“You want me to sit here and watch baseball?”

“I thought you liked baseball.”

“Yeah, but not enough to zone out in front of the TV.”

“Okay.” He heaved an exaggerated sigh. “I’m about to make the ultimate sacrifice for my breed. Pick a DVD. We’ll watch a movie, even if it’s a chick flick.”

She eased back. “Really?”

“But you have to make the popcorn.”

“You mean you’ll sit here and watch a girlie movie without making snide comments?”

“I don’t remember agreeing to the second part.”

“You know, I like action flicks.”

“Now we’re talking.”

“But I’d love to watch something romancey, with a couple of good weep scenes. Thanks!” She pressed her lips noisily to his, then jumped up. “I’m loading the popcorn with butter.” At the door, she stopped and beamed back at him. “I feel better already.”

SHE’D NEVER HAD so many ups and downs in her moods in all of her life. From manic energy to exhaustion, from joy to despair. She ran the gamut, it seemed, every day. And under the swings, the spurts, and the tumbles was an edgy anticipation of what happens next. And when.

When she spiraled down, she struggled to remind herself of what she had. A beautiful child, a wonderful man who loved her, friends, family, a good interesting job. And still, once the spiral began, she couldn’t seem to control the fall.

She worried there was something physically wrong with her. A chemical imbalance, a brain tumor. Maybe she was going as crazy as The Bride.

Feeling harassed and overtired, she swung into Wal-Mart on her morning off to pick up diapers, shampoo, a few other basics. She could only thank God to be able to snatch this little window of alone time. Or alone with Lily time, she corrected, as she strapped her daughter in the shopping cart.

At least nobody felt they were obliged to watch her when she was away from Harper House or work. And watching was what they did. Like hawks.

She understood why, God knew she appreciated the concern and care. But that didn’t stop her from feeling smothered. She could barely start to brush her teeth without whoever was hovering offering to spread the paste on the brush for her.

She wandered down aisles, listlessly picking up what she needed. Then she detoured into cosmetics, thinking a new lipstick might cheer her up. But the shades seemed too dark or too light, too bold or too dull. Nothing suited her.

She looked so pale and wan these days, she decided if she put anything bright on her lips they’d look as though they walked into the room a foot ahead of her.

New perfume maybe. But every tester she sniffed made her feel slightly queasy.

“Just forget it,” she muttered, and glanced back at Lily who was trying to stretch out her arm to reach a spin rack of mascaras and eye pencils.

“Not for a long time yet, young lady. It’s fun being a girl though, you’ll see. All these toys we get to play with.” She chose one of the mascaras herself, tossed it in the cart. “I just can’t seem to gear myself up for it right now. We’ll just go on, get your diapers. And maybe if you’re good, a new board book.”

She turned down another aisle, reluctant to leave. Once she did, she’d need to take Lily to the sitter’s, go to work. Where somebody would be attached to her hip for the rest of the day.

She wanted to do something normal, damn it. More, she wanted to feel like doing something. Anything.

And an absent glance to her right stopped her in her tracks.

Something that was both panic and nausea, with a helping of dull realization spurted into her belly. It continued to rise as she did hasty calculations in her head.

While everything inside her sank, Hayley closed her eyes. She opened them again, looked into Lily’s happy face. And reached for the home pregnancy test.

SHE DROPPED LILY off, kept a smile plastered on her face until she walked out the door to her car. Afraid to do otherwise, she kept her mind blank while she drove home. She wouldn’t think, she wouldn’t project. She would just go home, take the test. Twice. When it came out negative, which of course it would, she’d hide the packages somewhere until she could dispose of them without anyone knowing she’d had a panic attack.

She wasn’t pregnant again. She absolutely couldn’t be pregnant again.

She parked, and made certain the boxes were buried at the bottom of her bag and well hidden. But she’d taken two steps into the house when David appeared like some magic genie.

“Hi, sugar, want a hand with that?”

“No.” She gripped the bag to her chest like a cache of gold. “No,” she repeated more calmly. “I’m just going to take these things up. And I have to pee, if that’s all the same to you.”

“It is. I often have to pee myself.”

Knowing her tone had been nasty, she rubbed a hand over her face. “I’m sorry. I’m in a mood.”

“Something else I often have.” He pulled an open tube of Life Savers from his pocket, thumbed out a cherry circle. “Open up.”

She smiled, obeyed.

“Let’s see if that sweetens your mood,” he said as he popped the candy into her mouth. “Can’t help worrying about you, honey.”

“I know. If I’m not back down in fifteen minutes, you can call out the cavalry. Deal?”

“Deal.”

She hurried up, then dumped the contents of the bag on her bed—for God’s sake, she’d forgotten the diapers. Cursing, she snatched both pregnancy tests and bolted to the bathroom.

For a moment she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to pee. Wouldn’t that just be her luck? She ordered herself to calm down, took several long breaths. Added a prayer.

Moments later, with the sweetness of cherry candy still on her tongue, she was staring at the stick with PREGNANT reading clear as day in its window.

“No.” She gripped the stick, shook it as if it were a thermometer and the action would drop things back down to normal. “No, no, no, no! What is this? What are you?” She looked down at herself, rapped a fist lightly below her navel. “Some kind of sperm magnet?”

Undone, she sat on the toilet lid, buried her face in her hands.

THOUGH SHE MIGHT have preferred to crawl into the cabinet under the sink, curl up in the dark, and stay there for the next nine months, she didn’t have much time to indulge in a pity fest. She washed her face, slapping on cold water to eradicate the signs of her bathroom crying jag.