“Pfffft.” She dismissed me with a wave of her hand.
I ignored it and looked to the nurse who was waiting patiently for my mother to finish talking. People rarely dared to interrupted her.
“Doctor Marks, here’s your paperwork,” a slight smirked crept along corner of her lip, “also, there was a delivery for you earlier, which has been put in your office.”
“Thank you.” I took what she was holding and then turned away, putting my arm around my mom, kissing her on the cheek. “Come on, come to my office. Tell me how excited you are to be agrand-mèrefor the first time, and how much money you’ve already spent on tiny baby clothes.”
“Ah, they’re just so cute!” she laughed, clapping her hands together. “But I need to wait until we find out what Freddie is having before I go too crazy.”
And crazy she would go, because my mom loved shopping. As kids we were always the best dressed, and while I had inherited my mother’s love for fashion, I never really got the opportunity to wear much more than scrubs. Chanel wasn’t exactly ideal for the inside of an operating room. My concession was spending a fortune on underwear because I could get away with it. And no one saw it.
It suddenly dawned on me how depressing that actually was.
“I hope it’s a girl. I think that would serve Coop right for all the years he was a total manwhore.”
She gave a loud tut. “Molly, don’t say things like that! Your brother just needed the right woman to come along. Young boyshave a lot of testosterone they need to get rid of somehow. Cooper has always been a lover of women.”
My throat constricted in a dry retch. “Oh my God, please don’t ever utter those words to me again.”
“Molly.Ne sois pas bête.And it wouldn’t hurt for you to try harder in the romance department, you know. You work too much.”
I looked at my watch. That took six minutes. Not the quickest my love life had ever been brought up, but definitely not the longest either.
“I’m a surgeon, Mom, this is just what happens.”
“Pfffft. That’s not true. Tell me, how many hours did you work last week?”
“Ninety.”
Her gasp was dramatic enough to win an award. “Ninety! That’s two weeks’ worth of work, Molly. How do you expect to meet anyone?”
“Stop trying to marry me off. You’ve got a grandchild on the way, just enjoy that and leave me alone.”
“I’m not trying to marry you off,ma chérie.I just want you to be happy.”
“I am happy.”
“Non,Molly, people that work ninety hours a week are not happy; they’re avoiding.”
I rolled my eyes and pushed down on the handle of my office door just as an intensely floral fragrance wafted through the air, and any hopes I had to not discuss my love life vanished into it when I saw what was on the other side. Because waiting there was the biggest bunch of pink roses I’d ever seen in my entire life.
I heard another sharp intake come from my mother. At this rate, she was going to hyperventilate soon.
“Ohchérie, elles sont magnifiques!”She walked over to smell them before I could, plucking an envelope from between the stems and handing it to me with an arched brow.
I pulled the card out and turned around to read it, wanting the moment for myself, because I knew I was about to be subjected to CIA levels of interrogation.
How many cells does the brain contain?
And for an extra bonus point, how many of mine are currently thinking about you?
(Answer – all of them)
Even with my back to her, I could feel my mother watching me for any reaction, and I was struggling to hold in the smile as warmth spread through my body and butterflies fluttered around my belly, setting off my heart in a series of rapid beats. The change in our relationship felt so unexpected, everything I’d ever wanted coming true, and it was hard to believe it was real.
But the strangest thing, the thing that was freaking me out the most, was that actually being with him yesterday, kissing him and touching him, running my fingers through his hair while his lips explored mine, didn’t feel strange at all.
Before I had a chance to prepare myself for questioning, the door flew open and in walked Hunter and Jameson, coming to an abrupt stop, their faces filled with synchronized horror.
