Page 111 of Empowered
Sarah turned her weary eyes away from her phone and stared at the small pile of snacks Lucas had procured from some vending machine somewhere. His jacket had gone missing between Alice Monroe’s water breaking in the backseat of her car and being admitted to the hospital. Not a terrible thing when everyone’s nerves were running wild and Lucas had to make a terrifying phone call to his best friend.“Hey, uh, Damon? You might wanna cut your meeting short and head back home, ‘cause your wife is in labor. For real. You know it’s an hour drive, right?”Now, however, the air conditioning was on full blast and they had been sitting around for over four hours. The only sign of life from the Monroe camp was when Damon arrived and nearly mowed his friend over with questions.
Sarah was free to go home, but if Lucas was sticking around for the sake of his friend, she figured she might as well keep him company. Besides, somebody had to keep the Monroes’ PR person updated with developments, and she might as well be the one to do it.
“Give me the peanuts.”
He sat next to her with a heavy sigh, slamming the small bag of peanuts into her hand. “One salty bag of protein coming right up.”
“Heard anything yet?”
Lucas had gone for a walk to both stretch his legs and to see if he could find out what was going on. Since Damon arrived two and a half hours ago, things had been quiet. That was either a good or a bad thing. So, not helpful one bit.
“Tried getting some info out of a nurse I came across, but nothing.”
“I’m sure everything is fine.”
“Man.” Lucas leaned back in his seat, hands folded on his stomach and head resting on the back of his chair. His scruff was extra dark tonight. If Sarah hadn’t watched him shave that morning, she would think he was slacking in the personal grooming department. “I do not envy him at all. Watching your first kid be born is the most nerve-wracking thing. Worse than getting married, honestly.”
Sarah popped open her peanuts. Damn, she hadn’t known how badly she needed salt. “I could’ve had a baby by now. Weird thing to think about.”
“How are you handling this?”
She chewed on a single peanut. “What do you mean?”
“You’ve said that sometimes this whole pregnancy thing makes you have bad thoughts.”
“I’m doing better now.” Sarah shrugged. “It’s not my pregnancy, not my birth, not my baby. I wish her luck, but that’s about it.”
He chuckled. “You wouldn’t say that if you were still working for them next week.”
“You’re right. The fact that their baby woes are now Alisha’s problem crossed my mind.”
“Ruthless.”
“The fewer diapers I have to change, the better.”
Lucas pretended to read the back of his water bottle. Sarah wasn’t buying it. The man was deep in thought, and she would hear all about it.
“What if we have a kid someday, hm?”
You’ve got to be kidding me.They already had this talk. Twice. Both times after sex, when hormones made them high enough to think it was a good idea to talk about. “I can’t get pregnant. You know that.”
“That’s not the only way we could have a baby one day.” Lucas gently nudged her shoulder. “We could adopt. Surrogate. Send Victor back to the cabbage patch from whence he came and find himself a new brother or sister. Or neither. I can’t keep up with what’s going on.”
“Then I guess I would be changing a few diapers. Not that I want to, mind you.”
“Admit it, Angel. You wanna know what a kid of ours would look like. Bonus points if you don’t have to deal with the gruesome end of childbirth.”
“You’re making me think you really want another kid, Luke.”
“I was never opposed to having more than one with Jill. Don’t know why I couldn’t have another one with the love of my life over here.”
Sometimes he said things so sweet that he probably didn’t even know theyweresweet. “Let me guess: you think it should be done before your son is old enough to think it’s terrible.”
“I mean…”
She slowly shook her head. “How about we do something else before seriously considering babies?”
“Like…?”
