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I close my eyes and let my lips rest on the top of her head. I savor her warmth, her closeness. “I just know.”
I know something else. Every day, every minute we’re apart, it will hurt. Physically tear me up, but that’s what being a father is—doing the right thing, the noble thing, even when it’s hard, especially then.
“Our kids will hear about all this one day,” I say. “The crazy way we met. They’ll laugh. Make jokes.Michelwill be there too. One of our kids will be sitting on his knee. Angela will be knitting in the corner.Michelsaid she likes to knit.”
She squeezes tightly onto my side, shaking slightly. I think she’s crying again. I kiss the top of her head.
“I promise,” I say fiercely. “We’re going to be together. All of us. One big happy family.” My voice gets choked up. I’ve never had that. A family, but now, maybe… I think about my mom and imagine her in the scene, rocking in her chair. “Maybe I’ll even reach out to Mom. She’s almost seventy. She was never healthy.”
“It’s your choice,” Emma says. “I’ll support you either way.”
I lean down and kiss her again. “I wish I could stay. If you asked me, I would, Emma. If you told me you needed me here and to abandon my team, I’d do it.”
“I can’t do that. I want to be with you, but you’re making the right decision, especially if this is your last season. Think about your legacy. Maybe you won’t regret it immediately, but you will one day. Being the man who ran out on his team.” She leans back in my arms and wipes her cheeks. It’s like this is hurting her to say. “I wish we never had to be apart, but this is the real world. We have to be mature about it. We can make it work.”
“Me, mature?” I say, kissing away her tears. “I’m not mature, Emma, just old.”
“Oh, hush. You’re thirty-six. Even if you think you’re ancient in professional athlete years, you’renotancient in real ones.”
“Either way, people are going to talk. They’re going to call you a gold digger. They’re going to call me a cradle robber.”
“Let them say anything they want,” she hisses passionately, staring up with that captivating fight in her eyes. “I don’t care. If Dad, Mom, and Eric support us, nobody else matters. Just me and you. Just our children.”
I love you, I almost say like I did earlier. I got so close, but I couldn’t crack myself open completely. Not until I know we’re getting our happily ever afterifwe do.
“I feel the same,” I tell her. “The world can have any damn opinion they want. We know we are made for each other.”
CHAPTERNINETEEN
TWO WEEKS LATER
Emma
I sit on Chrissy’s beanbag, my chest aching like crazy, which is pretty much the norm these days. My head hurts, too, aching from lack of sleep. It feels like pressure constantly expands inside of me. I groan and rub my face.
Chrissy wags her finger at me, causing her bracelets to clink together. “Why are you groaning, huh?” She just asked me, So, when are you telling your dad?“It’s been two weeks of secret texting. Phone calls. Two weeks of you telling me you’ll rip the Band-Aid off. Then nothing.”
I sit up, glaring at her. “I’ve already told you. We’re not talking about this crap. You just said it—two weeks. It’s only beentwo weekssince you—”
“Nope, nah-uh. Jeez, E. Okay, I was drugged, but those men are in jail. In fact, I’m pretty sure the cops have stopped looking for Mr. Vigilante, sothatstory has a happy ending, at least. Apparently, the weirdos even gave up their friends who ran.”
“That’s great news!”
“But,” Chrissy goes on, fidgeting in her computer chair, twisting it from side to side, “none of that means you have to treatme differently. It’s in the past. There are only so many times I can talk about the one freaking bike trail I’ve been to this past month, okay? So let’s cut. The. Crap.” She claps her hands with each word. “This is making you miserable. You haven’t slept. It’s not good for anybody. You need to tell them.”
I stand up, wanting to yell, but I can’t, not at Chrissy. I want to yell at myself for being such a coward. My life has taken on a routine these past two weeks: video chatting with Logan mid-day when Dad’s out with the volume turned low. The camera sex. Thephonesex. Logan’s team is winning again.
“I’m sorry,” Chrissy says. “I didn’t mean to yell at you, but it’s painful, E. Watching you eat yourself up. Look at me. Look at what happened, but it’sover. Not knowing, imagining all the worst-case scenarios. That’s the really bad part.”
I rub my eyes. She’s completely right, which makes arguing with her impossible. Whenever I think about telling Dad, his reaction surges into my head, his face malformed from the hate. “I should’ve told him the day Logan left. Every day, we’ve made it worse with more sneaking around. Dad doesn’t even know why Logan ghosted him. It was because of me, of how he felt. Loganwantsto be Dad’s friend, but he can’t reach out until Dad knows.”
“Why not?” Chrissy asks.
“Logan doesn’t want to lie to him. He wants to tell him, and it’s not like we’ve got forever.” I let my hand move over my belly. Chrissy’s retro-style digital clock readsDecemberabove the time. “I have to do it. Soon. Tonight.”
“Is Logan getting impatient?” Chrissy asks.
“He doesn’t talk about it unless I bring it up. Honestly, I don’t think he has the time. Logan’s very good at cordoning off parts of his mind. Do you know what I mean?”
