Total pages in book: 68
Estimated words: 63970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 320(@200wpm)___ 256(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 63970 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 320(@200wpm)___ 256(@250wpm)___ 213(@300wpm)
How would she ever go back to Sanctum now that everyone would know? Maybe he’d only told Kori and Kai.
Well, and the dungeon monitor. Maybe he hadn’t said anything. The McKay-Taggart crew could be tight-lipped when they wanted to, even though their leader was the worst gossip of them all. He might view it as distasteful emotion and never mention it again.
This could still work. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you, but I want this to be private.”
“You’re having major surgery and it’s private? I call complete bullshit. I had an ingrown toenail and you insisted on going to the salon with me to make sure they properly took care of it.”
She shrugged. “Infections are real things.”
“So is fucking cancer.”
Well, she wasn’t sure what to say to that. “I didn’t want you to worry. It might not be a problem at all. This is a proactive surgery. I’m having it done so I don’t have problems in the future.”
Kori stared and shook her head. “No. You don’t get to play that way. You don’t get to tell me you didn’t want me to worry. It’s my fucking job to worry. I don’t even understand this. Are we not the friends I thought we were? I sat up all night talking to Kai. I don’t understand.”
This was something else she’d wanted to avoid. Kai would shrink her to death over this. He would want to talk about feelings, and she wasn’t ready for that. She didn’t want to have any feelings about this. It was what it was, and there wasn’t anything she could do about it. She was numb and had been since that moment she’d realized her ideas about having a family were over before they’d even begun. She was barely thirty and she was going to go into menopause.
Damn Jared for making her think about this. She’d been detached and it had been a comfortable place to be. As comfortable as she was going to be. Now she had to think about it and talk about it. She’d had a damn plan and Jared had screwed her over.
Kori let the dogs off their leashes and Gideon and Lahki started their routine sniff of all the things. It was a ritual she usually found amusing, but now she couldn’t focus on anything but the fact that everyone was going to know.
They would know she wasn’t whole. God, even thinking the words made her angry with herself. She knew this didn’t make her less of a woman. She was a nurse who’d had this talk with so many people. Losing a piece of yourself didn’t make you less, but now it was happening to her and she couldn’t quite make herself believe it.
It was precisely why she wanted time without the pity she knew she’d get from the people around her.
Kori sighed and stared at her. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to deal with this.”
“Didn’t Kai tell you?” Sarah moved to the coffee maker. They would need some if they were going to hash this out, if she was going to make it through without breaking down completely.
“He has no idea how to handle this. He loves you. Sometimes he’s just a man, you know. Sometimes he’s blindsided, too. I know I should be all about taking care of you right now, but you don’t seem to want that so I’m left with the aching idea that we’re not the friends I believed we were. I thought we were sisters.”
“I don’t want to break down, okay?” Had she been wrong to leave Kori out of it? Kori had an actual sister and a mom. Her sister was a piling heap of garbage human, but her mom was awesome. More than once, she’d thought about calling Kori’s mom to ask her advice, but then she’d realized there wasn’t any advice to be given. She was taking the only path she could.
Or she could maybe hope for the best. She could be brave and try to have what she wanted. She hadn’t even thought about it until that moment Jared had knelt in front of her and said words she never thought she’d want to hear.
I dream about seeing you pregnant. I think about how I’ll take care of you, how I’ll rub your feet and hold you while we wait for our baby.
What if she waited? What if she gave them a chance?
She shook her head. Any child she had would likely be in the same place she was in. She’d struck out in the genetic department and she wasn’t going to pass it on. She knew other women might make different choices, and she respected the hell out of them for it, but she’d made hers.
She’d made it and she’d been okay with it, and then Jared had to walk back into her life and now Kori was here and it didn’t seem as cut and dried as it had before.