Tracie Peterson Read Online Free PDF

struck her. Her cheeks grew hot. “I don’t know.”
    “Look, Tess,” Justin began, “I’ve been friends with you and Brad for a long time. I know what you’ve been through withall the doctors and trying over and over again to get pregnant. I just want you to know there’s another route to consider.”
    “I appreciate that,” Tess said, reaching again for the glasses. “I know very well that this is a viable choice for many people. My own friend Kim is adopting in this manner. I think I’ve told you about her.” Tess straightened and met Justin’s compassionate gaze.
    He nodded. “She’s the one who had the hysterectomy, right?”
    “Yes. There’s no possibility of her getting pregnant. She’s worked through an adoption agency and attorney, and within the next few weeks she expects to have a baby.”
    Justin nodded again and moved closer. “Is she happy?”
    Tess thought back to Kim’s animated phone call a few days earlier. Happy seemed a weak word to describe the woman’s jubilant enthusiasm. “She’s ecstatic.”
    “You could be too.”
    Tess felt overwhelmed by the turn of events. Adoption was the last thing she had figured to deal with this evening. Looking to Brad she questioned, “Was this your idea?”
    Brad got a sheepish expression on his face that answered her without words. “I just thought it was time to . . . well, to think about a new approach. It actually seemed like it might be something God was steering us to consider. I mean, Justin is the one who came to me with the idea, and this came after I’d spent most of the day praying about having kids.”
    Tess softened, feeling an abundant love for her husband. He had prayed about their need. He had cared enough to consider the situation throughout the day.
    “Look, it’s just not an easy situation,” Tess said. “Adoption is a wonderful thing. I cherish the parents it gave me. I’ve known many blessings because I was adopted.”
    Brad’s eyes seemed to light up at this. “ Blessing is just the word I was thinking. Perhaps this is God’s way of blessing us with a child.”
    Tess hated causing him pain and she didn’t want to takeaway from his otherwise very successful evening by causing a scene. “I’ll think about it,” she finally said. “But please don’t pressure me. I’m doing well just to consider this.”
    Brad and Justin exchanged a look. “There’s plenty of time,” Justin finally said. “Most of the cases I know about aren’t going to be having their babies for several months.”
    Tess tried not to let her emotions take control. “Good” was all she managed to say before heading to the kitchen. She might have fooled her husband and his friend, but inside, the tight band that wrapped itself around her lungs, threatening to cut off her air, proved that she hadn’t fooled herself.
    ****
    “Do you think she’ll come around?” Justin asked as Brad walked him to the door.
    Brad drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly before answering. “She’s been so focused on getting pregnant that I don’t think she’s ever allowed herself to seriously consider that adoption might be her only chance to have a family.”
    “Why is she so against adoption?” Justin asked as he opened the front door.
    “Like I said, for years she’s thought only of having a child that would be her own flesh and blood. I don’t think she’s so much opposed to adoption as she is fixed on the idea of bearing a baby herself.
    “Then, again,” Brad added, remembering some of the conversations he’d shared with Tess, “I think she’s terrified of trying to adopt a baby. Every time there’s something on television about adoptions gone bad, Tess is right there to watch the story. Usually it’s some situation where the biological parents come to realize that they made a mistake. There was a story on a couple of nights ago about a mother who had given her baby up at age seventeen because the father skipped out on her. Then