Page 110 of The Clinch
Not if I’m around.
You both.
I know too quickly where those words would fit, and that’s exactly what’s wrong with them.
Leo doesn’t react. Just takes a beer from the cooler and passes me a seltzer like this is a normal assumption to make.
Maybe for him it is.
For me, it hits low and strange, another quiet piece of future sliding into place before I agreed to it.
Eden finds me the second I set foot on the lawn, as if she’s been waiting.
“Hey,” she says carefully, running a quick inventory of my face. “Haven’t seen you for weeks.”
She means since my toothbrush moved from the guest bath to Leo’s. Since “temporary” started turning into routine. I haven’t told her. I’m sure he hasn’t either.
Eden’s expression doesn’t change much, but her voice softens. “You okay?”
“I’m fine,” I say, too fast.
Her hug is brief and tight. A check-in I can’t dodge. “Good,” she says. “If you need to talk it out, I’m here.”
Over her shoulder, Leo is a few steps behind me, watching without hovering. Eden doesn’t look at him, but I can feel the message travel through the room anyway: I see you. I see this.
Nate is on the patio in a fitted tee, tongs in one hand, a cutting board in the other. Chicken, steak, and vegetables lined up in neat rows. He’s staging a photo shoot for protein.
Then Finn’s voice cuts across the patio. “Doc!” He grins and points to a double stroller parked in the shade. “Come say hi to my favorite tiny terrorists.”
Eden groans. “Oh my God. You’re doing it again.”
Finn’s grin goes wider. “Someone has to be Doc.” He points at me. “She’s starting med school in a few weeks. Completely legit.”
I laugh and lean in to peek.
His son Aidan is passed out with his mouth open, one chubby fist clenched around a battered stuffed animal, twin sister Maeve curled on her side, lashes on her cheeks, thumb tucked under her chin. She has decided the party can happen without her.
The noise doesn’t touch either of them. My brain does the math anyway.
If I’d kept that pregnancy, my baby would be almost four.
I step back before the thought can turn into anything else.
Leo comes in behind me, close enough that I can feel his heat. His hand settles at my waist through my shirt, broad and steady.
“What?” he murmurs, following my gaze.
“Nothing,” I lie, because it’s reflex.
His hand stays. He waits.
I taste metal before I can get the words out. “The stroller.”
“O’Reilly kids,” he says, low.
It takes strength to say it out loud. “I was pregnant once.”
Leo absorbs it without a word, the air beside me hardening.
