Page 33 of Burning Love (Looking For Love #7)
ALL POSITIVE
“ W hen are you going to tell me you’re pregnant?”
Talia turned her head quickly from where she was looking for ice cream in the freezer. She’d run out of it in her apartment and knew her mother always kept it in the house.
“What?”
“Talia,” her mother said. “I’ve been home for two weeks.
In that time you’ve raided my kitchen all but two days looking for different things.
You’ve been quiet at odd times, which isn’t like you.
You’re up earlier than normal in the morning and it makes me think that you’re not feeling well and trying to hide it, then making an appearance once you’re better.
” She continued to stare at her mother. “I felt the same way twice in my pregnancy. Remember, I’ve been pregnant eight times. ”
She sighed. “Who were the two you felt like that for?”
“You and Laken. I was fine with all the boys. You girls just messed with my hormones. So are you, or aren’t you?”
The way her mother was all but bouncing on her toes with a massive grin on her face told her there wouldn’t be any disappointment with the truth.
She’d been soooooo scared of that.
It was the happiness her mother was expressing that let the truth come out.
“I am,” she said, her eyes filling with tears. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry,” her mother said, hugging her. “Oh my God. I can’t believe my baby is having a baby. How far along are you?”
“You’re not disappointed in me?”
“Honey. I got pregnant after a few weeks of knowing your father too. Shit happens in life. But I knew I loved him, and had things not gone the way they had, we’d still be happily married.”
“You might have had more kids after me too,” she said drily.
“No. I was done after you. You know that. I was the sickest with you and it was hard to do alone. Come sit down and tell me everything.”
“There isn’t much to say. I found out when you were gone. I’m about nine weeks now. I’m due May eighth.”
“Which is an estimate. How do you feel about it? I know you’re not feeling well, right?”
“It’s getting better already. It’s not even every day now. But I wake up queasy. I’ve been eating a few crackers before I get out of bed and drinking half a bottle of water. That seems to do the trick.”
“I’m glad you found what is working for you. With Laken, I was only sick for the first trimester. With you it lasted to the end of the second. Only mornings though, thankfully.”
“I’m craving things. Odd things. My boobs hurt like hell, but other than that, nothing else.”
“Good. I know you’ll take care of yourself too. Tell me how you feel about the pregnancy? How Jace feels? He knows, right?”
“He knows.” She explained how she figured it out, that the first test was negative, but then took two more and had to break the news to him.
“He’s scared because he said babies are scary.
He wasn’t happy I waited a few days to tell him either.
I had to work it out in my mind. I thought he’d be so mad, but then realized how good he was that first test. But I also saw the relief in his eyes when it was negative.
So yeah, lots of things going through my mind. ”
“Babies are definitely scary,” her mother said, patting her hand and going to sit at the island. “And then the worry something could go wrong, but you pray it doesn’t.”
“Don’t remind me.” Reading everything she could on pregnancies wasn’t smart.
“Think positively.”
“I am. Being shocked is an understatement. We are getting there now. Once we heard the heartbeat it all became real. I’m really excited and happy.
Jace is too.” She believed he was because the nervousness wasn’t in his eyes as much as the confusion over why she didn’t want to talk about their plans in detail yet.
“I’m glad to hear that. What about your future with him?”
“I’m not ready to think about it.”
“You’re not?” her mother asked, lifting an eyebrow. “Why?”
She sighed. “Now you’re sounding like him because I keep putting off the conversation. Because this isn’t forty years ago. People have kids without being married all the time. Or even living together. There is no reason to talk about it day in and day out.”
“Has he talked to you about either of those things?”
“No. He wants to and I’m putting it off. I’m not ready to hear him say something I don’t want to hear.”
“Like what?” her mother asked, frowning.
“I don’t know. If he says it and it’s not what I want, then it will hurt too much. It’s best to just let things play out.”
Her mother shook her head. “That makes no sense at all. Do you love Jace?”
“I do,” she whispered and knuckled a runaway tear off her cheek.
“Have you told him?”
“No. I don’t know how he feels. He’s thirty-seven years old and has never been with a woman longer than three months. We are just over two. He’s never taken a relationship seriously and I know it has to do with his mother. He can’t forgive her for what she did to him.”
“I understand where that might be hard,” her mother said. “But she had her reasons, right or wrong.”
“They were wrong. But what she did makes it hard for him to open up. I know it.”
“He’s shown no signs of opening up at all?”
“I met his family two weeks ago. A few days after our doctor’s appointment. He went with me to the appointment. He wants to go to them all.”
“That is all positive,” her mother said. “He wants to be part of it. Not just concerned when the baby comes but of your healthcare.”
“He’s nuts about that. He’s always asking if I’m drinking enough. He texts me daily to see how I’m doing. He calls at night to talk if I don’t see him.”
Jace wanted to see her daily, but it didn’t always work out.
He was at the firehouse or he was working late with his father too.
She had a job.
They didn’t need to be in each other’s space all the time. She didn’t want them to get on each other’s nerves or sick of the other one yet.
And she didn’t want him to want to be with her more only because of the baby.
“That’s great,” her mother said. “What are you doing to show you love him?”
“We are spending more than double the time together. I’m the same way I’ve been. We talk about me, but not the baby. I mean, we talk about if it’s a boy or girl. Those things.”
“But not the important stuff.”
“It’s early.”
“Don’t be stubborn, Talia.”
“I get it from you.”
“Sad but true. How long are you waiting until you tell everyone about the baby?”
She shrugged. “I didn’t even want you to know yet. No one knows but the three of us now. We wanted to wait until the end of the first trimester.”
“Will you tell Jace that I know?”
“No,” she said.
“Why don’t you have him come to dinner tonight.”
“He’s working and if he came to dinner, now that you know, you’ll let it slip. You just can’t help yourself.”
Her mother laughed. “I can’t. But I’m still excited. You’ll figure it out, Talia. I know you will. But don’t wait too long either. You have a bad habit of that. When you don’t want to decide something, you put it off until it comes to you. You’re on the clock now.”
She sighed and hated that her mother said what she’d been feeling.