the lake so the cousins could still grow up together on weekends and in the summer. Nora had told her she needed to get her main housing sorted out before she could worry about a second place, but Erin had resumed her habit of sending real estate listings. They were all sweet little lake cottages in and around Moonflower Bay. None of them were as sweet as Jake’s place, though.
Erin was like a dog with a bone over the Jake question, but she’d finally let it go when Nora had sketched out the details of their last conversation. Now she probably had a Jake voodoo doll to go with her Rufus voodoo doll. Her mom was planning to take a short leave from work to come and stay for a few weeks after the baby was born.
And the baby. Her baby. She was having a baby!
She had a midwife in Grand View, and everything was looking good. She had an appointment for her twenty-week ultrasound and was trying to decide if she wanted to find out the gender at that point or if she wanted to be surprised.
It was all good. Mostly.
It was also…a lot. Thankfully, she had Eve and Maya by her side every step of the way. One of them was in the waiting room of the clinic at the end of every day—sometimes both of them. They’d have dinner for her, or they’d pick up pizza from the bar. She’d already told them to tell Sawyer and Law the news and had also decided that since she was starting to show, it was time to let the cat out of the bag more widely. So she stopped trying to hide the bump. In fact, she did the reverse: she wore formfitting clothing on purpose because she was anxious to get the big reveal over with.
The weird thing was that though it was clear everyone knew, no one said anything. When she went into the hardware store one morning for a light bulb, the old-timers stopped talking immediately—they had been yammering about something to do with human assembly lines? There was a weird, uncomfortable pause while they looked alternately at her belly and at each other. Then they started talking a mile a minute about stupid stuff, clearly overcompensating. She would have expected them to be over the moon about her news. She was staying. There was nothing like a kid to tie a girl down.
But no one said a word.
The other person who hadn’t said a word? Jake. It wasn’t like she’d expected a dramatic change of heart. She knew he was shocked and upset, and she respected that. But she kind of thought he would eventually be in touch to let her know what kind of involvement, if any, he wanted. But she hadn’t seen him or heard from him in the few days that had passed since she’d dropped her bomb on him, not even in passing. She hadn’t seen her dog.
Was Mick even her dog anymore?
She was heartbroken, was what it came down to. She was feeling better physically and accomplishing a lot, but she was heartbroken.
Still, as she had learned from Rufus, the way to deal with heartbreak was to keep going. To make a plan and execute it. And given that it was Friday night and she was locking the door to the clinic, right now her plan was to walk across the street to the bar to see her friends—strangely, neither Eve nor Maya had shown up in her waiting room today. But they were probably already at Law’s and assuming she’d meet them there. Maybe Jake would be there. Maybe it would be awkward. Maybe it would be excruciating. But she wasn’t going to let that deter her.
This was her town, too. She took a deep inhalation of the bracing early-spring air.
Despite her resolve, she didn’t make it inside the bar. Art and Jamila were standing outside, and judging by the looks on their faces—serious for Art, teary for Jamila—they were waiting for her.
She sighed. This was one big-ass item on the to-do list that she’d been putting off. She was hoping that even if Jake wasn’t interested in the baby, his dad and stepmom would be. She just didn’t know how to make that happen. How to ask.
“Nora.” Jamila flashed her a watery smile as she approached. “We’re so happy.”
She blew out a breath. That was a relief. “I’m glad. I hoped— Oof.”
She couldn’t get the rest out because Art had basically tackle-hugged her. He held her for a long time. She held him back. Let his strong arms bolster her. When he pulled away, his eyes were bright. He was so like Jake, a man of few words but many emotions.
He cleared his throat. “We want to show you something. Would that be okay?”
“Of course. I just have to pop into the bar and tell Maya and Eve not to worry about me.”
“No you don’t, because we’re coming, too.”
And there were her friends. Her generous, beloved friends. She hadn’t noticed them coming out of the bar during the hug.
She narrowed her eyes. “What’s going on?”
No one said anything. They just piled into Art’s car—Art and Jamila in front and Nora and her friends squished into the back.
It was probably a surprise baby shower or something. She could be cool with that. That was the point of staying here, right? As Maya had said, this was her village. It wasn’t long before they were parking behind Jake’s truck.
“You guys. I don’t think you understand. I can’t just—”
“He knows we’re coming,” Art said quickly.
“He does?”
“He asked us to bring you here,” Jamila said kindly.
“Hello, hello!” It was Eiko, opening the car door for Nora. “How are you feeling, Dr. Hon? You look wonderful.”
“Doesn’t she, though?” Pearl said—Pearl was here, too? “The pregnancy glow is real.”
“Just run with it,” Maya said, no doubt correctly intuiting that Nora was…what? What was she, even? Confused? Wary?
Scared out of her mind?
All of the above, actually.
“Trust us.” Eve took her hand, which prompted Maya to take the other.
The whole clump of them—Eve and Maya holding her hands and Pearl, Eiko, Art, and Jamila walking beside them—escorted her to the outcropping. There, Law and Sawyer were waiting.
What the hell was happening?
“We’re handing her over!” Pearl trilled. “The final item on the assembly line!”
“Handing me over? What?”
Sawyer and Law crossed their arms and clasped hands and made a “chair” for Nora to sit on.
“On you go,” Eiko said.
Nora thought about how wary she’d been her first few days in town. How suspicious she’d been of anyone who was nice to her. What’s the catch? she’d been constantly wondering.
Like that time she’d come home to find Jake building her a deck. Her hackles had gone right up.
But what had happened next? She had recognized her defensive impulse, paused, and thought about the fact that she was remaking her life. Asked herself what kind of person she wanted to be in that life.
“Trust,” Eve said again, with so much warmth and affection in her voice.
Nora sat.
And let the men ferry her out into the lake and around the outcropping like she was Cleopatra or something.
Jake was waiting on the other side.
Of course he was.
Gah. Just seeing him made her feel better—and worse. Better because she loved him. She loved him.