“Sloane?”
“Shh.” I put my fingertip on his lips. “Give me a minute, okay?”
He smiled. “I’ll give you all the time you need, peanut.”
“You seem happier than earlier.”
He cupped my cheek with his palm. “There’s something I need to tell you.”
“Okay.”
“Before I do, please know that she will not tell a soul, including my father.”
“You told your mother?” I tried to wriggle away from him, but this time, he held me tight where I was.
“Sloane, I swear to you that she will not tell anyone.”
I felt dizzy and closed my eyes. “If she—”
“She won’t. I promise you.”
“Is that what you had to tell me?”
He sat on the sofa, next to me. “No.”
I leaned my head against the cool leather. “There’s more?”
“You said I seem happier.”
“I’m struggling with caring about your happiness, Tackle. I can’t believe you told your mother.”
He rested his head on the back of the sofa like I had. “I really need to tell you this.”
I sighed. “Okay. Go ahead.”
“My mom asked me how I felt about having a baby. I told her that if she’d asked me that yesterday, I would’ve said no way in hell I wanted one at this point in my life.”
Every muscle in my body tightened, almost like rigor mortis.
“And then I told her today’s answer.” Tackle put his fingers on my chin and turned my face toward him. “Which was—and I’m going verbatim here—‘It’s Sloane, Mom. Can you imagine what an amazing mother she’ll be, not to mention how awesome the kid will be?’”
“Did you really say that?” I asked, trying my damnedest not to cry.
“I really did. Word for word.”
“What does she think?”
“That I handled things with you like a total jackass.”
“What does she think about me?”
“That if you’re smart, like she knows you are, you’ll kick me to the curb. She’s also praying you’ll give me another chance.” His eyes bored into mine. “Will you?”
“It isn’t that simple. There’s still the matter of my brother, who will likely kill you when he finds out.”
“Kill me? I figured he’d throw a couple of punches. You really think he’ll kill me?”
“You’re not funny. He’s going to be really mad, Tackle, and you know it. My parents will be too. At least my mom will be. She’ll be mad at both of us.”