A Mother's Secrets (Parent Portal 4)

Jamie called Christine every day, just checking in. The calls were short, never more than a minute, and just him asking her how she was feeling. He didn’t ask anything about her personal life, and didn’t offer anything from his. He never said why he’d canceled dinner that Friday and she didn’t ask. Presumed he’d been with his father-in-law. And knew in her heart that that was how it should be.

She’d cried herself to sleep that night, though, her hand cradling her belly. Just an overload of various emotions that needed to be expended. And then she got on with the business of growing a healthy baby.

With Cheryl’s permission she was back to playing racquetball—though being careful not to hit a ball so hard it came back and hit her in the stomach. Exercise within reason was not only healthy for the baby, but would help her have an easier delivery, too. She went to bed an hour earlier every night, and if she couldn’t sleep, at least she was resting.

And she heard Gram’s voice every time she put a bite in her mouth, reminding her that what she ate, her baby ate. Gram had been willing to let her keep Ryder. Had been willing to have a crying baby in the house, to release some of Christine’s trust money to support it. Gramps had been on board as well. And for a few months there, the first few months, she’d actually allowed herself to believe that she could keep her baby. She’d fallen in love with her son.

And yet she’d done the absolute right thing in giving him up. She’d loved him too much to force him to grow up with less than what adult parents could give him. And she’d loved Gram and Gramps too much to cut short their last years of life. With both of them in failing health, the stress of having a baby in the house would have killed them.

The choice to make the adoption private, without contact, had been her father’s. He’d thought it best that she rip off the bandage, as he’d put it. That she be forced to forget about Ryder as best she could and get on with her life. She’d “gotten on” to The Parent Portal, where there was always a choice for contact.

And Jamie was allowing her contact. She thought about Jamie a lot. Because it was his baby growing inside her. How could she not? He wasn’t hers, just as the baby wasn’t hers, but there was something very intimate about having his seed alive inside her.

His and Emily’s.

She struggled to keep the other woman in the forefront of her mind. The baby was Emily’s as much as it was Jamie’s.

But she’d only met Emily once. Christine had some key memories, but could only play them so many times over and over without anything new to add.

She was ready for Jamie’s call Monday morning—between seven and eight, as they’d been the previous two days—prepared to tell him that she’d slept well, and everything else was status quo. She figured, after a week or so, his calls would cut back to every other day. And then maybe every three or four. He didn’t have to call at all. Or see her. The level of contact had been left up to him.

She’d gone into the process knowing that she could do it on her own. And be just fine. She’d have her monthly checkups, do what she was told, and grow his baby for him.

“I had an offer on my house over the weekend,” he told her, instead of wishing her a good day and hanging up after her report. “Closing is set for a week after my new place closes, so everything’s going to work out on that end.”

In her office, she sat back in her chair, studying the pattern of ridges on her black, short-sleeved shirt. And then how those ridges lined up with the blue, white, black and purple flowers on her cotton skirt. She didn’t love the colors. But the skirt was soft. And she loved how it flowed around her when she walked.

Jamie’s housing situation was none of her concern. None of her business. Her clothes were. Still, she had clients tell her things about their nonbaby personal lives now and then. She was being too rigid.

“Congratulations!” she said. “Everything in your life seems to be coming together, Jamie. I’m happy for you.”

The words were 1,000 percent true. And felt good.

“I was just letting you know that I’ve taken care of my immediate responsibilities and would like to set up a visitation schedule.”

Oh. Oh! No. Just oh. She calmed the jump of excitement in her stomach. “Okay. What did you have in mind?”

“How much can you stand having me around?”

She wasn’t even going to let her mind contemplate the answer to that one. “Seriously,” she said. “Do you have some ideas of what you’re looking for?”

“If I had my way, we’d see each other every day,” he told her. “But I also realize you have a life to live and I’m not a part of that. I know the sacrifice you’re making for me. I just...forgive me, but you’ve got my whole future there and it’s hard to not be present all the time.”

Her heart melted. For him. For her. Because she didn’t hate the idea of seeing him every day.

“We said in the contract that you could be,” she told him. The man had just found out that a part of his wife lived on. This wasn’t about her.

Why did she have to keep reminding herself of that?

Maybe because, in the moment, her whole life was being disrupted. So, yeah, she was allowed a bit of having it be about her.

“I generally work twelve-hour days during the week,” she told him. “But I take breaks for some exercise and other things that come up. We could choose a time to meet a few times a week.” He wanted every day. The fact that she wasn’t opposed to that much contact with him told her that it probably wasn’t a good idea.

“I was thinking something a little more flexible,” he said. It sounded like he was moving around. She’d pictured him in his car. On his way to... Where?

“Where are you?”

“Walking on the beach. I just finished a run.”