the past three nights.
Three!
That had happened a couple of times over the past six months, but as she hadn’t been sleeping with anyone she hadn’t worried about it. Her night shifts always threw her schedule off, and it had been a crazy couple of weeks. Every other time she’d simply caught up with her dosage and gone on with life.
She swallowed as the implication hit her.
This wasn’t “every other time.”
Clay had offered to use a condom.
Why hadn’t she let him?
She’d been too caught up in her own greedy need to get him inside her, and she had no idea if the condom he’d talked about had been in his wallet or in another room of the house. And she hadn’t wanted him to get up.
Besides, she was on the Pill! Or she had been. And she hadn’t planned on spending the entire night at his place. She’d figured she’d just take it when she got home.
Panic flashed through her system. What if his sperm had already made its way to an egg?
Would taking a Pill now undo it all? Maybe.
Which is what you need to do!
Or there were morning-after pills. That might be the best route.
But hadn’t she been thinking about adoption or in vitro once her residency was completed? The image of herself holding Clay’s baby began growing in her head.
What if this was fate’s way of telling her to go for it? That now was the time?
And what about Clay? Did he have no say in the matter…? She didn’t know. Her emotions were a huge jumbled knot in her stomach.
She needed to give herself a few hours or a day to think this through. It wasn’t as if she had to decide in the next fifteen minutes.
Really?
God, she was setting herself up for a disaster. She was almost at the end of her residency—there was no way she could afford a pregnancy right now.
And especially not one with a man she’d ended things with four years ago.
What a mess.
Caren touched her arm. “Everything okay?”
“Yes. Of course it is.” She searched her mind for a believable reason for being so distant. “I’m just thinking about the festival. There are only two more weeks to get ready for it.”
“I know. You must be nervous. And it’s weird about those jars, but I’m sure it’s just some dummy playing around.” She winked.
Holly nodded, lowering her voice so that Sam, who was busy pouring their drinks, wouldn’t hear. “You know how things get blown out of proportion.”
“What things?” She had no idea what either of them were talking about.
The two women looked at each other. “The jars. The ones of you and Dr. Matthews,” Holly whispered. “Someone added something to them.”
“Added what?” Tessa had been far too distracted, her head racing with other, more pressing, worries.
Caren’s brows went up. “You haven’t seen them yet?”
She’d been too confused today to even look at them. Actually, she’d been avoiding looking at them like the plague. Because she somehow had to get up the nerve to keep on practicing with him or she’d have a lot of explaining to do to Peter Lloyd. And to Marcos. No way did she want to tell anyone what had happened between them last night.
Clay’s mom had shown up at eight o’clock this morning with Molly in tow. Tessa had been in the shower, still in a blissful haze after waking up to Clay’s lips on her neck. Only the Clay who’d poked his head into the bathroom had been a different man from the one who’d sunk into her two hours earlier. “My mom is here with Molly.”
Her heart had shuddered to a stop. “Meu Deus. What do you want me to do?”
She’d expected him to tell her to hide under the bed until he could sneak her out of the house. Instead, he’d shaken his head. “Nothing. I told them we had an emergency at the hospital and were exhausted. That you slept over.” He gave her a smile. “You were expecting to hide in a closet?”
Yes.
She brought herself back to the conversation at hand. Which she couldn’t seem to remember for the life of her. Oh, yeah. The collection jars. “We found out that the hospital administrator set them up. Are they overflowing or something?”
Holly glanced again at Sam, who was now headed toward them, juggling four glasses. “Just look at them when you get to the hospital in the morning, okay? You’d think that you and Dr. Matthews were dating.”
She sucked down a shocked breath, but before she could say anything else Sam was handing her a cranberry juice—she’d refused the wine, saying she wasn’t feeling all that well. Poor Caren. This wasn’t exactly the send-off she’d been looking to give her. And she would genuinely miss her.
“So when does Kimberlyn arrive again?”
“She’s supposed to start moving in the day of the festival, so I figure it’ll be a good way for her to see some of the hospital staff in a more laid-back setting.” Caren looked around at the group. “Make her feel welcome, okay? She’s been putting a lot of pressure on herself lately. If she doesn’t get that fellowship…”
Tessa laid a hand on her arm. “Don’t worry, we’ll make sure she feels at home. We’ll put up a sign and everything.”
Holly smiled, dropping onto one of the plush striped sofas that flanked the fireplace and taking a sip of her wine.
“I can tell her where all the cool shops are, or go with her if she needs anything. You just make sure you don’t catch any tropical diseases, or we’ll have to come down and rescue you.”
“I’ll be careful. Don’t get rid of my room or anything. I plan on taking up where I left off when I get back next year.”
This time Sam spoke up, his eyes glinting. “I’ll try to keep Holly from redecorating it while you’re gone.” Their male housemate might be quiet but his dry humor sometimes came out of nowhere, surprising them all.
They all laughed right on cue, and Sam emptied his glass of the last of his wine. “I can’t stay but, seriously, take care, kiddo. And keep in touch.”
“I will.” She gave him a hug. “I need to go, too. Would you mind lugging those two bags to the bottom of the stairs while I call a cab?”
“Will do.” Sam took his wineglass and set it on the counter by the sink. To Holly and Tessa he said, “See you sometime tonight.”
With that, he picked up their friend’s luggage as if it weighed nothing and headed out the door.
Tessa’s eyes
