She was also…pregnant.
With a groan,she dropped onto the closed toilet lid, looking around the pristine bathroom of her Buckhead apartment.
What was she going to do?
Absently, she clutched at the bathrobe that gaped open, glancing down at her tender breasts.
Their unexpected soreness had been her first sign that something wasn’t right. She’d checked the calendar, realized she was late, then looked back on the brief and lopsided “relationship” she’d had this past spring.
Oh, Trevor Whitlock hated protection, and hehadpersuaded her to skip it once. Could it be that easy? She had at least three girlfriends who were “trying” and taking ovulation tests daily. And she…
Yeah, always the overachiever, that was Meredith Lawson.
Just after taking the first test last night—she was sure it had to be wrong—her father had called with the devastating news that Jonah’s girlfriend had been killed.
After a sleepless and truly miserable night, she’d gone out at dawn, bought three more tests and now it could no longer be denied: the life she’d spent almost three decades meticulously building had just crumbled under the weight of this thin pink line.
And the only person who could help her was up to his eyeballs with hisotherdumb kid.
Closing her eyes, she stood and walked into the closet next to the bathroom, in a trance, unable to stop thinking about Dad.
Her dear, kind, deeply religious rock of a father who had raised her, loved her, trained her as an architect, and been both parents to her for fifteen years. Her closest confidante, her mentor, her hero.
What would Eli Lawson say when he found out?
She grunted and nearly folded to the hardwood floor. This would break him.
She took a few more breaths and tried to calm down, staring at the color-coded clothes, arranged by season, then fabric, then sleeve length.
Was this the closet of a person who has a really questionable relationship with a guy who told her from Day One that he wouldn’t be in town for long? Just a few months, Trevor had said. Then it’s off to the next Beans & Buns franchise he was buying, courtesy of what she imagined were rich parents.
She didn’t think Trevor was smart enough to build a business alone. He was certainly good-looking enough to catch her eye, though.
And his temporary situation was perfect, she’d decided on their first date. Meredith didn’t want to get married, but she needed…other stuff. She needed an escape from the pressure ofher architecture boards, a distraction from work, a little pleasure in a life that had nearly none.
All such sorry excuses.
“Dumb,” she muttered as she grabbed a pair of jeans and a T-shirt to run an errand she so did not want to run. But shehadto tell Trevor. And on a Sunday morning, she knew where to find the tall, charming, effortlessly sexy thirty-five-year-old entrepreneur.
And it sure wasn’t church.
She had to tell him. She didn’t want to tell him—she didn’t really want to ever see him again, which was why she’d been strategically avoiding the coffee shop on the lobby level of her office building.
And now, what started as a casual hang after work, then a drink, then making out to the point of dizziness had led to…a painstakingly planned life brought to a screeching halt.
She stuffed her feet into sneakers and glanced at the clock. It was nearly nine, which was the worst possible time to try and talk to a man who owned a coffee shop, but telling him had to be her very first move.
The ten-minute walk through Buckhead to her office building didn’t clear her head as she’d hoped it would.
Normally, the urban stroll made her feel invigorated for the day ahead, and so grateful to live and work in one of Atlanta’s most upscale neighborhoods.
Today, it felt like she was walking through mud and about to fall into molasses, each step heavier than the one before, her thoughts much louder and more distracting than any traffic on Peachtree.
She often came in on a Sunday—what self-respecting workaholic wouldn’t?—and knew that Beans & Buns was open and busy, with the franchise owner frequently working the front of the shop himself.
But today, as she rounded the atrium level to get to the street entrance, she didn’t see his casual smile or tousled chestnut hair at the coffee bar. Inside, she took a whiff of espresso and fresh cinnamon rolls, the very smell of the stuff making her stomach roll.
Or maybe that was the conversation she was about to have.
