AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I don’t know,” is all he says, and I growl under my breath. The first time I want him to step in, he’s got nothing. “It’s her body. That’s all I can really tell you. Listen to her.”
“Her body, but our baby,” I say with a slight heave of my stomach at the words.
Xan’s expression hardens, and he stands up straighter, which means he’s going to launch into me. I brace myself for it.
“Your job is done, Zeke. You had your fun. She does all the work now, okay?” He takes me by the back of the neck like he used to when I was younger, that serious sheen to his eyes, the unspoken message he was able to convey in the dim light of my room before he’d roughly let me go and close me in my bedroom with my sisters. I shake him off me because I can’t stand that look. I can’t stand that reminder. He pokes my chest to get my attention.
“There is a human growing inside of her body. You and I will never understand what that’s like. Your job now is to listen to her, to trust she knows her body, and to be there if she needs anything.”
“I have no clue how long she’s staying or how I can support her if she’s living in fucking Alabama.” The frustration whistles through clenched teeth, and slipping out around the edges of the words is the desperately lost version of me. The side of me that knows everything is different now.
Xan’s aware of my track record with women. That when it comes to devotion, the only thing I’ve dedicated my life to is making sure no one ever gets close enough to see me for what I really am.
“I didn’t say it would be easy. I saidlisten. That’s it, Zeke.” He taps his ear, and it sounds simple enough. Judging by all the ways my brain is conjuring up sentences that start withYeah, but…I think simple and easy might be two very different things.
“I haven’t told Jess yet,” I mumble, and Xan settles back into his relaxed pose, arms resting on the fence, his attention turned back to Millie and Sarah.
“Jess is a sweet girl. You won’t have trouble with her.”
He’s right. Jess has never been trouble for me, but I’ve been nothing but trouble for her.
There’s no fucking way I’m getting out of any of this.
Time to grow up.
And fast.
