“It didn’t upset your parents that you didn’t want to stay?” he asked.
“No,” I said, pulling my own food out of the refrigerator and bringing it to the microwave to warm up. “They wanted me to go my own way if that’s what made me happy.”
“Sounds like you’re close,” Peter said.
I nodded. “We are. All of us. We still get together at least once a week for dinner. It used to be just the six of us, but my brothers have families now.”
“All of them?”
“Yes. Quentin and his wife, Merry, have a baby girl. Darren and his wife, Kelly, have a little girl and are expecting their second baby. Vince is actually with my best friend, Lindsey. They’re raising her son, and I’m pretty sure they’re having a baby of their own soon. I’m the only one left,” I said.
“And I’m sure you don’t ever hear a word about that,” he said.
“Of course not,” I said with a laugh. “My parents are totally fine with that. Actually, I think my father probably is. He doesn’t really push about things like that. He always says he just wants us to be happy. Which, now that I think about it, is probably his way of telling me I need to find a woman.”
“Which one of them cooks?” Peter asked.
I gave him a questioning look as I brought my hot food to sit down at the table with him “What?”
“You said that the whole kitchen would be full of food if we were at the compound.”
“Oh. Right. My mother. She bakes, mostly. When she’s stressed or thinking about something, she does it more. So, you can imagine with all the weddings and babies and everything, she’s been making a lot recently. Sometimes she brings things by here. I’m sure you’ll get a chance to eat some soon,” I said.
“It must be great having a big family like that.”
He sounded almost sad, and I noticed him poking at the salad in front of him with his fork.
“What about you? What’s your family like?” I asked,
Peter shook his head. “Nothing much to tell. I’m an only child. My mother died when I was just a kid, and now Dad lives all the way across the country. So, it’s pretty much just me.”
“No, it’s not,” I said. “You’ve got all of us. And you’re coming to the bar tonight to meet everybody. We usually celebrate a race win the night of the race, but Lindsey rented out the bar last night for a private event, so we’re doing it tonight.”
Peter’s eyes lit up, and he nodded. “That sounds great.”
That night I met Peter outside the bar. Throwing my arm around his shoulders, I brought him inside and up to the bar. We hopped up onto the stools, and Lindsey turned around with a grin.
“Hey, Nick,” she said. “You’re the first to get here. Vince just called and said everybody is on the way.” She eyed Peter. “Who do we have here?”
“This is Peter. Peter, this is Lindsey, my best friend,” I said. “Lindsey, we’d like a pitcher of the IPA please.”
“Sure thing.”
She turned around and filled a pitcher, then put a beer mug in front of each of us. I poured the beer into each mug and handed one to Peter. Just then, the door opened, and Vince, Quentin, and Darren poured in. Merry and Kelly came in after, followed by Darren’s best friend, Colby, helping Greg, the team’s other rider. He was still recovering from a horrific accident during a race, but he was doing much better, and it was great to see him out and about again.
“Hey,” Vince said, coming up to the bar and pounding me on the back. He leaned across the bar toward Lindsey. “Hey, babe.”
They kissed, and everybody rolled their eyes but laughed.
“Good timing, guys,” I said, holding up my mug of beer. “Everybody, this is Peter. He’s new at the office, and tonight, I am making him an honorary Freeman brother.”
Peter’s eyes widened and his mouth opened, but no sound came out. My brothers cheered and welcomed him, while Colby and Greg, two men who had been given the same honor, patted Peter on the back and introduced themselves. That night, I took Peter under my wing, determined he was never going to feel alone again.
23
Bryn
For all the extra work I was able to pack into last month, it looked like this month was going to be a close call to whether I got my usual workload finished. At least, if the last few days were any indication of my productivity. I had gotten next to nothing done. My computer sat on my table, waiting for my next brief bursts of actually doing something.
There was very little chance of that happening anytime soon. I hadn’t touched it in more than an hour. Like I had been the last three days, I was curled up in the armchair next to the window, clutching the papers I had read probably a thousand times by that point. I memorized every single word on those papers, but I couldn’t stop myself from going over them again and again.
Maybe I’d missed something. Maybe if I just read it one more time, I would find where it had somebody else’s name. I would find that it was a mistake and they had given me the wrong paperwork.
Of course, that wouldn’t make any sense. It wasn’t the paperwork that broke the news. It was my doctor who stood beside the examination table and gave me the diagnosis. That afternoon after seeing Nick, I went straight to my doctor’s appointment and told her I was still experiencing the same types of stomach ailments and fatigue I was when I came in the month before.
I told her about my call with Sandy, the after-hours nurse, and assured her I was doing my best to find as many ways as I could to reduce my stress. I didn’t elaborate. At that moment, I didn’t figure she needed to hear the gory details about how the situation was unfolding with Justin, or about my intense feelings for Nick. Especially after we spent the night together.
My night with Nick. Maybe that was a detail I should have shared with the doctor earlier in the appointment. It would have saved me a whole lot of conversation and the lab a bunch of different tests. The doctor could have just gone straight for the pregnancy test and it would be over with.
