Learning to Let Go (30 page)

“Don’t change your plans on account of me,” Laurel said. “I’ll be fine. This will pass shortly. For all I know, it may be food poisoning or something I’m allergic to.”

I couldn’t believe she’d just dismiss her body’s responses so easily. “While I’d like to buy into your argument, it would be impossible. I haven’t given you anything to eat that you haven’t had already in my presence without a reaction. Plus, if it were food poisoning, I’d be affected and throwing up as violently as you.” I pulled her into the cradle of my arms and we rode in silence back to my place.

She seemed to perk up once we hit the elevator, actually trying to entice me into sex by rubbing up against me. My hand couldn’t resist the feel of her breasts and I tweaked her nipple through the fabric of her bra.

“Ouch!”

A thought suddenly crossed my mind. “Didn’t you say you had your period a few weeks ago?”

“Yes, a small one that only lasted a day, why are you asking? I’m not due again for several more days.”

“How long have your nipples been this sensitive?”

She shrugged her shoulders. “I don’t know, a few weeks maybe, but it could just be from the workouts Thompson and Dillon have been putting me through in the training room, learning self-defense. I’ve fallen hard on my chest a couple times and have a few sore muscles all over. Why do you ask?”

No, it couldn’t be, could it? Would that be possible? We’ve taken precautions…

My lips pressed against her temple as my hand ran down to touch her belly. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re having my baby, love.”

A look of horror passed over Laurel and she fainted in my arms.

An hour later, she finally stirred and opened her eyes, glaring immediately at the IV coming out of her arm. “What happened and why do I have an IV stuck in me?”

I sat down beside her in our bed and pushed the hair away from her face. “You passed out in the elevator. According to Dr. Givens, you’re severely dehydrated from throwing up.”

Her eyes were full of question. “Dehydrated?”

“Your system is going through some changes and not taking things very lightly. He’s given you some medicine to help with the nausea and wants to push these fluids to help keep the nausea at bay.”

She looked up at me and then over at the IV bag, watching it drip slowly. “Is it food poisoning like I suspected or just a really bad case of nerves?” Her eyes looked back into mine, looking fearful of the answer she was trying to avoid.

I shook my head and saw the disappointment on her face. “My suspicions were correct, love. You’re carrying our child and need to take care of the two of you.”

“No! That can’t be.” The look on her face showed she was scared and her voice cracked as she spoke. “I’m on birth control! We took precautions.”

My hand came up to cup her chin and forced her to look at me. “I’m not upset by it, Laurel, and you shouldn’t be either. I want to have kids with you and now we just get to start a little earlier. I’m elated to know that we’ve created a piece of us.” I moved my hand down to her stomach to emphasize my point.

Her lips kept pursing and changing, biting on that lip that I so loved to suck into my mouth. “But how?” she whispered, as tears ran slowly down her face.

“Dr. Givens wasn’t sure either, but given your symptoms, he drew some blood and had it run over to the lab. I had him put a rush on it, so we were able to get the results back. Your HCG levels are through the roof, indicating you’ve been pregnant for a while now and just didn’t know.”

She shook her head. “How is that possible?”

My thumb brushed across her cheek, wiping some of the tears away, trying to reassure her that things would be fine. “I’m no doctor, but I’ll relay what he told me. You got the shot close to the end of your cycle, thereby altering your monthly flow. You might have ovulated then, not realizing it and neither of us knowing that it took time to fully take effect before we resumed our relations. Or it’s possible that the medication Jocelyn prescribed for your sleep counteracted your pill. I looked into it and it has been known to cause a shift in birth control’s effectiveness.”

Her body shook as she absorbed everything around her. “Where’s Dr. Givens?” she asked.

I placed my hand atop of hers, which was now resting subconsciously on her belly. “He’s gone to try and secure a portable ultrasound to see how far along you are and if everything looks okay. Plus, he wanted to stop by his home office and review his copy of your hospital records. He thinks they might have missed giving you the Depo shot in the hospital all together.”

Just as I finished the words, in walked the doctor with the equipment. He wasted no time in getting right down to business. “There’s no surprise that you’re pregnant, Laurel. The order was there for you to get the shot, but it wasn’t completed. You never received the injection.”

“So then the baby is okay?” Laurel asked weakly. “Nothing crazy would’ve happened to it because of the birth control, right?”

“We’ll just check on that now, won’t we?” He patted her hand. “Since you never really had the shot and have only been on a birth control pill for a short time, which, according to Garrett, you’ve most likely thrown up daily, I would say the baby is just fine.”

Laurel and I breathed collective sighs of relief.

He placed the equipment down on the side of the bed and turned it on. “I need you to take off your bottoms and cover yourself with a blanket,” he said, holding up what looked like a gigantic white dildo. “I’ll need to insert this into you to see just how far along you are. Once you get further along, we can do the ultrasounds atop of your stomach.”

I helped Laurel get into a comfortable position, her eyes still bugging out of her head, as Dr. Givens inserted the white wand thingy to see how things were. He turned on the sound and picked up the tiny detection of a heartbeat right away.

“I know the screen is a bit grainy,” he said. “Unfortunately the industry hasn’t developed a good portable ultrasound yet. But, you see that spot, with a slight movement, right there?” He pointed to the white spot on the screen and we both nodded our heads. “That’s your baby.”

