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“A boy,” she whispered as tears welled in her eyes.
“Congratulations, mama,” her friend said softly as she gripped her hand and squeezed.
“Thanks.”
Rose handed her paper towels to wipe her stomach, then said, “I’ll let you get changed.”
As Olivia cleaned up and put her street clothes on, she contemplated what it was going to be like to have a boy. Was she equipped to parent a boy alone?
Rose had two boys and two girls, so when Olivia walked in her friend’s office after she got dressed, she casually asked, “How much does Chad do when it comes to Theo and Connor?”
Her friend tilted her head. “What do you mean? We’re both involved with raising the kids, you know that.”
“I know. I just mean, like are there things that you let him handle because he’s their dad?”
Rose thought about it for a second. “I suppose I defer most penis-related things to him, and he relies on me to handle anything dealing with female parts for the girls. And I appreciate that he models how to be a good man—for all the kids. The girls know how they should expect to be treated by a man, and the boys know what it means to be an honorable man.”
Olivia felt the lump in her throat as she nodded. “That’s what I thought.”
“Why?”
“I’m just wondering if I’m going to handicap my kid if he doesn’t have a father to do those things.”
“Oh, Liv. No. You’re going to love that little boy enough for two parents.”
“I know, but what about things I can’t teach him?”
“You’ll have your dad and your brother as role models.”
She snorted. “I’m not sure I want my son emulating Evan.”
That made Rose smile. “I know you’re just joking. Evan is a good man. A pain in the ass sometimes, but he’s a good man.”
“I think his daddy is, too,” she whispered as she rubbed her belly absent-mindedly. She looked up at Rose as the first tear rolled down her cheek. “Am I making a mistake keeping this from him?”
“Only you can answer that.”
“I think I need to tell him.”
Rose lifted her shoulders. “So, tell him.
**
She took a deep breath as she opened the heavy wooden door leading to Flannigan’s. The parking lot was less crowded than the last time she’d been there months ago, so she wasn’t surprised to see plenty of open tables and seats at the bar.
Olivia was leaving for the Cape the next morning to celebrate the Fourth of July. One of the neuros she worked with owned a place right on the beach that he rented out and had a last-minute cancellation, so she decided to spend the next two weeks with her toes in the sand.
But first, she needed to find out how to get a hold of Pete. The bar where they’d met and that he said he co-owned seemed like the most logical place to start. In fact, short of hiring a private investigator, it was the only place she knew to start. And the idea of hiring a PI to track down her one-night stand felt icky.
Her top was flowing, so it was impossible to tell if she was just chubby or pregnant. She’d worn it by design. She wanted to be the one to tell Pete about the baby, not some gossipy bartender.
She didn’t recognize the man who set the napkin down in front of her. It wasn’t Dan, the man tending bar the night she’d met Pete.
“What’ll you have?”
“Can I have a cheeseburger and fries, and a Sprite?”
He flashed her a smile. “You got it,” he said, then put ice in a glass and shot a clear liquid from the bar gun into it before handing it to her.