It wasn’t Sandy’s fault. She was just going on what I told her. And more specifically, what I didn’t tell her. This wasn’t the first time in my life I’d been told I took things too literally. It just happened to be the first time in my life when taking a question too literally resulted in missing finding out about my pregnancy.
Hearing the news was such an incredible shock, I didn’t even process it all the way. My doctor told me and I just kind of stared at her. I heard the words. I knew what they meant. But they just didn’t seem real. There was no question the baby belonged to Nick. The timing didn’t add up for it to be Justin’s. I really did have a stomach virus the last time I went through bouts of sickness.
As it turned out, this second wave wasn’t a return of the virus. It wasn’t stress or anxiety. It was morning sickness. She recommended I handle it with eating a few crackers first thing in the morning before getting out of bed and making sure I stayed properly hydrated. I was supposed to eat regularly throughout the day and never let my stomach get empty. Get plenty of rest. Take my vitamins.
All sorts of things I didn’t hear when I just had stomach virus, things I never expected to hear. I thought I was going to walk out of the office with a referral to a counselor so I could talk about my stress. Maybe some sort of prescription that would help manage my nausea. At the very worst, she would have told me I had an ulcer and put me on antacids.
I never would have thought I would have walked out with a stack of papers instructing me on how to deal with feeling sick and how to take care of the baby growing inside me. It shouldn’t have happened. I had been taking birth control for years. Even before I got into the relationship with Justin, I was on the pill. Prescribed when I was sixteen, it helped manage severe cramps and heavy periods.
And apparently did very little else. At least that night it didn’t.
I got the news three days ago and was still working on wrapping my mind around it. Pregnant. I was actually pregnant. Not enough to see anything recognizable
as a baby on an ultrasound screen. Not enough to make me show. But pregnant.
I had to tell Nick. This wasn’t something I could just keep to myself and never let him know. At some point, I was going to have to let him know our brief fling was going to be sticking with us for life. Just the thought of it made me break out in a cold sweat.
Setting the papers aside, I tried to sit back at my desk and concentrate on work. I couldn’t just let everything fall apart because I was trying to deal with the news. If nothing else, I now had to think about somebody other than myself. The baby might still have a long time of growing ahead of it, but I still had to be prepared. I was responsible for another life now, and that meant working hard had new meaning.
I managed to keep myself distracted long enough to get to the next afternoon when I had my first meeting with the financial lawyer. I’d made the appointment because I hoped sitting down with him would help me to be smarter about my money. I never wanted to be in a position again where anyone would be able to swoop in and hurt me the way Justin did.
Protecting myself meant protecting my finances, and I needed somebody to help me do that.
The lawyer, Mr. Bach, was essentially what I expected Nick to be before I met him. A kindly older man with white hair and a round belly that barely fit in his suit, he was warm and welcoming. When I went into the office, he offered me tea. It made my heart hurt, reminding me of Nick, and I wondered if they would ever be a time when everything didn’t remind me of him.
Checking the tea to make sure it was herbal and decaffeinated, I accepted a cup. I swirled honey into it as Mr. Bach shuffled around getting himself sorted. He struck me as the type of man who was easily distracted but knew what he was talking about. He wasn’t absentminded; it was more like he had so much going on in his brain at the same time he couldn’t decide which train of thought to follow.
Finally, he sat down and folded his hands on the desk in front of him. He smiled at me briefly, then reached for a folder. “So, you gave me an idea of what happened and the kinds of goals you have. But why don’t you fill me in a little bit more and we can talk about the best options for you.”
I nodded and went into the story of Justin taking my money from me. As I talked, the lawyer picked up a pen and started taking notes. He nodded and made acknowledging sounds every few sentences. When I was finished, he looked back over everything he wrote down, then up at me.
“That’s an interesting story. Definitely not something I’ve encountered in my career. But I have helped plenty of people who have had money stolen from them in different ways. And I am more than prepared to help you secure your finances and prevent anything else like that from happening again,” he said.
“That would be fantastic,” I said. “I’ve already gotten some advice from people in law enforcement and an investor, but do you think there’s any legal recourse I could take against my ex? Is there any way to prove what he did?”
“That’s not something I can know right off the bat. I would have to look into it more in-depth and contact the bank and the investor. But it’s definitely something we can discuss,” he said.
“That would be great. I’ve already pretty much resigned myself to not being able to prove everything, and I really am at peace with that. If it’s not an option, it’s not an option. But if there was something I could do about it, I am more than ready to,” I said. “The most important thing to me, though, is making sure I have a way to keep my money safe.”
“Perfect,” he said, reaching into his desk drawer. “Then let’s fill out some paperwork.”
As he searched around for another pen with no explanation as to why I couldn’t use the one he did, I thought about the baby and how I needed to protect it into the future. Taking the steps I was taking now wasn’t just about keeping myself safe. It was about making sure my child had everything I could possibly give it as it grew up. It was amazing how something so small could change my thoughts so much.
