“It’s fine. You think I haven’t thought about our future like that?” Now I lean on the island, stretching my hands out to take his. I don’t care if our kids are hockey players or football players. I want them to be ours. I want to trust theycanbe. Every day with Jordan makes me believe it a little more—believe that there’s nothing to fear with him.
“I’m so relieved you do,” he says quietly, holding my handstightly, like he wants me to understand all of his feelings in that grip. We sit there, staring at each other for several moments, before he pulls away, reaching for the pizza cutter. He dishes out our pizza and then rounds the island to sit next to me. We eat in silence for several minutes, Jordan finishing his first piece and grabbing another before either of us talk.
I’m still mulling overour kids. Will we be like Janelle and Charlie and have half a dozen? I don’t think I’m opposed. I’ve just never pictured myself with a whole brood like hers. Or will it be difficult, like with Ellie? Maybe only one or two? My heart squeezes, mostly aching for my sister. But we wouldn’t have Kat and Emmeline in our family if she’d been able to get pregnant.
“So, I got a call from Mitchell Hurst today,” Jordan says, breaking into my thoughts.
My eyebrows go up. “Oh? Did he find something?”
Jordan shakes his head. “There’s been adevelopment.”
I scowl, setting my fork down. “That doesn’t sound good.”
He lets out a long, frustrated sigh. “It’s not.” He turns on the stool, facing me. “He told me to make the payment because he knows I cheated on you four months ago.”
“What?” My mouth drops open. “But there were no girlfriends?—”
“There were four dates with Daria Cane.” He pulls his phone from his pocket and opens it up to Instagram, then hands it to me to show me a post. It’s nothing. A picture of Jordan posing with a pretty woman at a restaurant. The food does look really good, but she could be a fan asking for a selfie for all this picture shows.
I point to it, scowling. “He thinks you’re going to hand over half a million dollars based on that?”
Jordan shrugs. “That’s the thing. I don’t know what he has. Surely not just this, right? He told me to ‘think about it.’”
I snort. “I’m not super surprised that there are people coming after you, but this feels like amateur hour.”
Jordan holds out his hands. “There has to be more, right? Something conclusive.”
I fold my arms. “You would think so, but some people really are just stupid.” I pick up my phone from where it’s resting, face down, next to my plate.
“Caleb?” Jordan guesses.
“Not yet. I like to save Caleb for the tricky, gray-area stuff, and those favors are big, so we’ll keep that in our back pocket for now.” I tap the contact number for Adam, one of the private detectives I have on staff in Houston. “I may not be running the place, but I am still the boss of a private investigation firm.”
CHAPTER 32
JORDAN
I call Baylee the next morning from the home office at our apartment. TheBeing Libby Bennetcrew is down at the arena today, and we need to keep a tight lid on this until we know more about what’s going on.
Once I’ve told her about the latestdevelopmentin the Mitchell situation, she calls him some dirty names. I think my sister might have been a hockey player in another life. She certainly has the mouth of one.
“Agreed,” I say dryly.
“What are we going to do?” she asks. “And what about the others?”
“This isn’t for you to worry about. Redhaven won’t be paying Mitchell anything. Libby has someone looking into it.”
“This feels … bad,” she says, anxiousness coming through in her voice. “Like he must have something really incriminating.”
“Or he wants me to think he does,” I counter. “Even if he has something from Daria, there’s nothing to prove anything except that we went out a few times. Libby and I could say we weren’t serious yet. It would have been only two months into our supposed relationship.”
“The whirlwind relationship that led to you getting married after only six months,” she reminds me.
“Libby’s PR team is top notch.”
“That would be too easy.” Baylee’s voice is tight. I can hear the echoes in it of the days after we found out what Bryce had done and she felt responsible. The fact that Mitchell is another ex—even if it was from high school—has to be pulling all that back up again.
I have a moment of clarity that it’s no accident Libby came into my life. That like Baylee, she has scars from the past that need gentle care. And that I’m the man meant to be here for her, like I have been for Baylee. It’s like I was prepared for Libby to fall into my life, like I had to go through the heartache with Baylee to be exactly what Libby needed.
