Page 57 of The Undercover Billionaire's Baby

“Did we get different beans this week?”

Alice glanced at me. “What?”

“The coffee tastes different.”

“It’s the same coffee. Maybe the cream’s off?”

My stomach did a flip-flop. “I didn’t use cream.”

Alice went back to watching the road. “I forget every year, how quiet it gets. I can’t even sleep at night without the beach noise.”

“When they come back, you’ll say you can’t sleep with it.”

“Because change is hard. I like things the same. That’s why I don’t get it, the whole… summer impulse. This whole need to pick up and go somewhere else. You’d spend the first month just settling in, then you get maybe two carefree weeks. Then you start thinking about going back home. Even the ones who stay through September?—”

I gasped. “Wait, shut up.”

Alice frowned. “Rude.”

“No, but September. But it’s been two months.” I stared at my cooling, bad-tasting coffee. “Sam’s been gone two months now.”

“Who? Oh, you mean Brad.” Alice rolled her eyes. “I told you, you’re too good for him. If he ghosts you, it’s his loss, Lana.”

She wasn’t getting it. “He’s been gone two whole months.”

“What are you saying? Time to move on? Because, my cousin has this friend?—”

“No, Alice, I…” I gripped the counter and shut my eyes tight. The room spun around me like the rides at the fair. Eight weeks had slipped by since Sam kissed me goodbye, eight weeks that had felt more like eighty. Long days of waiting, checking my phone. Staying up late in case he might call. Then when we were over, the wait didn’t end. I waited to smile again. To lose that reflex to call him. To see something funny or silly or cute, and not right away want to share it with Sam.

“Lana? You okay?”

“It’s been eight weeks,” I said. “And I haven’t had…”

Alice arched a brow. “Sex?”

“No, not sex. I haven’t had…” I couldn’t say it. Couldn’t let it be true.

“Are you saying you’re late?”

I tried a sip of my coffee, still sour. Still gross. But no one else had complained, not even Alice. Didn’t things taste weird when you were… when you were?—

“Are you saying you’re pregnant?”

I shrieked. “Shut up!”

“Nobody’s in here! It’s just you and me!” Alice ran round the counter and peered at my midriff. “You don’t look pregnant yet, but I guess you wouldn’t.”

“Stop saying ‘pregnant.’ You’re making it true.”

We stared at each other, then both burst out laughing.

“If you think that’s how it happens, no wonder you’re pregnant.”

“Shut up, shut up.”

“I’ll get you a test,” she said. “Two to make sure.”

I grabbed her arm. “Not from next door. Go to the mall, go on your lunch hour. This can’t get around. Not till I’m sure.”

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