“I don’t think so. If you love her, then stop being a bitch about this. She lied to you, I get it. She’s been in a really bad place.” He slips into a more neutral tone. “I didn’t know her husband killed himself. She must’ve gone through hell. It explains why she was afraid to tell you this too, man.”
I grasp all this intellectually, and then there’s the fact that she’s been pissed off at me for a long time. I’ve never doubted we’d work through this, but she has. She wasn’t sure that we would find the love we once had. Or if it was all in our heads. I knew though.
“What the hell does that mean? Afraid to tell me?” I ask him.
“You left her. Todd left her. She lost everything. She gets you back. What the hell do you think was the next possible outcome to her?” He cracks his neck. “Please, make the wrong choice. Let her go. See what happens.”
Trent stands, walks over, and slaps the back of my head. “You’re an idiot.”
“You’re both assholes.”
“True.” He chuckles. “But at least I know that if Grace ever really was going to walk away, I’d chase her.”
He’s so full of shit. Grace has been gone for months, he just won’t see it. He’s the last person I’m taking love advice from. Wyatt gives me a look that lets me know we’re on the same page.
“How did you find out about the baby?” Trent asks.
“Doesn’t matter.”
The point is that she kept it from me. I found out, and that’s the damn issue.
Wyatt stares me down. “I think it does matter.”
“You would.” I raise my chin. “Imagine knowing the girl you love, want to marry, would died for, kept this goddamn secret for so long. I deserved to know about that baby.”
Wyatt hops to his feet and walks over. “You’ve always been the slowest out of the three of us. Yet, you managed to get the girl.” He huffs out a frustrated breath. “I know what it’s like to watch someone you love look at someone else. I lived it. I know what it feels like to not be able to say what you’re thinking, because you know when you do, life will change.” He snaps his fingers. “Just like that. You want to play games with her? She’ll find another player. There are plenty in the lineup.”
He walks out of the door of his own house, and Trent shakes his head. “He’s been in love with Presley since the first time he laid eyes on her, but she found you first. I don’t know what you’re expecting from him. He’s kept away because he’d never get between you two, but I’m not sure that if you walk away, he will anymore.”
“He’d be dead to me.”
“Why?”
“Because she’s mine.”
“Right now she is.” Trent rests his hand on my shoulder. “But not if you let her go.”
I lean back in the chair as Trent leaves the house. I don’t know what to do anymore. It’s been almost twenty-four hours since I saw her. She’s consumed every moment of my thoughts since I left her. Then I think about Logan and Cayden. How broken those boys were over the truth. How broken I am over the truth.
Did she do it because she wanted to hurt anyone? No. I’m fully aware of why she kept it from me. It doesn’t hurt any less though.
I sit there, thinking back on how we’d dreamed of having a baby. So many nights we spent talking about our life and how it would be.
“Two boys and a girl.” Presley looks over with stars in her eyes.
“I want all girls,” I tell her, and she rolls back over with a smile.
“You would, Zachary Hennington. You would.”
I’d give her whatever she wanted as long as she doesn’t quit smiling like that. I’m a lucky bastard.
“How about we compromise?” I ask her.
She looks over as she contemplates. “What kind of compromise?”
The thing about her is that she knows me well enough to know that I’d cave to her. But she lets me have this for a little while. Not as if I have any control over it anyway.
“Two boys and two girls.”
“Four babies?”
“Why not? I have two brothers and you have one. It would be better if we have an even number.” Which is true. Wyatt is always the one that Trent and I team up against. Last night we almost got beat with the spoon because we hung him on the flag pole. Land of the free is what we told Daddy. He laughed, but Mama was yelling about boys and her hair.
Presley tilts her head and looks at the sky. “I don’t know. I mean, that’s a lot of names. We only have two picked out.”
She’s crazy, but I love her. “We know the first girl will be Sadie and the first boy is Colton.”
“Right, but that was a month of fighting—”
“And making up,” I remind her.
“Which was fun.” She smirks. “But. Two more names would be a lot more fightin’.”
I love when her accent grows strong. Presley is a siren. I can hear her call no matter where I am. On the field I go into a tunnel. Focusing only on the batter, the ball, the runners. I hone in and live in that moment. Unless she speaks. I don’t know what it is, but she’ll break my trance with one word. And if she’s upset, her accent goes deep, and it’s all I hear.
“And a lot more making up.”
“If I forgive you.” She cocks her head.
“You always do,” I remind her.
Presley groans. “Stop being so damn cute.”