Geek Girl (Geek Girl, #1)(56)

Dad stares at me blankly.

“So,” I continue slowly, “she’s getting fat. She’s eating things she hates. She keeps changing her mind about things. She’s crying about inconsequential things and shouting a lot and peeing all the time.”

I’m ticking the points off on my fingers and holding them pretty much under his nose. There is no way he won’t get this now. No way.

Dad nods slowly, a look of realisation starting to dawn on his face (he has a red and yellow stain on the corner of his mouth and I’m trying really hard not to look at it). “My God,” he says in a stunned voice. “She’s… she’s…”

“Yes?”

“She’s… having an affair with a strawberry jam manufacturer?”

“Oh, for the love of sugar cookies,” I shout, standing up. How have I managed to grow into such a balanced, reasonable person with him as a role model? “She’s pregnant. Annabel is pregnant.” Then there’s a long silence while Dad’s entire face goes white.

Oops. I didn’t mean to just throw it at him like that. He’s quite old. Over forty. He’d better not have a heart attack.

“Sh-she can’t be,” Dad finally stammers. “It’s utterly impossible.”

“Is this the part where I have to tell you about the birds and the bees and the fact that it has nothing to do with either?”

“No, I mean the doctors have always said she can’t have children. Almost totally impossible. We’ve been trying for years.”

OK: ugh. That’s disgusting.

“Too much information,” I interrupt. “Well, she is. The proverbial bun is cooking in the proverbial oven.”

“She’s pregnant?” Dad says again. He looks like he’d fall over if he wasn’t already sitting down.

“I just saw her. Trust me, she’s pregnant.”

Dad inexplicably looks even more astonished. “You just saw her?”

“She’s not the Loch Ness monster, Dad. She’s in her office, doing paperwork.”

“She’s pregnant. With a baby?” For some reason Dad looks at me questioningly.

“Yes, with a baby. What else is she going to be pregnant with?”

“A mini werewolf perhaps,” he mumbles. Then there’s a long silence while he puts his head in his hands. “I’m an idiot, aren’t I?” he mumbles through his fingers. “A total idiot.”

There’s no beating around the bush here. “Yes. I think it must be in our gene pool.”

“I need her. I need to tell her I need her immediately.”

“No, you don’t.” I shake my head crossly. “You need to show her that you’re there for her when she needs you.”

And then I shut my mouth in surprise. Oh. Oh.

Is that why Nat is so angry with me?

Dad looks at me in shock. “When did you get so smart, missy?”

I put my nose in the air, totally offended. “I’ve always been smart, actually.”

“Not that kind of smart, you haven’t.” Dad thinks about it and then stands up and dramatically takes off his dressing gown like some kind of superhero transforming. Underneath, he’s wearing jeans, a T-shirt and a cardigan.

“Hey!” I say crossly. “That’s my trick!”

“Like I said, I’m a maverick. And you’re a chip off the old block.” Dad stretches the muscles in his neck. “Now grab your coat, Harriet. We’re going to get your not-so-evil stepmother back.”





have absolutely no idea where we’re going.

“Annabel’s office isn’t in this direction,” I point out as Dad pounds down the street in the steadily increasing drizzle, with me jogging along behind him. I’ve never seen him looking so purposeful (apart from when he’s on the Easter egg hunt, and that has chocolate at the other end of it).

“She’s not in her office.”

“But she is, Dad. I was just there.”

Dad looks at his watch. “The cleaners come in at seven and Annabel hates the sound of a vacuum cleaner. She’ll have gone. I know my wife. Werewife or not.”

He takes another turning and I can feel myself getting steadily more anxious (which is not helped by the fact that my phone keeps vibrating in my pocket). “We’re going shopping?” I say as Dad takes an abrupt right turn into a clothes shop.

“Trust me, Harriet.” Dad picks up a shopping basket and throws a green floral dress into it. “This is part of the master plan.” I look with concern at the yellow ruffled shirt he’s chucking on top of it, followed by a pink catsuit and a sequined boobtube.

“Have you ever met Annabel before?” I ask in concern as he shovels more hideous clothes into the basket. “They’re not suits or dressing gowns.”

“They’re not for Annabel.”

I look with alarm at the purple hotpants he’s just picked up. “Tell me they’re not for you, Dad.”

Dad laughs.

“Or me,” I say sternly. I’m still looking at the hotpants.

“They’re not for you, Harriet.” Dad marches abruptly into the baby section.

“They’re not going to fit the baby either.”