The Welcoming

little. They told me November twenty-first. So, Thanksgiving babies instead of Christmas/New Year’s.”
    “Gobble, gobble,” Avery said, and made Clare laugh again.
    “You have to let us help set up the nursery,” Hope began. Planning was in her blood.
    “I’m counting on it. I don’t have a thing. I gave away all the baby things after Murphy. I never thought I’d fall in love again, or marry again, or have more children.”
    “Can we say baby shower? A double-the-fun theme,” Hope decided. “Or what comes in pairs, sets of two. Something like that. I’ll work on it. We should schedule it in early October, just to be safe.”
    “Baby shower.” Clare sighed. “More and more real. I need to call my parents, and I need to tell the girls,” she added, referring to her bookstore staff. She levered herself up. “November babies,” she said again. “I should be able to shed the baby weight by May and the wedding.”
    “Oh, yeah, I’m getting married.” Avery held out her hand, admired the diamond that had replaced the bubble-gum ring Owen had put on her finger. Twice.
    “Getting married
and
opening a second restaurant, and helping plan a baby shower, and redecorating the current single guy’s master suite into a couple’s master suite.” Hope poked Avery in the arm. “We have a lot of planning to do.”
    “I can take some time tomorrow.”
    “Good.” Hope took a moment to flip through her mental list, rearrange tasks, gauge the timing. “One o’clock. I can clear the time. Can you make that?” she asked Clare. “I can fix us a little lunch and we can get some of the planning worked out before I have check-ins.”
    “One o’clock tomorrow.” Clare patted her belly. “We’ll be there.”
    “I’ll be over,” Avery promised. “If I’m a little later, we had a good lunch rush. But I’ll get over.”
    Hope walked out with Clare, grabbed another hug before separating. And imagined Clare telling her parents the happy news. Imagined, too, Avery texting Owen. And Beckett slipping off to check on Clare during the day, or just stealing a few minutes to bask with her.
    For a moment she wished she had someone to call or text or slip away to, someone to share the lovely news with.
    Instead she went around the back of the inn, up the outside stairs. She let herself in on the third floor, listening as she walked down to her apartment.
    Yes, she thought, she could just hear Carolee’s voice, and the excitement in it. No doubt Justine Montgomery had already called her sister to share the news about the twins.
    Hope closed herself into her apartment. She’d spend a couple hours in the quiet, she decided, researching their resident ghost, and the man named Billy she waited for.
    ***
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Nora Roberts is the #1
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bestselling author of more than 200 novels. She is also the author of the bestselling futuristic suspense series written under the pen name J. D. Robb. There are more than 400 million copies of her books in print. Visit her online at www.noraroberts.com and facebook.com/noraroberts.

Nora Roberts
     
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