Page 156 of Price of Angels

“Have you told Michael yet?” she asked.

No beating around the bush, then. Holly put her back to the wall and let it hold her weight, shaking her head. “I’m afraid,” she admitted. “I love him more than life itself, but he’s not like Mercy. He’s never said anything about wanting a family.”

Ava shrugged. “So? I have no idea if Mercy ever wanted a family; he wanted to have a baby with me, and that’s not the same thing.”

Holly blinked, surprised.

Ava’s grin stretched. “I don’t think it matters at all whether he wants kids or not. He loves you, he married you; he won’t turn away from the baby you have together.”

Holly breathed a humorless laugh. “Well, I’m gladyou’reconfident about it.”

“I think you should tell him,” Ava persisted, tone softening. There was true understanding in her eyes. “Mercy knocked me up when I was seventeen,” she said in a tone of admission, and Holly stiffened in shock. “I had a hard time telling him, for the same reason you don’t want to tell Michael, and then…” Her breath caught. “Then something happened, and I…I lost it.” She shook her head, blinking against a sudden sheen of tears.

Squaring her shoulders, she said, “You didn’t make a baby by yourself. I think…I think if a man gives you one out of love, he won’t look at it as a mistake. Whether he wants to be a father or not.”

Holly nodded, throat tightening.

Ava reached out a hand for her, a silent gesture of friendship.

Holly took it.

Michael was on the back deck when she got home. She let herself out the rear French doors and found him barefoot, in an old Lean Dogs silkscreened t-shirt and busted-up jeans, drinking a beer and turning burgers on the grill. The greasy, charcoal-stroked smell of the meat almost sent her back inside, her stomach turning over. But she swallowed down the gag reflex and let the doors close silently behind her, stealing a moment to soak in the sight of him and smile to herself.

From the moment she’d met him, he’d possessed a tension that had been so constant, it was merely a part of him. Like the hazel of his eyes, or the brown of his hair, his shoulders and spine were tense. But watching him now, as he grilled their dinner, she saw none of that tension. He looked loose-limbed, at ease. Happy. He was happy these days, and it pained her to think she might be about to shatter that.

He turned, glancing at her over his shoulder. His face would always be a granite mask, but that was fine, because she could read the fine twitches of it, and the deep emotions the smooth surface belied.

“You’re back,” he said. “You wanna make a salad or something? There’s potatoes in there, I think, if you wanted to make those fries you did last time.” He tried hard not to look hopeful, but Holly noted the little gleam in his eyes.

A couple weeks ago, she’d sliced baking potatoes into thick steak fry wedges, soaked them, fried them and seasoned them with pepper and chili powder and garlic; save the handful she’d put on her own plate, he’d eaten all of them. They’d been a hit.

She nodded. “That’s fine.”

He turned back to the grill.

Now, she thought, breath catching in her throat. She had to tell him now. Waiting until after dinner felt too much like lying.

She swallowed. “Michael.”

Something in her voice brought him around fast. He closed the grill on the burgers, set down the spatula and his beer on the deck rail, and fixed her with a searching look. A what’s-wrong look. A ready-to-leap-to-her-defense look.

She swallowed again, throat burning. “Remember how I didn’t feel so great last night?”

He nodded, taking a step toward her. “You still sick? You need to go to the doc?” Another step, like he was already prepared to bundle her into the car.

She shook her head, staving him off with a hand against his chest. She felt his heartbeat thrumming against her palm, elevated, worried. “I’m not sick,” she said, wincing. “But there’s something wrong.”

He caught her upper arm in one hand, squeezing in question. His face had clamped down into a tight, terrified expression. “What?”

“I…” All the breath rushed out of her lungs, her confession riding it. “I’m pregnant.”

She stared at the faded lettering on his shirt a long moment, feeling the rapid rise and fall of his chest. The thunder of his heart. Finally, she lifted her eyes, prepared for any number of awful snarls, or dark frowns.

Instead, his face was perfectly blank. Wide eyes and a relaxed jaw and smooth brow, he stared at her like he didn’t know who she was, or what she’d just said.

“Michael–”

“You are?”

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