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“Amazing,” Mom corrected. “We heard the heartbeat.”
Greer’s face lit up. “Aw, you did? Can they tell if it’s a boy or a girl yet?”
“Definitely a boy,” my brother Ian said, appearing from behind me to snatch a giant chocolate chip cookie.
I swatted his big, dumb hand away when he tried to grab a second one. “Next appointment, if I want to.”
“What’s at the next appointment?” Cameron asked, dropping a kiss on the top of my head and snagging a cookie from the box. When he finished half the giant cookie in one bite, I rolled my eyes.
“Ultrasound,” I told him. “Oh my gosh, did you even chew that? Don’t you have any manners?”
“I’m starving. I haven’t eaten since breakfast.”
One of the loud machines from upstairs turned off, so I no longer had to raise my voice to speak over it. “They’ll be able to tell the gender at the next appointment as long as nugget is cooperating.” I ran my hand over my stomach, wishing desperately I could feel them move. “But honestly, I’m not sure I want to find out.”
Greer let out a disappointed groan. “You’re not going to find out? How am I supposed to plan the most epic nursery of all time?”
I fluttered my eyelashes. “Any good interior designer can work with gender neutral, right?”
She gave me a withering stare in return.
A few guys walked past, taking cookies and saying thank you. Only one of them glanced down at my bump with slightly widened eyes.
Sigh.
Here we go.
One of the younger ones gave me a grateful, slightly flirty smile, which had Greer clearing her throat pointedly.
Cameron smothered a laugh with another bite of his cookie. “Can someone go tell Wade and Jax we’ve got cookies?”
My chest turned into a giant block of ice, something almost impossible to breathe through. “Jax?” I whispered.
Cameron gave me a guarded look. “Yeah, he, uh, got back last night. Showed up this morning without any warning, of course.”
Oh good. This wasgreat.
My vision went a little spotty, and I vaguely registered just how fucking horrible it would be if I passed out right there at my brother’s feet.
Some heavy boots came down the stairs from the loftspace, and I rubbed at my belly, an undoubtedly nervous gesture. Maybe I could run. Sprint the hell out of the house and figure out a better time to have this little reveal.
Yes. Running was great. Sure, I hadn’t run voluntarily in about five years when an angry swarm of bees was chasing me, but I could easily break that streak with the icy-cold panic coursing through my veins.
I needed out.Now.
My hands fumbled with the box as I tried to push them off at Cameron, but he wasn’t paying attention, and just as a big, broad body came into view in my peripheral vision, the box fell to the floor.
“Hey, watch the cookies,” Cameron said, leaning down to snag them.
My heart was in my fucking throat, thrashing at a rate that could not be good for my blood pressure. Jax hadn’t seen me yet since he was deep in conversation with his coworker Wade.
It wasn’t too late, right? If I hid behind my sister and then bolted through the back, maybe he wouldn’t see me.
Maybe there was a way for me to communicate wordlessly. Just project very strongly with nothing but the power of my gaze for him tokeep his cool, and I’d talk to him later when half my family was not in the room with us.
In my head, panicked laughter crowded my brain.
He washere.