We both watched as he twisted the wand this way and that, pausing to take a few measurements from the screen. “I’d say, based on what I’m seeing, that you’re at least eleven weeks along.”

I quickly did the math and realized we’d conceived shortly after her attack from Chase, most likely on the yacht or at the beach house. Laurel looked completely dazed, struggling to comprehend everything going on.

“What can we do about her nausea?” I asked. “And what about her low blood sugar?”

“I’d recommend calling Dr. Chadler, her diabetic counsel, immediately and have him work in coordination with a perinatologist. With her having diabetes, the pregnancy may be high risk. That’s why her nausea is all over the place, because she can’t keep any food down and her sugar levels are all over the chart. That, combined with normal morning sickness, appears to be causing extra nausea and fainting. It’s a vicious cycle she’s fallen into, but I can help alleviate it and get you both pointed back to the right track.”

A few hours later, Dr. Givens had removed the IV drip and prescribed some medication to help with the nausea, suggesting she eat plenty of saltine crackers and tea. He told her to remain in bed for the next several days and said he would take care of scheduling follow-up appointments for us with the doctor he recommended.

I walked the doctor out, thanking him for his services and being willing to see us on a Saturday. When I returned, she was up out of bed and pacing the floor.

“What the hell are you doing?” I almost yelled. “You’re supposed to be in bed, resting and taking care of our baby.”

She sank to the edge of the bed, allowing tears to flow freely from her eyes. “You’re right,” she moaned. “Just when life starts to look amazing, like it can’t get any better, a wrench is thrown at us.”

I moved in front of her, kneeling on the rug beside the bed. “You’re not happy about us making a child together? I thought you wanted a family?” Had all our talks been just that, nothing but words?

Her shoulders shifted with her cries. “I did…I still do, just not this quickly. I’m not ready for this. Everything over the past six months has moved so quickly, leaving my mind in a whirlwind. I’m happy we met, that we’re getting married, but I wanted to wait a few years to have kids. I wanted to go explore the world and have some amazing adventures first, just be us for a while. Plus, there’s always the issue of that jerk, Chase.” She looked up at me, her eyes red and bloodshot, face pale and gaunt. “What am I supposed to do with all this?”

I rose, pulling her into my arms. “Yes, this happened a little before we we’re ready,” I admitted, “but there’s happiness, not sadness, to be found in a time like this. The conditions of your security do not change, they’ll only be heightened because now you’re carrying the future heir to the Waters Medical Empire.”

She smiled a bit and laughed at the last part. My hand came down and rested on her belly as I brought an ear to her skin and pretended to listen to our child talk.

“You say you can’t wait to meet your mom and dad?” I said with a grin. “You know very well you need to stay in there for at least another six months. Just show mommy how much you’ll love her when you’re born.”

My words seemed to work, as I felt her finally relax. I looked up to her, happy to see her finally content. “You do realize this means we’re going to have to push up the wedding; unless you mind having a baby bump in our wedding photos, of course.” I tried to wiggle my eyebrows to get the smile I was looking for and it worked.

Her smile grew and small laugh escaped. “You would try every trick in the book to get me to marry you quicker. I didn’t know you’d resort to knocking me up.”

“If I knew I could get you to commit to me sooner, I’d have definitely tried. Just look at this as a sign that we’re meant to be starting a new life together.”

The rest of the weekend passed without incident. Laurel took to the bed rest with relative ease and Deidre hovered over her like a mother hen, pushing the fluids and whatever she could entice Laurel to eat. Even my security team seemed happy to be taking extra care to keep her secure. Something had definitely shifted around me and it was for the better.

Or so I thought.

I hated having to go into work on Monday and leave Laurel at the penthouse, but was promised by both Dillon and Deidre that they would look after her while Thompson accompanied me to a meeting that couldn’t be postponed.

When I went to kiss Laurel goodbye, she seemed distant. She responded to my lips but not with the guttural qualities I’d come to appreciate about her. I could tell she was still fighting her inner mind; I would make a point to have Jocelyn come over and talk to her about her fears.

“I love you, Laurel. I’ll be home soon.” Since she wasn’t accepting my full kisses, I gave her a peck on the cheek.

“I love you, too. Try not to be too long.”

There was fear in her voice. It tore at my heart, but I needed to see the meeting through and get back to my sweetheart.

The meeting ran longer than expected. We were trying to persuade a neurological company to try our new equipment design in the hospital setting, offering it up as test equipment so we could get their honest opinions and have the word passed around about our latest creation. My arguments faltered today and I was thankful my father and brother were in attendance to provide the additional coaxing we needed. They tried to ask what was wrong and while I wanted to shout out to the world that I was going to be a father, something inside me told me I needed to head back to the penthouse.

Everything appeared to be in order when I walked through the doors. “How’s Laurel doing?” I asked Deidre as she offered me a bite to eat for lunch, declining to first go check on my fiancé.

“She’s been rather quiet. She ate some of her toast and a couple bites of peanut butter. I tried coaxing her into something hearty for the baby’s sake, but she said she couldn’t tolerate it.”

Dillon quickly approached to give a status report. “We had a small incident with one of the cameras in your elevator. I checked it out and got it working again after about thirty minutes. Otherwise, things have been relatively quiet, with the exception of Grace coming by for a visit. She left a while ago, but wouldn’t look at any of us, only waving as she went.”