Page 37 of After-Party Consequences

‘I see. When did you have your last period?’

Her mind slammed into a wall of sheer panic as she tried to remember the date. She hadn’t had one in a while. But her menstrual cycle had always been erratic. ‘I... I’m not sure. I’d have to check my phone.’

She was forced to look at Cade when he scooped up her purse and handed it to her. To her astonishment, his agitation had disappeared. But then, she couldn’t gauge his reaction to the doctor’s line of questioning because his expression had gone completely blank.

It took her forever to locate her phone, switch it on and open her calendar app. But as she scrolled through the weeks—looking for the redPshe always stuck into the app to keep track of her cycle—panic started to claw at her throat.

By the time she finally located theP, then counted the weeks in between, her fingers were trembling. She lifted her head.

The doctor had a kindly, encouraging smile on his face. Cade, though, who stood behind him, was staring at her with an intensity she recognised, his stance rigid.

She wasn’t pregnant. That would be nuts. He’d worn a condom that night. And they’d only done it the once.

‘Charlotte, how long?’ Cade prompted, his voice controlled, but with an edge which suggested he was holding on to his composure by his fingertips.

‘Um...well, it’s been a little over seven weeks... But really that’s not unusual. I have a very irregular cycle,’ she rushed to clarify, her cheeks burning now, because talking about her menstrual cycle with this man felt more intimate than having him inside her.

Which was almost as ludicrous as the notion she might be carrying his child.

This isn’t happening. It can’t be. It’s too absurd.

But even as she tried desperately to convince herself the doctor had to be mistaken, all the ways in which her body had changed—the things she had dismissed as the emotional and physical stress of kick-starting her business and the fallout from her night with Cade in San Francisco—suddenly coalesced in her head into a burning pile of incontrovertible proof.

Her sore, heavy, oversensitive breasts. The queasiness which had begun over a week ago. The fact she’d had her last period three weeks before she’d slept with Cade that first night. Yes, her cycle was erratic, but notthaterratic.

She pressed her hand to her stomach.

‘And did you have sexual relations during that time?’ the doctor asked gently, oblivious to Charley’s shock and that strange feeling of horrified awe which was now pressing down on her chest.

Charley’s gaze met Cade’s. ‘Um...yes, once,’ she murmured. ‘About four and a half weeks ago. But we used protection.’

‘What kind of protection?’ the doctor asked.

‘A condom.’ Cade’s deep voice cut through the feeling of unreality. ‘Which I was too distracted to check afterwards.’

The doctor nodded—still so calm, as if Charley’s life wasn’t going into free fall.

‘Condoms are usually very reliable, Mr Landry.’ He turned to address Cade. ‘But I would still advise a pregnancy test. Thesymptoms Ms Courtney has described to me are very common in the first trimester.’

‘How do we do that?’ Cade asked, taking charge, because Charley had totally lost the power of speech now—her emotions pitching on a stormy sea of questions without answers.

Could I have made a baby? With Cade Landry? What if I have a life? Growing inside me? How do I even feel about that?

‘You can get an over-the-counter test—they’re very accurate—or I could arrange a blood test this morning at my office on West Twenty-Fifth Street...’

‘We’ll take the blood test,’ Cade said with his usual pragmatism.

Charley should have been annoyed—this was her body he was talking about—but she couldn’t seem to feel much of anything at the moment.

As the next hour passed, she sank deeper into the fog.

Cade accompanied her to the private medical facility in Chelsea. She had to sign a ton of forms, the nurse drew a vial of blood, and five minutes later they were led into Dr Ramirez’s office. The clean white space looked out over the Hudson River, the scent of expensive leather and potpourri doing nothing to cover the scent of the man beside her.

She could have objected to Cade being there, but it seemed pointless.

The realisation they would always share this moment made her pulse race when Dr Ramirez appeared. And cut straight to the chase.

‘Your blood test is conclusive, Ms Courtney. Given the date of your last menstruation, that would make you just over seven weeks pregnant.’

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