A Baby Affair (Parent Portal 2)

There was no passion. Just a promise of good thoughts, of connection and kind regard always. She was kissing him goodbye.

“Please, please call if I can help in any way,” she said, stepping back.

That was his cue. He nodded. “Will you do the same?”

She nodded.

“Honestly?”

“I swear, Craig. It’s the least I can do for you. You can rest assured that if you don’t hear from me, she’s fine.”

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“And you,” he said. “I...care, Amelia. If you ever need anything, if there’s anything I can do to help, I want you to call. It would make me happy.”

She nodded, her lower lip trembling, and turned, heading slowly down the hall, clearly leaving him to let himself out.

He stood there, watching his family walk out of his life, wanting to go after them. Wondering if he was making a mistake. And knowing he wasn’t. A break now was hard. But after Isabella came and life settled into something that wasn’t right for either of them, a break would still come. And it wouldn’t be just the two of them hurting then. It would be Isabella, too.

Grabbing his keys, he left.

Chapter Twenty

Amelia cried for a while after Craig left. She cried for a life she couldn’t have. Cried because she’d hurt him. And hurt herself again, too, even after swearing to herself that she wouldn’t let it happen. Because she couldn’t make things better for them. Because she missed him already. And then she lay in her bed, her head where his had been, her hand on her belly, and took comfort from the fact that it was his daughter growing inside her.

She’d looked at a lot of profiles of potential sperm donors—all were good ones. The Parent Portal screened very carefully. She could have picked any number of them.

She was so thankful she’d chosen him. And fell asleep telling herself that everything was going to be all right.

The “breakup” hurt in the moment, but she and Craig would both be fine. They’d known their time together wasn’t going to last forever. With a little time to get some distance and perspective, they’d be fine. Able to talk on the phone now and then, keep up with each other’s lives.

She went to sleep feeling somewhat better. But she woke up with a cloud that followed her everywhere and continued for days. No matter what she did, where she was, what she told herself or did to distract herself, she couldn’t shake the darkness.

And if she gave in to it, she cried. Which was how Angie found her the following Tuesday afternoon, six days after Craig had walked out of her life forever. Sitting at her drawing table, a necklace design that had been going well and then nowhere, ruined by her tears.

She’d told her sister about Craig leaving the morning after it had happened. Angie had been great, holding her while she cried, crying a little with her. Listening to her. She’d never once said “I told you so.”

Instead, Angie had told Amelia that she had done the right thing because she’d listened to herself and followed her own heart.

Amelia told Angie that she didn’t regret her time with Craig. She was so glad she knew him. So thankful that Isabella’s father was such a great, decent and kind man.

“Come here.” Angie took her hand, led her from the drawing board to the couch, sitting down with her and then jumping back up to get her a small container of juice from the minifridge. She grabbed one for herself, too, uncapping one and handing it to Amelia and then taking a sip of the other for herself.

“I think you need to reassess,” Angie said, her tone kind but sure. In black jeans with off-white beige lace around the holes ripped into them, she didn’t look like the boss of anything, but Amelia knew that tone of voice. Their staff knew it, too. It was the one you didn’t argue with.

Unless you were Angie’s big sister, of course. She shook her head. “I had to send him away, Angie. I couldn’t keep being with him, knowing I was hurting him.”

“Again, his choice,” she said, but Amelia shook her head again. “I know, which is what I told him, and he was the one who chose to walk out the door.”

She’d done the right thing.

She’d just never expected the pain to be so debilitating. No matter what she did, she couldn’t make it stop.

“This isn’t good for the baby.”

“You think I don’t know that?” It was a constant worry, and why she was trying so damn hard to recover. To move on. To figure everything out. Find what would cure her.

“Craig and I are too different. We’ve both already learned the hard way that we can’t be happy without being true to ourselves.”