“You expected the shrewd businessman who built his empire from the ground up,” Miles guessed.
“Well, yes.” The elevator doors opened on the ground floor and they started toward the parking lot.
“If you’d met him a few years ago, that’s who you would have found,” Miles said. “But he’s changed. I’m not sure what to make of it, but he’s not the same man he was a few years ago. This cheerful, smiling, laughing person… this is new.”
He glanced at Chelsea. “He liked you, though,” he said, and there was real warmth in his voice. “I can tell. He thought you were great, Chelsea. I think this is really going to work.” Chelsea hoped he was right.
CHAPTER 9
MILES
“Well, I have good news,” Dr. Montgomery said. “You’re pregnant!”
Chelsea gasped. Miles didn’t react, but he felt the same sense of shock. Though this was exactly the outcome they’d been trying to achieve — it shouldn’t have come as a surprise — he hadn’t expected things to be so easy. They had only been through one round of IUI. Miles had been mentally bracing himself for a much longer process, one during which he would have to fudge the timeline to his father and hope he hadn’t paid too much attention to the date when Miles had told him he was expecting a baby.
But now it would be easy. He could give his father the real timeline. The baby would be a few weeks later than his father might expect if he had been paying very close attention, but that wouldn’t be too difficult to obfuscate. Miles guessed that once he gave his father a due date, his father probably wouldn’t ask any more questions.
Chelsea’s thoughts didn’t seem to be coming as quickly. “Am I really pregnant?” she asked the doctor. “Already? We only didone round of treatment. Everyone was telling us we needed to be prepared for this to take a long time.”
“That is what we say to people,” Dr. Montgomery agreed. “And it’s good advice, because this processcantake months, even years. But sometimes we get lucky.” She smiled. “You should look at it as a good sign, I think. You’re both healthy and have good fertility, according to our tests. There’s a compatibility between the two of you — almost as if you were meant to have a child together. It’s a very good thing. Congratulations! Do you have any questions for me right now?”
“I…” Chelsea shook her head. “I wasn’t expecting this news today. I’m not prepared.”
“That’s okay,” Dr. Montgomery said. “It’s not unusual for people to need a moment to process news as big as this. Why don’t I give you a few minutes?”
“That would be great,” Miles spoke up at last. A moment was exactly what Chelsea needed. That much was easy to see.
Dr. Montgomery got to her feet, still smiling at the two of them. “I’ll give you some time together, and then I’ll come back and we can discuss plans for the future and any questions.” The doctor smiled and left them alone in the room.
Chelsea slumped back in her chair and let out a long sigh. The sound of it sent a spike of anxiety through Miles. “Is everything all right? This is good news, isn’t it?”
She looked up at him. “I think so. But you haven’t said much. You’re happy about it, right?”
“Of course! This is what we were hoping for.” Miles hadn’t sat down when they had first come into the office — he hadn’texpected they’d be here for very long — but now he walked around and took the seat next to Chelsea. “Now we can talk to my dad about the baby without feeling like we’re being dishonest.”
“I didn’t know you were feeling that way,” she admitted.
“Of course. Wearebeing dishonest. Or wewere.”
“Are,” she corrected. “We’re still pretending to be in a relationship with each other, and that isn’t true.”
“Yeah, but that’s not the part that really matters to Dad,” Miles said. “In fact, we can probably tell him we’ve split up in a couple of months. He’ll be ready to cope with that news by then. I don’t want to tell him while he’s sick, but once he’s a bit stronger, we can just say the relationship is over but that we’re going to raise the baby together anyway.”
“Which means I could move back into my own place,” Chelsea said.
“Sure, you could, but not yet. Since he’s out of the hospital now, he might want to come visit — and for now, at least, I do want him to think we’re still involved.” He shook his head. “I don’t know why we’re talking about this right now. We just got amazing news, Chelsea. We’re going to have a baby!”
“I know why that’s amazing forme,” Chelsea said. “I mean, this is all I’ve wanted for the longest time. To be a mother.” She rested a hand on her stomach reverently. Watching her, Miles thought she actually looked like a pregnant woman, even though her body wasn’t showing any signs yet. It was something about the way she held herself, as if she contained something impossibly precious.
She really is going to make a great mother. I made the right choice here—not just because she wants a baby and needs my help to have one, but because I want the best possible mother for my child, and I really think Chelsea is that person.
To his utter surprise, he felt his throat swell with emotion.
I’m going to be a father. This is really happening.
He turned his face away and brought himself quickly back under control. What was he doing getting worked up like that? This was a business arrangement. It wasn’t supposed to move him to emotion.
But it wasn’tjustbusiness. Of course it wasn’t. He was doing this because he wanted to make his father happy, and to provide for the future of the company, but he wasn’t a robot. Of course he would feel something about his own child. It’d be strange if he didn’t have these feelings, at least in passing. This was going to be a massive change to his life.
