Page 28 of A Forbidden Spring
“You give me whiplash sometimes.”
“It’s what you do to me, Wren. Now get home before I change my mind and decide making you come all night is more important than whatever your brother needs.”
“Fine.”
“Drive safe, Hellcat.”
* * *
“Hey,”I say softly as I push open my apartment door and find Beau pacing the length of the kitchen.
Turning, he lets his arms drop to his sides, his hair mussed like he’s been running his hands through it since he got here.
“I picked up pizza.” He points toward the counter where the cardboard box is sitting next to plates, napkins, and cups.
Oh boy.
“Do you want to talk now or after we eat?”
“Indie’s pregnant,” he blurts out, my coat not quite making it to the hook before I spin and face him.
“From the wedding?” He nods. “And it’s yours?” I ask, my voice going up an octave as he nods again, this time narrowing his eyes. Clearing my throat as my heart beats like a drumline in my chest, I ask, “And how are you feeling about it?”
A myriad of emotions crosses his face, and my stoic and fiercely protective brother, usually so buttoned up, meets my gaze with tears in his eyes.
He’s a big, beautiful mess, and I don’t wait for him to say anything before running at him at full speed and eliciting anooffrom him on contact.
“You’re going to be a dad!” I squeal as he holds me tight.
“No one knows.”
A secret for a secret.
“Of course,” I whisper, emotion clogging my throat as I try to wrap my head around it. “Come on, let’s sit and you can tell me all about it.”
It takes another minute for him to release me, my brother’s eyes wet with tears that he hastily wipes away with the sleeve of his shirt.
“I went to see her this weekend. God, Wren, she was so sick and then she’s apologizing for throwing up like she has any control over that. So I left and went to the store and bought everything I thought might make her feel better, looked up some of those natural remedies to see if they would help and?—”
“You are absolutely precious,” I tell him around a bite of pizza. He doesn’t even scowl, and I want to burst with happiness becausemy brother is going to be a dad,but he needs me to keep it together.
At least for now.
“I stayed an extra day to go to the appointment with her, the one where they pour the stuff on your belly and it’s a baby but it doesn’t really look like one, you know? And then,”—he swallows hard—“I heard the heartbeat.”
“That must have been so amazing.”
“My knees damn near buckled, and I was crying and Indie was crying, and nothing’s ever felt more right, you know?”
I don’t know, but I can tell by the look on Beau’s face that he absolutely does.
And I couldn’t be happier for my big brother.
“Are you going to move out to be closer to her? She’s from Tennessee, right? She’s not going back, is she?”
“Yeah, she’s from Blackstone Falls but she has lived in Montana since college. And no,” he says, clearing his throat, “she’s going to move to Wintervale.”
“Really?”
