The question was on the tip of my tongue, but I had no clue how to ask it.
“How long are you here for?” I tested instead.
Sensing my shift, her guarded brown eyes flicked to mine.
“I mean,” I coughed to clear my throat, “when do you have to get back to the cruise ship?”
Her nose flared with a breath, but she remained silent. She wasn’t answering because I had a feeling she wasn’t leaving, but I needed to hear her say it. I needed to hear her say that she was…
“Ali…are you…” I couldn’t even finish the sentence. But the more I thought about it, the more I was sure of it. The barfing. Her boobs. The fact that her stomach was slightly popping out. “How many months?” I asked, keeping my voice low.
Her slender throat bobbed with a swallow.
“How many months along are you, Ali?”
Her shoulders hiked up. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she stammered.
“Alinna,” I said gently.
She closed her eyes, looking equal parts exasperated and exhausted. “Jameson.”
The silence in the bathroom was deafening. “How many?”
She licked her lips. “I don’t know. Maybe three?”
My knees buckled. We were halfway through October, so that meant…October, September, August…the middle of July. The room spun around me. I held the side of the stall to keep myself standing.
“Can you get me some more water?” she asked, coughing to clear her throat.
“Yeah, yeah,” I choked out, moving to the door like I was walking through a haze.
She’s pregnant.
Ali’s pregnant.
Ali’s pregnant with our baby.
Making a beeline to the waters, I ran right into Colt. “Jeez, JP, what the f—” He stopped when he saw my face. “You good? You’re all white.”
I shook my head. “Water.”
He immediately handed me a bottle. Without thinking, I turned on my heel.
“Dude, you okay?” Colt jogged to catch up with me as I rushed back to the women’s room.
Before I could enter, Colt yanked my right shoulder, making searing pain shoot through my shoulder. “Sorry, sorry!” He immediately released me. “But that’s the ladies’ room.”
“I know,” I said through gritted teeth.
His eyebrows slammed down as he pointed to the door. “You can’t just go in there. It’s an invasion of privacy.”
My jaw clenched. “Ali’s in there.”
Lucy skipped up between us. “Whatcha guys doing?” she asked sweetly. “Do you like my hair? Auntie P did it for me,” she said, showing off her slicked back up-do.
“Very pretty,” Colt said with a dopey smile.
I tried to enter the bathroom, but Colt pulled me back again.
