Swear (Landry Family 4)

Heath’s arms wrap around the two of us as we stand in the middle of my bathroom. No one says a word.

All I can think about is telling Ford and his reaction. I wonder how it will mirror the first time I had to tell him I thought we were having a baby.

The tears come harder as I’m flooded with so many emotions I can’t even begin to get them together. My friends hold me, rubbing my back, whispering things in my ear that I can’t hear over the sound of my own thoughts.

Once I simmer down and they release me, I set the test on the counter and splash cool water on my face. It’s only when I’ve pressed a towel to my eyes do I even try to speak.

“Well, there goes Wine Wednesday,” I attempt to joke. “That wasn’t funny, was it?”

“Do you have any idea how beautiful this child is going to be?” Heath gushes.

“She’s not there yet, Heath. Give her a second.”

Pulling the lavender cloth from my face, I look between my two best friends. “This is either a monumental fuck-up or the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I’m not sure which.”

I do know. I can feel it creeping into my heart, twisting itself around hopes and dreams that have scattered through my soul and binding them together. What comes with that? Blinding fear.

A family with a man like Ford is every woman’s fantasy. Maybe I didn’t want it now if I had the choice. Maybe I needed more time to get there. But the concept is something that has been the pinnacle of my wish-list for almost a decade, a pipedream I thought was unattainable. What happens if it gets ruined? What if it doesn’t work out? What if—

“Easy,” Violet laughs, bumping me with her hip. “I don’t know where you just checked out to, but I’m going to need you to come back.”

“I’m afraid to tell him.”

“Why? He’s going to be over the moon!” Violet looks at me like I’m crazy. “I kinda want to watch him find out.”

The faces she makes usually make me laugh, but it doesn’t even register now.

“What if I tell him . . . what if that’s like jinxing it or something?” I wipe my eyes. “What if he comes at me like I know he will, wanting to put some plan into place to do everything the right way, and I . . .” I close my eyes, a sudden dizziness rocking me.

“You don’t want to?” Heath crooks a brow. “I’d prepare myself for him going off the deep end in the sexiest way, my friend.”

My phone dings in Heath’s hand. He looks at it and then up to me. “You’d be smart to call your baby daddy back or it appears he’ll be showing up here.”

“What did he say?” I groan.

“The text reads, ‘Either call me back or I’m coming to see you. I need to know you’re okay. You have ten minutes, babe.’ He called you ‘babe,’” Heath gushes.

I roll my eyes. “Tell him . . . tell him I’m going into a meeting and I’ll call him in a little bit.”

“So don’t say congratulations or anything?”

“Heath, don’t you even joke about this!” I say, springing to my feet. My stomach flip-flops and I flash a look at Violet. “This sickness isn’t going away, is it?”

She laughs, tossing an arm around my shoulders. “Not for nine months, friend.”

Ford

“NO, I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING stupid,” I sigh, pouring a glass of sweet tea. “You’d have been proud.”

“Let’s not get crazy,” Mallory huffs through the phone. “You had to have done something to make her balk.”

“Why is it always the guy’s fault? Why can’t it just be something in her head that caused this?”

“Because I live in reality.”

Sighing, I try to get the edge off the ball of anxiety I’m dealing with. I might have been able to manage giving her actual space had she not gotten sick. I may have even been able to deal with just checking on her once or twice if I didn’t know something was actually wrong. Without Heath, I probably wouldn’t know.

Luckily for me, he gave me a heads-up this morning when I called her phone. Now I wait for her to show up at my house like she promised in a text an hour ago.