1022 Evergreen Place - Debbie Macomber [42]
Corrie needed to sit down again. Looking at the calendar, although it hardly seemed necessary, she realized her daughter was five months along. “You mean you’ve known all this time and didn’t tell me?”
“Yes. Mom, I’m sorry. I wanted to say something but I was afraid you and Dad would be upset with us, so like I said, I kept putting it off.”
“I’m not upset. I’m thrilled!”
“Will you tell Daddy for me?”
“Of course.”
Linnette hesitated. “Do you think he’ll be mad?”
“No, sweetheart, I think he’ll be overjoyed. Can I tell Mack and Gloria?”
“Oh, of course. Except…Mack already knows.”
“Mack knows.” Corrie found it hard to believe her children had been able to keep this secret—hard to believe and a little hurtful.
Swallowing her disappointment, she asked, “What about Gloria?”
“I haven’t told her yet. Do you want to do it or should I?”
“I will,” Corrie said. It would be a good—and legitimate—reason to visit her.
Linnette expelled her breath loudly. “I feel so much better, Mom. I can’t tell you what a relief it is finally to let you know about Pete…and the baby.”
They spoke for another ten or fifteen minutes, and by the time Corrie hung up, any hurt or disappointment had disappeared. She felt…ecstatic. Okay, so she’d hoped to arrange the perfect wedding for her daughter someday, but she reminded herself that the marriage was more important than the wedding. She wondered if this baby would be a boy or a girl; Linnette had chosen not to know. So…yellow was the right color, at least for now.
Caught up in her musings, she did some housework and prepared a special dinner of pork tenderloin and sautéed spinach, Roy’s favorite meal.
“Hello, darling,” she said when he walked into the house shortly after six. She met him in the living room, and slipped her arms around his waist.
Roy eyed her suspiciously. “Okay, what did you buy? How much is it going to set us back?”
“Roy,” she chided. “I spent less than two hundred dollars.”
“On what?”
“Baby clothes.”
“Baby clothes?” he repeated, his forehead creased.
“Yes, Grandpa. We’re going to have a baby in…oh, late September.”
“We are?” He looked as if he needed to sit down. “Who’s having the baby?”
Corrie started to laugh. “You’ll never guess. Linnette and Pete, and before you say anything, they’re married.”
Eleven
Gloria Ashton paced the small living room of her apartment as she waited for her dinner date. She’d gone out with the doctor only once before, nearly three years ago. From her point of view, the evening had been a disaster. Afterward, Chad had made numerous attempts to ask her out a second time, but Gloria had declined repeatedly.
Just thinking about that long-ago date made her cheeks burn with mortification. She’d spent the night with him. One date, and she’d fallen into bed without a single thought to the consequences. She’d never done that before or since and would never do it again. Such irrational, impulsive behavior went against everything Gloria believed. In her opinion, lovemaking should be reserved for committed couples. All she could attribute her conduct to was the fact that she was lost, lonely and unsettled. She’d moved to Washington State in search of her birth parents shortly after the death of the two people who’d adopted, raised and loved her. She was alone and vulnerable, and for reasons she still couldn’t fathom, she’d lowered her natural reserve with this stranger. Afterward she’d felt embarrassed and frankly humiliated by her own behavior, so she’d refused to see him again.
Then she’d learned that Chad intended to move away from Cedar Cove and she realized she didn’t want him to go. Overwhelmed by unfamiliar emotions, she recognized that she didn’t want to lose him but equally disturbing was her fear of what might happen if she allowed him back in her life. Before she could properly