I can’t travel back and forth from Chicago to LA when I’m home with a newborn, let alone go overseas to visit her on set. Nothing was done intentionally, of course, but I feel like I’ve let Chloe down. Again. I’ve loved and longed for her for so long, I thought I’d possibly put her on a pedestal. It’s time I face the cold hard truth that maybe I’m just not good enough for her. Because no matter what I do, how hard I try, she’s going to get hurt.

The weekend.

It’s all we have, and I’m going to make sure we fucking enjoy it, ignoring the nagging guilt that’s going to weigh me down and distract me the whole time. Sighing, I close the locker, grab my stuff, and head out to the parking garage. Traffic is slow and it takes twice as long as usual to get home. I text Chloe instead of calling her, hardly able to stand talking and acting like everything is okay when it’s far from it. The truth bubbles inside of me, wanting to come out and ease my own guilt, but the repercussions of telling her now, of spoiling our time together, make me pause. I stew over it the whole drive home, and am spacing out, lost in thought as I walk through the lobby of my apartment.

“Sam!” someone calls, and I come to a sudden halt. I know that voice—fuck—and turn to see Stacey.

“What the hell—” Blinking, I cut myself off. “What are you doing here? Is everything all right?” My heart skips a beat and I fight the urge to turn and make sure Chloe isn’t coming off the elevator.

“Yeah, I’m fine. I wanted to talk to you.”

“So you came here?” I don’t mean to be blunt, but the fuck?

“I was in the neighborhood.” She smiles and looks around the upscale lobby. “I missed the way this place smells. Weird, isn’t it? How I crave smells more than I crave food?” She laughs. “I’m gonna have to ask what kind of air freshener they use so I can get it at home.”

I swallow hard, desperate to get away and upstairs, locking the door and warning Chloe about solicitors that somehow got past security, so there’s no need to answer the door or even look through the peephole to see who it is. I let out a slow breath and look at Stacey. I don’t dislike her. We had fun together, and I found comfort in our familiar routine. Yet this…this is wrong. So fucking wrong.

“What did you want to talk about?” I ask, eyes going to Stacey’s midsection. She’s wearing a tight-fitting gray t-shirt, tucked into high-waist jeans. She was always a fashionable and rather flashy dresser, which attracted the shallow part of me when we first started dating.

I know some women start showing very early in pregnancy and others don’t until they’re nearly halfway through. Stacey doesn’t have the slightest bump yet.

“It’s a little awkward,” she starts, wrinkling her nose. “But, um, you said you wanted to be involved.”

“I do.” If the kid is mine, that is. “How can I help?”

“I want to start buying stuff for the baby.”

“Oh, uh, right.” A lot of people wait until after the twelfth week to start shopping, and Stacey is several weeks past that. It is time to start prepping…and the thought makes me want to hyperventilate.

The first family get-together after Rory told us she was pregnant will filled with excitement and with our mother planning a laundry list of things to do. Items to buy. People to invite to the baby shower. Names to use. Names not to use. It was fun, everyone was happy, and the baby was loved by his whole family right away.

I don’t want to take those things away from Stacey. She should be excited. She should decorate a nursery and spend hours looking at lists of baby names. She should have a baby shower and know she doesn’t have to go through it alone.

And this baby should be loved right away as well.

But no matter how hard I try, I can’t get excited. It makes me feel guilty, and I wish so much Chloe was the one having my baby instead of Stacey.

“What do you want to get?”

“Like everything,” she laughs. “Though I want to wait to find out if it’s a boy or girl before I buy some stuff, like the bedding and clothes of course.”

“You should be able to find out soon,” I tell her, trying to get just a spark of excitement to ignite inside of me. “You’re far enough along.”

“Yeah, maybe.” She waves her hand in the air. “You can just give me cash and I’ll go shopping.”

“Oh,” I say, not expecting that. “I, uh, can go with you.”

“I figured you’d be busy. And I need maternity clothes. You always hated when I went clothes shopping.”

“Oh,” I repeat, not knowing what else to say. I want to be involved and I thought Stacey wanted me to be involved too. I pinch the bridge of my nose and then rub my forehead. “I’ll go with you.”

“The cash would be easier,” she laughs and playfully nudges me. Her touch feels wrong.

“Yeah.” I rarely carry cash on me when I’m going to and from work. If I had a bunch of cash in my wallet, I’d just give it to her to make her leave before she and Chloe somehow bump into each other. “But I meant it when I said I wanted to be involved.”

She smiles. “Well in that case, my car is kind of old.”

I blink. And then blink again. Is she—no, she can’t be. But yet…what? “You bought it two years ago. I went with you.”

“Yeah, but it was used and only seats four.”

I open my mouth only to snap it shut. Even if she had twins, they’d fit in the backseat.

“And I was looking at safety ratings and there are a lot safer cars out there. I assumed you’d want what’s best for you child.”

What the fuck am I supposed to say? Of course I want what’s best for my child. “I do.”

“Your car is nice. BMWs have good safety ratings. I’d love to have an M6 like you,” she giggles and inches closer, reaching out to touch my arm.

“It…it’s a really nice car,” I say slowly, eyes darting behind her to the hallway where the elevators are located. I got annoyed when Rory told me Stacey was nothing more than a gold-digger because I took it personally, like I was stupid for falling for her act. But if she’s seriously asking me to buy her a car that cost over a hundred-thousand dollars…

“But something like an X3 would be fine too. I’ve done my research. They have great safety ratings.”

“They do,” I echo, still in a suspended state of shock. I don’t know how to react to any of this. I don’t wish anything bad on Stacey, but simply want her out of my life so I can build one with Chloe…which is kind of hard to do if Stacey really is carrying my child. I need her to get a paternity test as soon as possible, yet I know Stacey and have a good guess how she’ll react when I tell her we need to have one done.

“I’d love one just like that. For the baby. I’d be a stylish soccer mom.”

“It’ll be a few years before the baby is playing soccer.”

She flattens her hand on my bicep, laughing. “True, and good point. I’ll want something newer by then. And who knows, maybe we’ll have another in that time."

“Stacey.” My brows furrow and I step back. “I told you. I’ll be there for the child, if it’s mine, but me and you…we’re over.”