Helen R. - The Pregnancy Plan / Hope's Child

“Do you want a snack?” he asked.

“Ice cream,” she said hopefully, hopping onto one of the stools at the breakfast bar.

“We don’t have any.”

She pouted. “You promised to get ice cream.”

“I know I did, but I forgot.”

His admission of guilt didn’t appease her and though Cam knew the dangers of being over-indulgent, he figured the first day at a new school warranted an exception to the rules.

“So why don’t you go wash up and we’ll go to Walton’s?”

“Who’s Walton?”

He smiled. “Walton isn’t a who but a where, and it’s where we go to get the very best ice cream in all of Pinehurst, New York.”

“Really?” Her eyes were almost as wide as her smile.

“Really.”

She hopped off of her stool and wrapped her arms around his waist. “Thanks, Daddy. You’re the best.”

Twenty minutes later, he handed a strawberry sundae to Maddie before accepting his double scoop of butter pecan from the teenager behind the counter and turned to look for a vacant table. A quick glance around the room revealed that there weren’t any.

“There’s my teacher, Daddy.”

Maddie’s words registered at the exact moment his gaze landed on Ashley, seated with her sister at a table for four on the other side of the room.

“Her name’s Miss Ashley,” his daughter reminded him.

Cam nodded.

“She’s very pretty,” Maddie said. “And she smiles a lot and she doesn’t yell. Not even when the skinny boy with the curly hair forgot to ask to go to the bathroom and went pee right in his pants.”

His lips curved. “Not even then?”

Maddie shook her head solemnly.

“So maybe first grade won’t be so bad, huh?”

“Maybe,” she allowed. “But it’s really too soon to tell.”

He was smiling at her comment as he guided her toward Ashley and Megan’s table.

“Looks like someone else decided to celebrate the first day of school with ice cream,” Ashley noted, her attention and smile focused on Madeline.

“It seemed appropriate,” Cam said.

“We thought the same thing,” Megan said, when Ashley failed to respond to his comment.

“But there don’t seem to be any vacant tables,” he pointed out. “So we were hoping you wouldn’t object to us joining you.”

“Of course not,” Megan said, though she cast a worried glance across the table.

Ashley still didn’t say anything to him, but she slid across the bench she was sitting on to make room for his daughter. Maddie smiled shyly at her and carefully set her dish on the table before climbing up beside her teacher.

“Thanks,” Cam said, taking the seat beside Megan. “I don’t remember it ever being so busy in here.”

“A lot changes in twelve years,” Ashley told him.

He met her gaze across the table and felt the zing of sparks that weren’t entirely attributable to her obvious annoyance with him.

“And some things,” he countered, “never do.”

Ashley ate her chocolate fudge brownie sundae so fast she was surprised she didn’t get brain freeze. But from the moment she’d looked up and spotted Cam in line at the counter, she’d wanted only to get out of Walton’s as quickly as possible. Thankfully her sister had sensed her discomfort and quickly finished her ice cream as well.

It was only after they’d said goodbye to Cam and Maddie and were on their way out the door that Ashley thought to ask again about the reasons for her sister’s unexpected midweek visit.

Megan dumped her empty dish and spoon in the garbage. “It really wasn’t that important.”

“Important enough to bring you to the school to talk to me.”

Her sister sighed. “Because I wanted to tell you first, but you’ve had a lot sprung on you already today.”

And Ashley knew her sister’s news and why she was suddenly reluctant to share it.

“You’re pregnant,” she guessed.

Meg nodded.

Ashley sucked in a breath.

Her sister was going to have a baby.

She felt a tug deep inside her heart. A combination of excitement and envy. She wanted to be happy for Megan. She was happy for her. And yet she couldn’t help but look at the life her sister was building with her new husband and wonder why all of the stars had aligned so perfectly for Megan and, seemingly at the same time, scattered everything in her own world.

A little more than six months earlier, she and Paige had struggled to convince Megan that she had nothing to lose by inviting Gage Richmond to be her date for Ashley’s engagement party. Megan had finally agreed, only because she’d been sure that Gage wouldn’t accept. But he had and, even on that first date, Ashley had seen the chemistry between them. Even more significantly, she’d recognized that there was a connection between them that she didn’t feel with the man she was planning to marry.

But she didn’t let that dissuade her from her plans, because she believed that there were more important things than connections. There were shared interests and common goals. Or maybe she’d deluded herself into thinking she and Trevor had shared interests and common goals because she so desperately wanted to get married and have a family of her own.

She wasn’t so desperate, however, that she was willing to overlook the fact that he’d been sleeping around on her almost from the time he’d put the ring on her finger. She’d been crushed to learn of his betrayal. And maybe, just a little, secretly relieved.

Because the closer the date had come for their wedding, the more she had started to realize that she was making a mistake. That she didn’t love Trevor as much as she should love the man she intended to marry. That she didn’t love him specifically as much as she loved the prospect of being a wife and mother.

Now Megan and Gage were married and getting ready to have a baby.

The tug came again. Stronger this time, but she pushed it aside. “Oh, Meg. That’s wonderful news.”

Her sister looked uncertain. “Are you really okay with this?”

“I’m thrilled for you,” Ashley told her, willing it to be true. “I was just caught off guard by your announcement. I didn’t even realize you and Gage were trying to have a baby.”

“Well, we weren’t actually trying, we just weren’t trying to prevent it.” She blushed prettily. “In fact, I think Gage is a little disappointed it happened as quickly as it did.”

“Obviously you guys are doing something right,” Ashley said.

Her sister’s blush deepened. “Everything is right with Gage. I never thought I would feel this way about anyone—or that anyone else would feel the same way about me. But he’s just—” her sigh was filled with blissful contentment “—amazing.”

“So are you,” Ashley told her sister. “Which is why you guys are so perfect for one another.”

“That’s what I want for you,” Megan said. “I know Trevor’s betrayal hit you hard, but you can’t give up hope that you’ll find someone to spend your life with just because of CBB.”

“I haven’t given up hope,” Ashley said, though she wasn’t entirely sure it was true. “I’m just not willing to put the rest of my life on hold while I wait around for Mr. Right to show up, because the reality is, there may not be a Mr. Right for me.”

“There is,” Megan insisted, and smiled slyly. “And I think he might already have shown up. Or maybe I should say shown up again.”

Ashley didn’t bother to respond. Cam Turcotte was part of her past, not her future, and she had no intention of arguing with her sister about that fact.

And no intention of letting herself yearn again for something that could never be.

Though it wasn’t one of their scheduled evenings to get together, Ashley wasn’t surprised when Paige showed up at her door Friday night. Or that she’d brought a bottle of her favorite merlot with her.