“Are you okay?” she asks.
“Is it that obvious?”
She chuckles. “Well, Asher told me you and Dex are having problems, but he didn’t seem to know anything else.”
I’m not sure how much to say. I don’t know who’s my friend or who’s his or who I can trust in this town. But I need someone to talk to, and she invited me here so the boys could play together, and I guess this is my best option for someone to talk to.
“Can I trust you?” I ask.
Her eyes whip to mine, and she looks nearly insulted by my question. If she is, she doesn’t mention it. “Of course. Anything you say to me stays with me.”
“I should probably make you sign the same NDA Dex made our families sign, but whatever. Our marriage started out as an arrangement, but it turned into something else. Something more. Something real. And then last night, I was forced to end things with him, but I’m in this for the duration of our contract, and I’m Jack’s nanny, and I have to live with Dex when I love him so much but can’t be with him, and I just want to go home.” I realize how very much I’m babbling by the end, but I can’t seem to stop until the entire story is out.
“Oh, gosh, Ains,” she says, and she moves toward me to give me a hug. The squeeze feels comforting, and I draw in a shaky breath as I do my best to ward off the tears.
“I’m so sorry,” she says. And then, instead of asking what she can do to help, she jumps into action. “Listen, Dex asked Asher if he could stay with us the next few days. Why don’t you leave Jack here, too, and go home for a while? I’ll watch him, and maybe time apart and away from this town will help you figure out what your next move should be.”
“I couldn’t ask you to do that,” I murmur.
She reaches over and squeezes my forearm. “I know. It’s why I offered.”
“You’re a good friend.” I pat her hand on my arm.
“And you’re going through a hard time. If you miss home and feel the need to be there, I’m simply opening up the option to make that happen.”
“I’ll think about it,” I say softly. It’s so easy for all of these people to just jet off to another town to get away from things for a while. My entire life, I’ve never had the money to do that sort of thing, and it feels strange that I do now. I’m not quite used to it yet, and I’m still living frugally even though my bank account is growing every two weeks thanks to Dex’s generous paychecks.
I can dip into that and go see my family for a few days. But I’m not as sure how to get home to Chicago and avoid seeing Ivy. I’m not ready to admit that things got pretty damn real between her brother and me…especially not now that it’s all over. She’s my best friend, though. She’s who I would talk to aboutanyguy trouble, and that doesn’t preclude her big, dumb brother.
The boys play, and we chat. She slips something about how she’s already starting to show, and I find out she’s due in February with her second child.
I hate that I love her as much as I do since he’ll win this couple in our split. He works with her husband. Of course they’ll side with him. It makes sense that their allegiance will lie with him.
The boys go down for a nap at the same time, around three o’clock, and we keep talking right through naptime.
It feels good to have someone to chat with even if there is likely no future to this friendship. But blabbing my secrets would hurt Dex, her husband’s teammate, so I feel like there’s a bit of inherent trust there.
The boys both wake, and we’re doing some tummy time when Desi gasps.
“Jakey Jakey!” she sings. “Daddy’s home!”
My brows dip. “He is?”
She giggles. “I can hear the garage when it opens.” And thirty seconds later, the door opens.
My heart starts to beat in double time as I realize Dex is probably with Asher. I didn’t mean to stay this late knowing there was a chance I’d run into him, but here I am.
“Hey, there’s my family!” Asher says when he walks into the room.
“Da da da da,” Jake babbles, and he holds his arms up in the cutest way to indicate his dad should pick him up.
Desi gets up off the floor to greet Asher with a kiss, and I spot Dex behind him but avert my eyes to Jack so I don’t have to make eye contact with him.
God, this is complicated.
Dex gets a little too close as he moves in to greet his son. He picks him up and hugs him, and then he asks, “Ains, can we talk?”
“You can go upstairs and leave Jack down here if you want some privacy,” Desi says.
