Plus I knew my sister would help. Our personalities were wildly different, but there was no one I trusted to have my back more than my twin sister.
While everyone got to work, looking on their phones and making lists, I stood there, feeling immensely grateful that I’d managed to get so lucky to have friends who jumped right in to help, no questions asked. And no judgment about how I’d ended up in this situation. Just instant, unwavering support.
Aurora chose that moment to yawn, and it was the cutest fucking thing I’d ever seen in my life. I couldn’t believe she was my daughter.
I had a daughter.
I was a fuckingdad.
That was so weird and would definitely take some getting used to, but I would do my best—nothing less was acceptable, even if I had no fucking clue what I was doing.
I looked down at her cute little face and the way her fingers were curled into tiny fists. She nestled against me as if she already trusted me completely.
“Alright,” Liam announced, looking up from his phone. “According to the Internet, babies this age eat every two to three hours, sleep like sixteen to twenty hours a day, and cry for basically any reason or no reason at all. So…we’re in for an adventure.”
“Great,” I muttered, but I was smiling despite myself.
“Also,” Liam continued with that grin of his, “it says here that the most important thing is to make sure she feels safe and loved. And looking at you right now, man, I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.”
The tightness that had been in my chest since I laid eyes on the baby loosened just a little at his words. Maybe I didn’t know what I was doing. Maybe I was terrified out of my mind. But Aurora was mine, and I was going to figure out how to be what she needed.
And fortunately, I wasn’t going to have to figure it out alone.
TWELVE
This was going to be the longest meeting of my life, and I kept thinking about the millions of other places I’d rather be than here, but I wasn’t about to let Drew tank my psych grade, so here I was. I knocked on the front door of the hockey house and waited. When no one answered after a few seconds, I tried again, louder this time. Still nothing.
The party last night had been loud enough that I’d heard it from my bedroom next door until well past two in the morning, so I wasn’t surprised they were all probably dead to the world. But it was already eleven. Surely he could function on less than nine hours of sleep.
I tried the door handle and found it unlocked. Typical.
“Hello?” I called out, stepping into the entryway. The house smelled like stale beer, and red cups were scattered everywhere. Did it always look like this after one of their parties?
Heavy footsteps came down the stairs, and Liam appeared, looking like he’d been hit by a truck. His dark brown hair was sticking up in every direction, and there were dark circles under his eyes that made him look olderthan his twenty years. He was wearing a Clark Fork Hockey T-shirt that fit snug across his pecs and biceps.
“If you did this as some sick joke, it’s not funny,” he said without preamble, his slight Irish accent thicker than usual and his voice rough with exhaustion.
I blinked at him. “Did what?”
He stared at me for a long moment, studying my face like he was trying to read my mind. I had absolutely no idea what he was talking about. What kind of joke could I have possibly played that would have Liam looking at me like I’d committed a felony?
Before he could explain, the sound of a baby crying echoed from somewhere deeper in the house.
I froze. “Was that?—”
“Drew?” Liam called out, not taking his eyes off me. “She’s here.”
Was I hallucinating or was that a baby? What the hell was a baby doing in the hockey house?
I heard Drew’s voice, muffled but clearly trying to shush someone—or something. The crying continued, high-pitched, distressed, and impossible to ignore.
Holy shit, itwasa baby.
Who the hell would let Drew Dumontier babysit their kid?
Without thinking, I walked past Liam toward the back of the house, following the sound.
And then stopped dead in my tracks when I reached the kitchen and found Drew.
