Jasmine Guillory - The Proposal

And then like twenty of the fist-in-the-air and fireworks emojis.

Courtney screeched in.

WHAT

OMG

TELL US EVERYTHING

Nik grinned and relaxed into her couch cushions. Who needed Carlos when you had girlfriends?

She texted them the whole story—one-handed—and then, halfway through her gin and tonic, she fell asleep on the couch. She woke up two hours later from a dream about Carlos high-fiving her. When she realized it was just a dream, she started to cry.

Should she text him and tell him what happened? God knows she wanted to. But he was probably still pretty mad at her.

And if he wasn’t? Texting him wasn’t fair to him. He deserved more than she could give him—than she knew how to give him.

Instead, she texted a picture of her raw knuckles to her friends. Their responses made her smile through her tears.

Chapter Twenty-two

. . . . . . .

Carlos sat at his desk and stared at his phone. His meeting had been canceled at the last minute. That unfortunately gave him time to make that phone call he’d been avoiding all week.

All week? He’d avoided making that call for the past five years.

He picked up the phone.

“Yes, hi. I’d like to schedule an appointment with Dr. Guerriero? Just a physical. Yes, Carlos Ibarra.” He swallowed hard, as the person on the other end took his insurance information. “I totally understand if you can’t get me in for a while—oh, you have a cancellation tomorrow? I don’t know if . . .” He took a deep breath. “What time tomorrow?”

He hung up the phone and stared out the window. Tomorrow. Damn it.

No, tomorrow was too soon. He should call back to reschedule. He picked up the phone.

“Dr. Ibarra?” One of the nurses poked her head into his office, and he put the phone down again. “There’s someone at the front desk to see you. She says she’s your cousin?”

He stood up. If Jessie had left the NICU to come over to his office to see him, it was either really good or really bad news.

“I’ll be right there.”

He almost ran down the hall.

“Jessie?” He poked his head into the waiting room. The huge smile on her face answered his question. She ran over to him, and he threw open the door so she could follow him back to his office. But the door was barely shut before she threw her arms around him.

“We get to take her home today! Yesterday they said maybe, but I was too scared to tell anyone. Last night I couldn’t sleep, partly because of the fireworks going on all night, but mostly because I was just praying that I would have my baby at home with me by tonight. And my prayers were answered. Just a few hours for them to do all of the paperwork and to give us all of her instructions. Oh, Carlos! I get to take my baby home!”

He hugged her tight and pulled her down the hall to his office. Once the door was closed, he hugged her again.

“I didn’t think she’d be able to go home this early. You’ve got a fighter on your hands. When they told me you were here to see me, I . . .” He wiped his eyes. “Anyway, this is wonderful. I’m so happy for you and for Eva, who won the mom lottery.” He took a step back and handed her the tissue box on his desk. “Where’s Jon? Do you need help getting Eva home?”

Jessie took a handful of tissues and shook her head.

“He’s upstairs with Eva. I’ve barely stopped crying since the doctors told us she could go home today.”

Carlos gently pushed her down in one of the chairs in front of his desk and sat next to her.

“And you, you’re okay?” He shook his head. “No, you don’t have to tell me. I’m your cousin, not your doctor.”

She leaned over to hug him.

“Just for that, I’ll tell you that my blood pressure is almost normal. And I can even fit into some of my pre-pregnancy shoes now. Not clothes, let’s not be ambitious, but I was getting very nervous I’d never be able to wear those Tory Burch flats again, so that was a tiny relief.”

His office phone rang and he ignored it.

“I don’t know who Tory is, but if that’s a relief to you, it is to me, too. Do you need anything? Food, diapers, a crib, bottles, anything?”

She laughed, even though tears were still trickling down her face.

“Don’t forget, you already brought me those enchiladas. We’ve already defrosted one pan and have been eating them all week. And I think my mom has spent all day every day since Eva was born cooking for her little namesake; my freezer is going to be filled to bursting soon. I don’t even know what else we need. I’m mad at myself for not letting my friends push the date of my shower up. I thought it was tempting fate, if you can believe that. Thank God someone already bought us the bassinet so she has somewhere to sleep.”

He made a mental note to buy whatever was the most expensive thing on the registry. Okay, okay, maybe Angela was right; he could pull back a little. The second most expensive thing.

She stood up.

“I should go. I probably have to sign a bunch of stuff, and I can’t wait to get our little girl out of this hospital, even though I’m sort of terrified to pull her away from the people taking care of her.”

Carlos put his hand on her shoulder.

“You and Jon, you are the people taking care of her. And you’ll do a wonderful job, I promise.”

She punched his arm.

“Damn you, Carlos. I just stopped crying, and now you’ve got to get me started again?”

She leaned in for a hug, and he kissed her on the forehead.

“I’m so happy for you, Jessie. And I can’t wait to spoil little Eva rotten.”

She opened his office door.

“I can’t wait for that, either. Oh, and you thanked your friend Nik for me for the cupcakes, right? Tell her I said that was so thoughtful. I want to send her a thank-you card, but this week has just been . . .”

He had not thanked Nik on Jessie’s behalf, no.

“Don’t worry about it. You’ve been kind of preoccupied this week; she understands.” He was sure Nik did understand, so that wasn’t exactly a lie. “Go back upstairs to your baby. Call me if you have any questions at all, okay?”

Right, right, she was his cousin, not his patient. This shit was hard.

“Actually, you should probably call the NICU and not me, they know this stuff better than I do. But let me know if you need anything at all, okay?”

She nodded.

“I will. Have I ever told you how glad I am that you’re my cousin?”

He grinned.

“I’m not sure, refresh my memory about why? You had at least ten or fifteen reasons, correct? Can you list them for me?”

She walked into the hallway.

“Never, you’re cocky enough as it is.”

She disappeared toward the elevators with another wave over her shoulder, and he went laughing back to his desk.

Maybe he should text Nik to thank her for the cupcakes. He couldn’t keep pretending to Jessie that he’d done that without actually doing it, right?

And wouldn’t Nik want to know that Eva was okay and was getting to go home from the hospital? She’d been there the night Eva was born; she’d cried along with everyone else. Shouldn’t he let her know?

He laughed at himself. That was a pretext, and he knew it. He didn’t need to thank Nik; he needed to apologize to Nik. He hated what he’d said to her that awful morning, he hated the memory of the hurt look on her face when he’d walked out of his house, and he hated that she’d remember him like that. Even if she didn’t love him back, he didn’t want her to hate him.

An email was probably the way to do this, not a text. A text felt too immediate. Like he’d be expecting a response.