Piece of My Heart (Fostering Love 4)

My face fell. Why did she have to ask the one question that had been rolling around in my brain the past couple of days?

“I have seen her—we just don’t live in each other’s pockets,” I said finally. “Why are you so bitchy lately?”

“Jesus,” she said with a groan. “I’m sorry. I’m totally bitchy.”

“What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” she snapped, then immediately her voice softened. “Sorry, I’m just stressed.”

If Ani was owning up to not having everything in her world perfectly handled, I knew that whatever she had going on had to be serious. She wasn’t a complainer.

“Anything I can help with?” I asked.

“No, not really.” She was quiet for a moment. “Arielle’s still on a shitty sleep schedule.”

“She’s sleeping a little, right?” I asked. For a while, my sweet little niece had been keeping her parents up all night, every night. The doctor had told them it was purely developmental and there wasn’t anything wrong, but it hadn’t made their sleep deprivation any easier to deal with.

“Yeah,” Ani replied. “But it’s still not great, and I think it’s making Bram question if we should have any more.”

“What?” I sat up a little straighter on the couch. “That’s nuts.”

“I know that,” she said. “But we were doing all this paperwork to get certified to foster—you know, so we could hopefully adopt at some point? And now Bram is dragging his feet about it.”

“He’s just overwhelmed and exhausted,” I assured her. “You know Bram wants more kids. My idiot brother is kind of great at the whole dad thing.”

“Yeah.” I could hear the smile in her voice. “Who knew?”

“I did,” I said smugly. “I just wasn’t sure if he’d pull his head out long enough to realize it.”

“You have such a way with words,” Ani said drily. “Shit, Arie’s awake. I’ll text you later, okay?”

“Sounds good. Give my baby girl a big kiss from her favorite uncle.”

“I will. She loves kisses from Uncle Shane,” she said, referring to my sister Kate’s husband. Ani laughed just before the phone line went dead.

“I’m her favorite,” I snapped, knowing that she couldn’t even hear me.

I dropped my phone and cursed as I lifted the ice pack off my knee again. The skin was tight and looked like it was beginning to bruise. I dropped my feet to the floor and let out a loud groan as I pushed myself off the couch. Dammit, I really didn’t want to go to medical to get the thing looked at, but putting any weight on it was excruciating. I hobbled into the kitchen, threw the ice pack into the sink, and grabbed some ibuprofen out of a cabinet. I wished that our doctors handed out something stronger, but they rarely did, so I never had any good painkillers lying around the house.

After using my beer to wash down the pills, I made my way to the shower. I hadn’t even rinsed the dirt and stink off when I’d gotten home, because I’d been in such a hurry to ice my damn knee before it got any worse.

Getting old sucked. Who knew thirty was the new seventy?

By the time I climbed out, feeling more relaxed, I was also in more pain. My knee just continued to fucking swell.

I toweled off quickly and dropped onto my bed, grabbing an extra pillow to prop up my leg. When I was situated, my mind was once again full of Sarai. The way she talked, the way she moved, the way she smiled and used her hands like they were part of the conversation.

Ani was right. If we weren’t actually seeing each other, what were we doing? I’d thought the night of our picnic had gone really well, but I hadn’t seen Sarai since, and it was messing with my head.

I lifted my phone and pulled up our text messages. I hadn’t talked to her since this morning, and although that wasn’t uncommon for us, it suddenly felt like a glowing red flag.

Hey, what are you up to? I texted. It was a stupid question. I knew what she was up to. It was Tuesday, and she always worked on schoolwork Tuesday nights. I could set my calendar by how regimented Sarai was.

Writing a paper, pacing, writing some more, pacing, deleting and rewriting…

Dammit. I sighed. I was doing exactly what she’d said I would do. I was fucking pouting about her busy schedule. Before I could regroup, she sent me another text.

What are you doing? Softball practice tonight, right? ?

Hurt my knee and came home early. Want some company?

There, I’d made my move. Ten minutes went by with no answer, so I sent another message.

I’ll bring my cleaning supplies…

Almost as soon as I’d sent my last text, a reply popped up on my phone.

Sure. What happened to your knee? Have you had dinner?

I grinned and texted her back.