Page 3 of Captivating Mr. Second Chance

When she shoved the front door open, pointing to the half bath right off the entryway, Bobby popped his head up from the couch.

“Hey, babe.”

“Hey,” she said in a rush, throwing down her coat to toss Gem the test.

“How was dinner?”

“Great.”

“Everything ok—”

Laney shut the bathroom door on Bobby’s question and took the small cardboard box from Gem’s fingers when she struggled to open it.

Gem bent over the sink. “I feel pukey.”

“Because you’re nervous, or because you puke a lot when you’re pregnant?”

Gem leaned her elbows on the marbled counter, her head in her hands. “Probably both.”

“Here.” Laney held out one of the sticks, and Gem took it before unbuttoning her jeans.

Outside, Bobby knocked on the door. “Oi, everything okay in there?”

Laney opened the door a smidge, enough to meet her boyfriend’s hazel eyes. “We’ll be out in a few minutes.”

He lowered his voice to a whisper. “Okay, love. Just checking.” Then he winked and walked back to the living room, and Laney pivoted back around as Gem peed on the stick. She held the wrapper up for the garbage, and Laney took it, lifting the lid of the small trash bin in the corner.

“What the…” She tilted her head and leaned closer to the garbage.

“What?” Gem asked behind her.

Blinking, Laney lifted the used condom wrapper, her mind skidding to a stop. “I don’t…”

Gem flushed the toilet. “What’s that?”

But Laney couldn’t answer. At the moment, finding words was like trying to solve a geometry proof.

In her periphery, she was aware Gem washed her hands and set a timer on her cell phone, but the reality of finding a Trojan wrapper in the bathroom garbage clouded her ability to even put a whole thought together. There were only broken fragments in her mind.

Bobby didn’t use condoms.

Laney was on the pill.

Her best friend was about to find out if she was pregnant.

Someonein this condo didn’t want to getsomeone elsepregnant.

That someone wasn’t Laney.

And the someone else certainly wasn’t Laney.

“Is that—” Gem started, but Laney cut her off as she opened the bathroom door, holding the wrapper out with a straight arm, pinching it between the tip of her thumb and index finger.

“Bobby.”

“Yeah?” Her boyfriend lifted his head from the garish gold pillows he’d insisted on buying when they moved in here last year. When she flicked the offending foil packet at him, his smile vanished immediately.

“I found it in the garbage.”

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