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“You know, for someone who’s supposedly so madly in love and so thrilled to be having a baby, you’re amazingly disinterested.”
“I am not.”
“Umm, fuckyes, you are. What gives?”
“Nothing.” I forced down a miniscule bite of hot dog, chasing it with some soda when it got stuck in my throat.
Dropping her hot dog onto her plate and wiping her fingers on a napkin, Stef watched me closely. “Just so you know, I’ve never bought this bullshit charade. I’ve known from the start that it wasn’t legit.”
“You don’t know shit.” I heard the desperation in my voice and barely kept from wincing at how pathetic it sounded.
“You’re my brother. I’ve known you my whole life. I know that if you’d just had a casual hookup or whatever, you wouldn’t have mentioned it. But if you really felt that you had met the love of your life in Seattle that weekend, you would have told me. But you never said a word about it that whole week. So, imagine my surprise when you call to say you’d gotten married. To Lucy fucking Cooper, no less.” She picked up a fry and popped it into her mouth, watching me meditatively. I squirmed under the scrutiny. But she wasn’t done yet. “And you were so vague about the details that I just couldn't make sense of it, and that’s when I thought,Hmm, best I get my ass down there and find out what the fuck is actually going on.”
“No need to do that.”
“On the contrary, there’s every fucking need, because I’m barely in the door five minutes when I find out you’re being investigated. Forinsurance fraud!”
“Keep your voice down,” I hissed desperately.
“Aaah, I’m thinking, now it’s starting to make sense. Because this is peak Dante Moretti, if I know my brother. Which I do. You accidentally knock up your weekend fling and being the man of complete honor but zero sense that you are, you decide that the best course of action is to marry her, post haste— Man, I love that term.Post haste. It means superfast, if you’re wondering.”
“I got that. Or should I say,surmised, if we’re getting all fancy.”
“Anyway, where was I?”
“Talking completely out of your ass, from what I could tell.”
“Bullshit. You and Lucy get married for your insurance coverage. On one hand, it’s a smart move, considering that she’s been so unwell. But on the other, really dumb, because, you know, investigation.” She stopped to take a breath and a sip of soda. “So. You make a marriage of convenience that you no doubt plan to end once the baby is safely born. How am I doing so far?”
I dropped my gaze to my uneaten food. There was no way I could deny it, because then that would be outright lying to my sister, and I couldn’t ever do that. “You’ve…got the gist of it.”
“Of course I have. There’s just one part I can’t figure out, no matter how hard I try.”
“What’s that?”
“If you’re as madly in love with her as I think you are, why haven’t you told her? Why are you sticking with the sham marriage bullshit?”
I went completely still, staring at my baby sister in utter shock.
“Oh, you didn’t know you were in love with her? Sorry to drop that bombshell on you, but you are.”
She said it so simply, and her tone was so matter of fact, that there was no possible way for me to deny it. I was deeply and profoundly in love with Lucy.
“Well, this has been a lot of fun.” She glanced at her watch. “But I guess I should hit the road and let you get to your meeting before you head home to break the good news to Lucy. I can’t quite get a read on her, but I really hope she’s open to a huge declaration, that she feels the same, and that you sail off into the sunset, with my baby niece in tow. Or nephew.”
Still reeling from finally acknowledging what my heart had known for a long time, I flinched at her words.
Catching my reaction, she frowned. “What the fuck? You aren’t even gonna tell her? You’re that chicken shit, you’re too scared to put it all on the line for—”
“I can’t, Stef!” I blurted out.
“Of course you can! It’s easy. You just go home, waltz in the door, say, Hey, Luce, I’ve got some news. I love you to pieces and want to spend the rest of my life with you, be an amazing dad to our bab—” She cut herself off, staring at me, her brown eyes wide. I tried to make my face blank, expressionless, but she knew. “No! Fuck that! No, Dante.”
“Come on, Stef. How can I possibly be a dad to Lucy’s baby? I don’t know the first thing about it and I’m going to fuck it up completely. The baby and Lucy are both much better off without me. I’m not father material, that’s all there is to it.”
“Holy fucking dog’s balls, you’re a real dumbass.”
“Don’t start that.”
