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“I love you, Rhys.”
He looked up sharply, and his entire face broke out into a grin. “I’ve loved you since the day I woke up in the hospital room and found you staring at me…I just didn’t know what the emotion I was feeling was.”Chapter 26I call it taking care of myself and chasing my dreams. Others call it a nap.
-Rhys to Henley
Rhys
Three days later, I found myself in a grocery store for the first time since I was a young kid.
This time, though, it was immensely more fun staring at my woman’s ass rather than my mother’s.
Speaking of my woman, we made eye contact across the fruits and vegetables, and she looked down with embarrassment.
Why was she so embarrassed all the time? Literally, I only looked at her, and she was flushing pink.
Not that I didn’t enjoy the hell out of it when she flushed pink, but still.
My girl needed to learn to take the looks I was giving her, because I didn’t plan on stopping anytime soon.
“What is it?” I asked, looking at her like she was hiding something.
“Nothing,” she lied.
I rolled my eyes, then looked at the spread of apples.
Why were there so many fuckin’ kinds?
I grabbed three different bags, putting them all into the grocery cart.
“Jesus,” Henley whispered, catching her niece around the waist and hitching her up onto her hip. “Stop throwing stuff into my cart. You’re not even going to be here this week to eat any of this.”
She had a point but…I was hungry. One shouldn’t ever go to the grocery store hungry.
I looked at the little girl and held my hands out to her.
She came willingly.
Autumn had shared the flu with Henley and was just now on the mend just like Henley was.
Unfortunately, Alana had missed too much work and was being threatened with a write up if she didn’t go in today—which was why we ended up on babysitting duty.
Tonight, I’d be on a plane flying to Toronto for a baseball game and leaving my woman behind for over a week. During the week that I would be gone, Henley would be doing three things.
One, visiting with the women who were carrying our children.
Two, doing a photo shoot for Baller Magazine that would be showcasing us as a couple, and our wedding, as one of a four-part series involving ‘bachelors of baseball.’
And three, she would be flying to Toronto—out of the country for the first time—by herself. It was only her third plane ride, and I was already hating the fact that I wouldn’t be with her.
All three of those things I did not, under any circumstances, want her doing by herself.
Yet, I had no choice.
Per our contract with the surrogates, we met with them once a week during their pregnancy. Went to all their doctor appointments, and every single sonogram. Hell, we even had legal rights to call them at any hour of the day to ask how they were doing.
As for Baller Magazine, that hadn’t been my pony show. That’d been all Henley.
She’d been approached during the last game, and they’d asked her if she’d be willing to do it. She’d, of course, said yes and I hadn’t had anything to do with the time or place that they had it.
Then there was the flight out to Toronto.
Since she had all the other stuff going on during the week, she couldn’t fly out with the rest of the wives and girlfriends, ensuring she wouldn’t be alone. I wished she would be able to fly out with me, but even if she’d been able to go at the same time as me, team regulations meant that she’d be banned from our flight.
“Are you listening to me at all when I say you don’t need this?” Henley asked, poking me in the chest. “This will expire by this weekend. You’re leaving tonight. And I already have dinner in the crock pot for tonight…”
I looked at the steaks I’d added to the cart. “They freeze.”
She rolled her eyes and walked away, and I watched her ass as she did.
Autumn smacked me on the chest, and I looked down at her still tired eyes.
“What do you want to eat?” I asked her.
“Nana.”
I went to the bananas, grabbed a bunch, and put them into the cart, too.
Then I followed Henley to wherever she was going now.
I found her at the meat counter.
Once she’d selected what she wanted, her eyes caught on something behind me, and she rushed over.
I turned and watched her, chuckling softly when she walked straight over to the end cap, which happened to have extra-large condoms as well as lube. She grabbed a handful of each.
Four times.
I nearly choked.
But I didn’t stop her.
She’d been ‘healthy’ again for two days. And both of those days I’d taken her twice before she’d ordered me to back away from her.
