Page 230 of Triplet Babies for my Ex's Best Friend

Addy lowers herself carefully onto the couch. I sit across from her, because beside her feels too presumptuous and standing feels too cold.

She notices the choice.

“How are you feeling?” I ask.

“Tired.” She looks at her hands. “Scared. Nauseous. Like my body has opened negotiations without legal counsel.”

Despite myself, my mouth shifts.

Then I see the hospital bracelet again, and whatever almost passed for relief disappears.

“I’m sorry.” Her eyes lift. “I should have come back.”

“You had Oliver. And work.”

“I should have come back,” I say again. “I froze.”

Her face changes.

There it is. The truth. Ugly and insufficient.

“I saw you in that bed,” I continue. “I heard the monitor. The doctor. And for a moment, I wasn’t there anymore.”

Addy goes still.

“I was four years ago,” I say. “In another hospital. Too late. Again.”

Her expression softens so quickly it almost makes me angry.

She should be angry. Anger, I understand. Tenderness is harder to survive.

“Ethan,” she whispers.

“That isn’t an excuse.”

“No,” she says. “It’s not.”

I nod once.

She needs to know that.

“But it is a reason,” she adds.

My hands curl into fists against my knees. “I hurt you.”

The words scrape on the way out.

Addy’s eyes shine instantly, like the truth hurts even more spoken aloud. “Yes.”

Before I can answer, her breath catches, and she looks away toward the windows.

“I need to tell you something.”

My pulse slows.

Every pilot knows the moment before impact. The hush, the narrowing of the world, the body becoming instrument and calculation while fear waits outside the cockpit door.

“All right,” I say.