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I start to respond but then stop. It would be weird if I said something, considering I don’t technically have any of those things in my life. When the guys asked me about being engaged during our workout the other day, I just played it off. They know Poppy. They weren’t really surprised and didn’t really poke around about it.

What I want to say is that I’ve had my first taste of those things. Messy houses, loud kids, being expected to take the trash out and move the car seat and get up with the baby at night. And it’s been the best fucking week of my life.

Football has always been a game that I love, something I could never imagine my life without. But over the past few days, I’ve started to wonder if it isn’t the love of my life anymore.

That space could be taken up by Miss Poppy Quinn.

The girl who’s been in my bed every night, in my kitchen every morning, and in my living room every evening. I can’t get her out of my mind, and I don’t want her out of my house. I’m just not quite sure how to make any of that happen.

Branch’s decision to retire makes a lot more sense now. He worships the ground Layla walks on, and I’ve never seen him happier than when he’s holding Sunny. He’d do anything for either of them.

I’ve watched him navigate this season of his life with respect and curiosity. I’ve wondered if he’d regret his decision to walk away from the game. It was his whole life—his identity—for so long.

But he won’t. I get it now.

Branch is building something at home that makes football a thing of the past. It can’t compete with early mornings with his daughter and late nights with his wife. He didn’t lose a team. He built his own.

“Hey, guys. I gotta go,” I say, picking up my things. “I’ll see you on Monday.”

“Later,” they all say in various forms as I walk away with my thoughts in one place—and it’s not on the football field.

It’s that I want to build my own team, too. With Poppy.

The ball is in my hands. I just can’t fumble it.

CHAPTER

TWENTY-FOUR

Poppy

I creep out of Sunny’s room, gently shutting the door behind me. Despite her two naps today, she fell asleep pretty easily tonight. She had dinner, curled up in Finn’s arms while I cleaned up the kitchen, and passed out.

Been there, done that, kiddo.

Our room’s quiet, the bed unmade from this morning’s hurried tryst before Finn had to leave for meetings. I haven’t figured out how to be a work-from-home auntie yet and do all the domestic things, perform my employee obligations, and keep the kid alive. Thankfully, Finn seems fine, maybe even amused, that the domestic things go undone.

I take a quick shower and throw on one of Finn’s T-shirts, mulling over how to tell Mom that we’re fake engaged. I’ve put it off all week. But now that Finn has told his parents, it only seems right that I tell mine.

Besides, I don’t want her finding out some other way.

I grab my phone off the nightstand and place the call before I chicken out.

“Hey, baby girl,” Mom says. “I was just thinking of you.”

“You were?”

“Yes. I was just in the attic looking for my extra crock pot for the church potluck and found a box full of those little outfits you made me make for your baby dolls. Do you remember those?”

I smile. “I do.”

“You drew little outfits on paper and then picked out scraps of fabric from my bin. You were so specific with your instructions. And you loved the gold rickrack.”

“It seemed so fancy.”

“It was so fancy back then—for baby dolls, especially.” She laughs. “You were always independent and determined to get what you wanted. Dad used to call you Miss Ambitious.”

My heart swells at the memory—one I’d forgotten.