When Mr. Bach finally located a pen that was acceptable for me to use, I filled out the paperwork he put in front of me. That finished, he gave me another bright smile.
“Anything else I can help you with right now?” he asked.
I almost asked what I should do about the little bean growing in my belly but decided against it. That probably wasn’t his area of expertise. Instead, I said no, shook his hand, and headed home to stuff myself into pajamas and watch useless TV for the rest of the day.
As delightful as that plan sounded, it wasn’t to be. I walked out of the office and was staring down into my purse as I turned down the sidewalk. Two steps later I crashed into somebody.
“Oh! I’m so sorry!” I said, looking up to see who I’d tried to plow down with my lack of attention.
“Bryn?” the woman in front of me said.
It took me a second to recognize her. The last time I saw her face, it was behind enormous sunglasses.
“Minnie,” I said in surprise. “Hi.”
“I thought that was you! How are you doing, sweetheart?” she asked.
Well, if this isn’t one of the most uncomfortable moments of my entire existence.
“I’m doing well,” I said, glossing over reality. “I’m sorry about running into you like that.”
She made a dismissive sound and waved it away. “Don’t you even think about it. I’m happy to see you no matter how it happens. Are you busy?”
The question came so quickly after all the other words she said, I was taken aback and found myself responding before my brain was able to think all the way through what to say.
“No. I was just heading home.”
“Good,” she said, looping her arm through mine. “Then you can come with me to the bakery for an afternoon treat.”
Next thing I knew, I was sitting in the bakery across a tiny window table from Minnie. Each of us sipped at our cup of tea and munched on a pile of delicately decorated cookies. Something about her made me open up, and soon I was telling her all about my childhood.
Minnie was an exceptional listener and just as good a talker. She was a force of nature who clearly wanted her last son married off. She made me laugh, and for a while I wasn’t even thinking about everything that was going on in my life.
But then I noticed a glint in the older woman’s eye. It was like she knew something. I took that as my cue to get out of the conversation before I blurted out she had a grandchild coming and started talking names. Nick didn’t need to learn he was soon going to be a father by seeing monogrammed onesies first.
When I finally escaped the bakery and rushed back to my car, I was running on adrenaline and I wasn’t sure why.
24
Nick
“How could you do this to Nick?”
The voice coming out of the other room as soon as I walked into my house startled me so much, I didn’t even recognize it. I dropped the grocery bags in my hands and whipped around toward it. Lindsey was coming down the hallway from my kitchen, eating an apple and glaring at me.
“What the hell are you doing?” I asked.
“Having a snack while I wait for you to come home,” she said. “Which by the way, is getting later all the time. You really should try to prioritize your time away from the office. It isn’t good for you to become such a workaholic.”
“What are you doing in my house?” I asked. “How did you get in here?”
She looked at me like it was one of the stupidest questions she had ever heard. “With a key. The one you gave me?”
“Oh, yeah,” I said, reaching down to pick up my grocery bags so I could carry them to the kitchen. “Why are you in my house? Where is Remy?”
“Remy is with his father today,” she said with a heavy dose of restrained disdain.
She really was doing her best to not utterly hate her ex. To his credit, Grant was putting in some sort of an effort with her now. For a while, there was only conflict between them. It was so rough, Lindsey didn’t even tell people around town she had a son. She
ended up having to get a lawyer and prepare to fight in court when Grant threatened to take her son away from her completely.
In the end, she didn’t have to go through with it. Grant finally saw the true effect of what he was doing and called it off. Since then he had been trying to effectively co-parent their three-year-old together. The whole situation wasn’t easy on her. But it’s what brought her and Vince together, and what got her official visitation rights with Remy, so in those ways, it was worth it.
“Which brings me back to my original question of what the hell are you doing?” I asked.
“I came for an intervention,” she said.
“What are you intervening in?” I asked.
We got to the kitchen and I plopped the bags in the middle of the table so I could unload them. Lindsey came up to the side of the table and held the apple in between her teeth as she took boxes of pasta and canned San Marzano tomatoes out of a bag.
“You and Bryn,” she said.
“What about me and Bryn? I haven’t even spoken to her in over a week. She dropped off the seed money for her investments, and that was it,” I said.
“You might not have spoken to her, but your mother has,” Lindsey said.
I turned slowly away from the cabinet where I was putting cereal away. “Excuse me?”
“Yeah, apparently they had a deep and meaningful heart-to-heart at the bakery a couple of days ago. Vince was just getting over all the chaos with Quentin’s baby and Darren’s wedding and everything. Now we throw another pregnancy into the mix and we have your mother all in a flutter about you and Bryn,” Lindsey said.
“Who did you hear this from?” I asked.
“Vince,” she said sharply, taking a forceful bite out of the apple. “He called me from work because your mother couldn’t stop talking about how nice it was running into Bryn and how lovely a girl she is. Which, she totally is. I’m not going to lie. I really like her. But can’t you just have a normal beginning of your relationship?”
Millionaire Hero (Freeman Brothers Book 4) Page 12