Free She Woke Up Married by Suzanne Macpherson Page B

she was lucky. Which she wasn’t.
    Or maybe Turner was sitting in a tall kitchen chair, leaning on the high counter with his arms crossed across his chest, staring at her with hisbig, serious brown eyes, looking concerned. Him and his look of concern. She broke his gaze and trudged toward her bed. Bed…give me bed, she thought to herself.
    But he was hot on her trail. He pulled the covers open for her and let her fall into the bliss of her bed without any dignity left. He rolled them back over her curled-up body that would not face him if it had to. She made herself into a ball in the darkness of the down comforter and its many quilt companions. “Uuhhhhh,” was all she said.
    “Paris, I’m going to the drugstore now and get a pregnancy test. Let’s just face the facts and see what we are dealing with.”
    “Flu. Plague,” she muttered.
    “How long?” he asked.
    “Long.”
    “We’ll see. Drink some water because I’m going to need a few drops of pee.”
    “Charming,” she muttered again.
    Turner put his coat on and strode out the door.
     
    Outside in the hallway Turner locked the dead bolt with her keys. He walked toward the elevator and looked at the indicator above the doors. She was on six, and the elevator was hovering on twenty-six. Turner decided to take the stairs. A particular urgency overtook him. What was sixflights of stairs compared to obtaining certain knowledge that he was going to be a father?
    He wondered how Paris could have gotten pregnant wearing her birth control patch, but it sure wouldn’t have been the first time a determined soul had made it through to stir up some couple’s life. He smiled thinking of that determined soul meeting up with Paris.
    But Paris—she’d be devastated. Fear washed through him as his boots hit one stair after another. What would her reaction be?
    As he rounded the landing on the third floor he felt his wave of panic subside. It was replaced by an odd calm. Whatever came up, he was going to be there for her.
     
    In the drugstore he found a friendly guy to grill for information on the entire shelf of tests before him. “Which of these is the most accurate?”
    “Well, these are mid-stream tests, and these are strip tests. The strip is faster, but this one detects minute amounts of pregnancy hormone. It’s pretty darn sensitive. That’s about eight or ten days after conception,” the pharmacist rattled on.
    “I’ll take two of each kind, thanks.” Turner went for his wallet and started pulling out twenties. “What do I owe you?”
    “Fifty three dollars and twelve cents.”
    Turner handed him fifty-five dollars.
    “Here you go, that makes fifty-four and one more is fifty-five. Good luck, sir,” the pharmacist added.
    “Thanks, I’m going to need it.” Turner took the bagged-up tests and steadied himself against the counter before shoving off.
    Outside the drugstore, a kind-looking old man was handing out religious pamphlets. “Bless you, my child.” He smiled and nodded at Turner as if he knew something.
    “Thank you.” Turner took the flyer and smiled back at him. He kept moving down the sidewalk, thinking of the odd string of coincidences that had led him to this moment in time. How strange it was that he and Paris should cross paths after all these years. Or maybe collide was the proper term. He and Paris had collided into each other, each for their own reasons, and now life would never be the same for either of them. He saw his path very clearly, all of a sudden. Like fog lifting off the city streets and leaving a ribbon of road clearly visible. He knew the way.
     
    Paris rocked herself back and forth in her overstuffed rocking chair, her knees drawn up, her retrieved nightshirt stretched over her gray leggings, her arms wrapped around her captive legs. She put her head forward and let her curtain of hair fall around her, blocking out thelight. She didn’t have much experience with this stuff, but she was pretty sure from the talks