His Nanny Mate (Moana and Edrick Morgan) novel Chapter 73

#Chapter 73: Keeping Secrets

Edrick

“Edrick…” My mother dropped her tone of voice and leaned closer to me. She took my hand in hers and gave me a serious, knowing look that only a mother could have. “Is she pregnant?”

I frowned, hiding the fact that my heart had just started beating rapidly. “What?” I said, shaking my head. “What makes you think that?”

My mother folded her arms across her chest and narrowed her eyes. “Edrick, I’m your mother. You can’t lie to me.” There was a long silence after she spoke, but her eyes never wavered from mine. Even in her old age, she was still just as astute and level-headed as ever. I had never been able to lie to my mother, and she knew that. Finally, I caved.

“Yes,” I replied quietly. “She is pregnant.”

“I knew it,” my mother said. I could tell that she was hiding a bit of a smirk at her miniature victory, but at the same time, she was dead serious. “Is it yours?”

I didn’t answer right away. I felt a lump rise in my throat after being put on the spot. Sure, I was planning on telling my mother eventually, but now? Like this? It felt so out of the blue, and I had no time at all to prepare an explanation.

“It’s not—”

“You know, the way you act around Ella,” my mother interrupted, lowering her voice even more, “if you had another illegitimate child… It would only cause more problems for you, for the daughter you already have, and the baby. Not to mention the emotional toll it would take on that poor girl to feel like she birthed a baby that could never be truly loved by its father.”

I shook my head. “It’s not mine, mom,” I lied, this time taking care to hide my lie even though it pained me to hide something like this from my mother. “It’s someone else’s.”

My mother went silent for a moment. I could practically see the gears turning in her head; I knew that she didn’t believe me. “Darling, I already heard all about your visit to the hospital this morning,” she admitted. “You know, the couples that you let her ahead of are well known, after all, and they were very put out by the entire thing. But I digress, and it was well within your rights to do such a thing if you felt it necessary. If it wasn’t yours, though, why would you bother going to the doctor’s appointments with her? And why would you care so much as to go against our hospital’s policy like that?”

I started to panic again. “I only wanted to help her,” I lied once more. “She doesn’t have anyone else, and those human doctors…” What was I supposed to say? That I cared about my daughter’s nanny out of the kindness of my heart and didn’t want her visiting some shoddy doctor who wouldn’t give her and the baby in her belly the best care possible? My mother would never believe it; she had always been an intuitive woman, and even now, I knew that she didn’t believe me one bit.

But, much to my surprise, she didn’t question further. “Well then,” she said with a slight sigh, leaning back in her chair. “That’s very nice of you. I wish her all the best in her pregnancy.”

Just then, Selina emerged from the kitchen with tea. She set the tray down, then began to pour a cup for my mother.

“Oh, thank you, but that won’t be necessary,” my mother said, standing. “I only wanted to pop in for a few minutes. I should be going now.”