This would be a terrible idea. He's injured. We're both exhausted. We're supposed to be roommates, co-parents, nothing more.
But I want to kiss him so badly I can barely breathe.
"Sloane," he says, and there's a warning in his voice. Or maybe a question.
"I should go to bed." I don't move.
"Yeah. Me too." He doesn't move either.
The moment stretches between us, loaded with everything we're not saying. Everything we're not doing.
Then Tucker steps back, putting space between us. "Goodnight, Sloane.”
I shouldn’t love the sound of my name in his mouth, the way his tongue moves against his teeth when he says it. I shouldn’t want this man. “Goodnight."
I flee to my room—his room, that he gave me—and close the door.
My heart races. The babies are tumbling around like they can feel the adrenaline coursing through me.
This is getting complicated.
No—this has been complicated from the start. I'm just finally admitting it.
I climb into bed, the sheets expensive and soft, and stare at the ceiling.
Down the hall, I hear Tucker's door close. Hear the shower start up.
I imagine him in there, washing off the flight, the violence. Taking care of his bruised face. Being alone when maybe he doesn't want to be.
Is he touching himself in there, the way I touched myself in his tub, just thinking about the lightning that struck when we slept together?
I could go to him. Could knock on his door. Could tell him I don't want to be just roommates anymore.
But fear keeps me frozen. Fear of losing myself again. Fear of making the same mistakes. Fear that this is just proximity and pregnancy hormones and not something real.
So, I stay in bed, hand on my stomach, feeling his babies move and wondering how much longer I can resist their father.
CHAPTER 26
TUCKER
She's staringat me again.
I pretend not to notice, keeping my eyes on the TV where my cousin Wyatt and West Ham are getting demolished by Liverpool. But I can feel Sloane's gaze tracking across my shoulders, down my bare chest, lingering on my stomach.
It's been happening for weeks now.
Ever since that night I came home from St. Louis with a bruised face and she looked at me like she wanted to jump my bones.
At first, I thought she thought I looked weird, especially as the bruise shifted to a weird yellow-green.
But something shifted. I see it in the way she watches me move around the apartment. The way her eyes drop to my mouth when I'm talking. The way she bites her lip when I walk past her in the hallway.
I’ve had my nose to the ice, totally focused on working out, keeping my cool around Grentley, and calling the players union every fucking afternoon to talk about actual time off for when these babies show up.
And all the while, Sloane’s been looking at me like she’s starving and I’m a bowl of ice cream.
It's driving me insane.
