Her lower belly was visibly rounded — a curve that couldn’t be explained by a big meal. My eyes went from that swell to Michael’s terrified face, and the temperature in the hallway seemed to drop.

A realization cut clean through everything I’d refused to see.

I made my voice work, keeping the hysteria out of it. “Khloe. You’re pregnant.”

Her face went from pale to gray. She shrank back, using Michael’s shoulders as a shield, tears welling on cue. Michael clamped his jaw shut, and his silence was the confession.

But the worst was still coming.

The slippers shuffled again. This time it was my mother-in-law, Diane, coming out of the kitchen with a steaming bowl of chicken broth.