AllFreeNovel
Share Us
And when John continues, I hate her a little more. “She thinks he should stay with us for a while. She wants me to have a relationship with him. So, I thought he could fly home with me tomorrow.”
For what feels like an entire minute, I’m rendered speechless. I… I just can’t. JesusfuckingChrist. “You did not actually think that.”
“Yeah,” he says, and not for the first time, I wonder if he walks around with a head full of nothing. “I did, babe.”
“Don’t call me that.” I pinch the bridge of my nose like that might stem the impending migraine. “No.No. Absolutely not.”
Genuinely, mind-bogglingly shocked, John huffs. “You’re being unreasonable. He’s not just yours, you know. That’s my kid too.”
That’s where he’s wrong, though. From the very beginning, August has been mine. All mine. Only mine. It’s always been me and him, and it always will be. I’d only ever consider sharing the light of my life with someone worthy.
John and Clare are not that.
“You need to leave,” I say firmly. “Now.”
“Babe, c’mon.”
“I said don’t—”
A yell of my name cuts me off. Another has my gaze whipping towards the field, landing on the man standing square in the center. Hands on his hips, Cass cocks his head, the epitome of condescension as he kisses his teeth loud enough for me to hear all the way over here. “Say goodbye to your friend. We’re starting.”
“Seriously?” John’s irritation is as tangible as it is audible. “I can’t stay?”
“Sorry,” Cass says, not sounding very sorry at all. “All spectators need to be pre-approved.”
Bullshit. That is so bullshit, I know it is, and while I don’t appreciate him barking orders at me in front of everyone, another part of me—the honest part of me, maybe—could kiss him for giving me an unarguable out.
Keeping my expression carefully blank, I shrug at John. “Coach’s orders.”
He’s pissed. Red-faced, flared nostrils, spittle-developing kind of pissed and he’s so freaking eager to take it out on me but we’re in public and we’re not in Texas and Cass—again, kisses of gratitude come to mind—keeps yelling about being on a time-crunch so he’s kinda shit outta luck.
He doesn’t say goodbye to his son. He doesn’t say goodbye to me either, technically, since I think his snarled, “this isn’t over, Sunny,” is meant more as a threat than anything else. But he does leave.
And I do swallow my indignation for just long enough to mouth my thanks at the man who made him.
5
SUNDAY
I knewKristal Wainwright was gonna be a pain in my ass the very first day we met, when she dropped her son off in my class, greeted me asMrs. Laneand didn’t particularly like me correcting her.
No husband?she’d asked with the stiffest smile, her voice so thick with disapproval it made me a little nauseous.
My teeth had ached with how hard I’d gritted them.No, ma’am.
And August is your son?
Yes, ma’am.
She only hummed before bidding me goodbye but Lord, was it a loaded noise.
I get it—my situation is a little jarring. Formerly teen, always unmarried mom does merit some kind of a reaction. But is it really that big a deal? In this day and age, is it really such a grievous offense? Does it truly warrant Kristal running her mouth to her silly little friends every damn chance she gets?
Yes. As she makes so very apparent, it is.
“You know how old she is?” Even if I wasn’t only three rows behind the woman, I’d hear her loud and clear; she makes no effort to whisper. Hell, I swear she even glances back once or twice to make sure I’m listening. “Twenty-seven with an eleven-year-old.”
Shireen Hayes—number two on my shit list if only for being so buddy-buddy with Kristal—gasps as if they haven’t had this exact conversation at least three times in as many weeks, and that’s only the ones I’ve been privy to. “I can’t believe they hired her.”
