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“I should go,” Emmy whispered. “I love you.”
“I love you too.” It killed him not to be there when she was upset. All he wanted to do was hug her tightly and make everything okay. “Call me if you need me. Or if you change your mind about me coming to get you. Maybe I should just come anyway. Shall I?”
“No.” There was a hint of tearful laughter and he could imagine her rolling her eyes. “I told you I’m okay. Just homesick.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yeah.” He waited for her to say goodbye and hang up. “Dad?” she said after a moment.
“Yeah?”
“You’re the best dad in the world, you know.”
The lump in his throat swelled further. “I have to be, because I have the best kid in the world.”
“That’s true,” she said, sounding a little more like herself. “Bye, Dad.”
“Love you,” he said again before the line went dead.
He took a few deep breaths before calling Nancy. She answered almost immediately and didn’t bother with a greeting.
“I’ve been trying to get in touch with you,” she said impatiently. “Why don’t you answer your phone?”
“I was busy. And I’ve tried calling you back a few times.”
“Emmy was always around. I wanted to speak to you before I spoke to her, but you didn’t answer … it’s fine anyway. I talked to her and it’s fine.” There was a vacant quality to her voice, as though she was talking to herself rather than Hugh.
“What’s fine?” he asked, a jolt of anger hitting him as he waited to hear what had upset Emmy.
“We’re having a baby,” she said. “Louise is pregnant.”
He huffed out a surprised breath. “Congratulations.”
“Thanks. Louise is carrying it. She’s three months along. Biologically, it’s my baby.”
After a quick shake of his head, Hugh massaged his temple. “You’ve lost me.”
“My egg and donor sperm, implanted into Louise.”
“Oh, right.”
“Louise tried sperm insemination but it didn’t work. It turned out she couldn’t have a baby, but she wanted to be the one to carry it so … well, anyway, she’s pregnant. I was worried about Em’s reaction so I wanted to talk to you about how I break the news. But you didn’t answer so I just told her yesterday evening. I was probably making a big deal of it in my head because she was fine with it.”
“Was she?” he said, an undertone of aggression in his voice.
“I think she was surprised. She didn’t really say much, but I think once it sinks in she’ll be excited about having a sibling.”
“She’s not okay with it.” Hugh peered out of the window at the quiet street below. “She just called me in floods of tears, asking me to pick her up. She didn’t mention the baby, but that seems like a clue. If she was fine with it, she’d have told me.”
Nancy muttered a string of swear words, then Louise’s voice came in the background, asking what was wrong. Hugh rubbed the bridge of his nose while Nancy filled her in. Immediately, Louise went to check on Em, which Hugh appreciated, but he was also irked that it wasn’t Nancy who’d drop everything to check on their daughter.
“She’ll probably just need time to get used to it,” Nancy said defensively. “I reassured her I’ll still have time for her. I even told her she can visit more often.”
“She can’t though, can she?” Hugh snapped. “She has school.”
“Yes, but she can spend more of the holidays here. And in the summer, before the baby arrives, I can plan a trip somewhere just for Emmy and me. I thought she’d like that.”
Hugh scratched at the back of his head. “I’m not sure the amount of time she spends with you is the issue. Did it ever occur to you that she might be upset that you didn’t want to be a mother to her, but now you want to be a mother to another baby?”
