Don't Let Go(67)

He looked him up for himself, or probably as a gift for Noah. Had Noah and I not reconnected, if Shayna were the protective jealous shrew she should be instead of being so damn nice to me, would I even be standing there?
Yes. Because Noah would have done the right thing.
“In all honesty,” Seth continued, “The timing really worked out because I signed up on an online list last year.” He gave a boyish shrug that tugged at my mommy heart. “I figured it’d be nice to know where I came from. In case there was anybody with eleven toes or insanity that hits at thirty or something.”
Everyone laughed. And it felt wonderful. I swiped tears off my cheeks and let myself laugh, watching my amazing boy stand there with everyone staring at him like he was under a microscope and still talk with ease and make a room full of strangers laugh with no problem.
“Well, no extra limbs that I know of,” Linny said, sniffling loudly. “But the old man has serious sanity issues.”
Johnny Mack reddened and tried to look good-natured in spite of the fact that nothing in him could ever be that. Seth chuckled and continued to stand there as I realized we needed to do something besides stare at him in the little room.
“Um,” I began, profoundly. “Do you want to go sit down? Go next door to the bookstore—it’s mine, we can do that,” I rambled. “Or forget the store, I’ll close it for the day. We can go to my house and—” Wait. No.
“I think staying here in the diner is fine,” Johnny Mack piped in.
“And what, cram everyone in a booth?” Linny said, fixing him with a look. “Let them go, he’ll be back.”
Seth looked amused at the tug-of-war over him. “Hey, I’m just grateful to be here. To meet everyone.” He held his palms out. “I’m here today and tomorrow, so there’s no rush.” He looked at me and then to Noah, as if we were the deciding votes. Which I guess we were. “Whatever you want to do. Wherever you want to go. It’s probably gonna be weird anywhere so don’t stress.”
Damn good thing he was the grown-up in the situation, because I felt like neither of us were.
“Noah, Jules has the right idea. Why don’t the three of you go over to her house so you can just be comfortable and relax,” Shayna said, her hands on his arm. “It’s okay,” she said reassuringly as he looked down at her in surprise.
But I knew what that look was, as the same sense of oh shit permeated my brain. Why had I suggested that? Going back to my house? With Noah. In my living room. Where we almost did the deed just two days ago. No, we needed Shayna there, because that made it infinitely better. Always better that the pregnant fiancée come along—the one whose phone call stopped us from the primal monkey sex on the rug.
“Or we could go back to your dad’s house,” I said quickly, meeting his eyes and pretending he was someone else so Shayna wouldn’t see it. My stealth skills were toast. “If that’s better.”
Noah nodded, looking spent. “Probably so.”
“Well, then I can just go—” Shayna began, looking uncertain.
“You don’t need to go anywhere,” I said. “You stay with us.”
Her face relaxed and she smiled a thank-you to me that didn’t quite reach her eyes. Nothing had. That was something I’d learned about her in the short time I’d known her. She wore her worry there. And something was chewing on her. Was it me? Did she know? Surely not. Or maybe she was beginning to suspect since Noah and I were wearing our crazy like neon signs. Then again, maybe that was my own paranoid guilt waving at me, and she just had a lot on her plate. Like being unsure about marrying Noah.
“Let’s go,” I said, leading the way, needing to move and needing to stop looking at him even more.
Ruthie dabbed under her eyes and stopped me to throw her arms around my neck. I felt the weakness come into my bones, as everything in me just wanted to drop to the floor and sit cross-legged across from her and unload all my woes like we did when we were girls. But there was no time for that now.
“I’ve got the store,” she whispered. “Go.”
“Thank you,” I breathed.
On the sidewalk, I turned back to Seth, struck once again with the Noah resemblance. “Do you—have a car? Want to ride with me?”
“I’ve got my truck over here,” he said, probably grateful for the breathing space for the fifteen seconds it was going to take to get to the house. “I’ll follow.”
“Good,” I said, turning down the sidewalk and then spinning around with a hand up. “I don’t mean good, like good, I just meant—”
“I got it,” Seth said, laughing and getting into his truck with a wink.
“Of course,” I mumbled, smiling, as I turned around and walked toward my car on legs I couldn’t feel. I passed Shayna and Noah getting in his truck and refused to look that way. I was going to his friggin’ house, I’d see plenty of them there.
I shut my car door and plugged my keys in, watching my hands tremble. I gripped the steering wheel and squeezed my eyes shut. My breaths got choppy and I knew what was coming. I pressed my hand against my mouth to push it back.
“Oh, my God,” I whispered, sucking in sharp breaths against the burn. “I just met my son.”

? ? ?

Seth cased the place very much like Noah had when he’d come to my house that first morning, hands in his jacket pockets and eyes soaking in every detail. He of course went to the photographs first, and I wondered what that felt like. Looking at photos of a family that you should have been part of but weren’t. His photos were in another house, with another family.