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“In the sense that I work off hours, yes. But that’s just expected of teachers. I’ve got nothing on you.”

“No one is as big a workaholic as Cap,” Ricci chimed in. “Except maybe Kean, but his focus is more about improving himself, while Cap is worried about the whole team.”

“Wait, is she volunteering with you too? Can I talk with her? Is that too much?” Mom asked.

“Maybe not now, but next time for sure. We’re still figuring things out, but … I’m excited for you to meet her. And the baby, of course.”

“And a little nervous too, I bet.”

“Yeah. A lot.” I laughed.

“It’d be weird if you weren’t,” she assured.

“Thanks, Mom. I—”

“Christenson,” Kodi called, waving at me from the door. When she saw I was on the phone, she cringed and mouthed an apology that I waved off.

“Sorry, Mom. I gotta go for a photo shoot. But I’ll call you back sometime next week so we can really catch up, okay?”

“Of course, always happy to hear from you. Talk soon, love you.”

“Love you too,” I said before hanging up and heading to the hall.

“Good talk?” Leah asked, popping up at my side.

“Are you coming to the shoot?” I asked instead of answering her question.

“Yeah, I’m curious what it’s like. Unless you don’t want me to come.”

“Uh.” I cringed, remembering the brief Kodi had given the photographers for this shoot. This and all the other shoots have been … clearly for the female gaze, which was the whole concept. But something about having Leah be there while I was being sexualized for folding laundry was … a little awkward. Especially after that call we haven’t addressed and the way my insides were twisting. “I might be shirtless.”

“Oh, I see. So you’re worried I’ll get enough material for my spank bank from this shoot that I won’t need to call you again,” she said, laughing.

It was a joke, clearly. But also …

“Maybe.” I shrugged and specifically didn’t look at Leah.

“Visuals are nice, but they don’t compare to your voice.”

I didn’t linger on her response. I couldn’t. It sounded like a dream. Like she wanted more. But I was probably hearing what I wanted, even though I shouldn’t want more. I still had the team to take care of, then the baby. I shouldn’t be thinking so much about Leah as … a partner.

So I pushed to another topic.

“Have you told your parents about the baby yet? I know you said your mom wasn’t around, but what about your dad? Or any other family?”

“Nope,” she said, popping the P. “I mean, I guess I told my folks in the only way I could.”

“Is that … a good thing?”

Leah tilted her head side to side, hem-hawing. “It’s as good as it can get.”

I nodded, fighting off disappointment. Her coming to this event, encouraging me to talk to my mom, the phone sex, the tightening in my chest, all of that was just happenstance. We weren’t any closer than we were when we first met and I hated it. I didn’t want those moments we felt like more to be fleeting. I wanted something, even if I couldn’t name what it was.

In the few seconds that it took to walk down to the laundry room, I thought about what Brooker had said about healing happening by pushing through someone’s walls and about Leah’s reaction to how I acted at her first appointment. And I thought about her hand on my leg as I talked to my mom. Maybe that was progress for her. After all, she said she didn’t do fuck buddies and we sort of did that.

If this was a matter of me being impatient …

“Leah?”