“I want to fix sister.Her falls downall the time.”Peter beamed at him.“There’s the Daddy car!”
She did fall down all the time.Of course that was because she threw herself into everything.She also always got back up again.
“There it is indeed.Come on.”Using his cane, he hauled himself up again and took Peter’s hand.Shit, he still hadn’t talked to Ian about his offer.
His head was going to explode.
“Let’s go home.”
ChapterTwenty-Three
Ian spent the rest of his day rocking and holding one little one after another.
When Tori wasn’t sniffling, Peter was.
JP was quiet as a mouse, deep in his phone.He would sit with Peter or Tori if they wanted, but he was distracted.Something was clearly up.
Finally, both the kids were asleep together on the sofa, and he leaned over, touching JP’s arm.“Love?You okay?”
JP startled and looked up at him.“Huh?Oh, I’m fine.Relieved Tori’s okay.”
“Yeah, that was terrifying.She was swinging from one bar to another, and she just hit the ground.”He’d never seen anything so horrifying, never done something so difficult as just picking her up and bringing the kids home.
“She’s fearless.”JP shook his head.“And it makes me proud, and yeah, it’s also kind of terrifying.”
“Yeah.Good thing I’m used to it, hmm?”Ian knew something was wrong, but he didn’t know what.“Are you okay, love?”
“Yeah.I got a call from my agent today.”
His heart stopped beating.Just totally stopped.
What was going to happen?Was JP going back?Was JP mad?What were they going to do?He didn’t want to do this without JP anymore.They were falling in love again.
They were in love again.
“Oh?”He went for super casual.
JP sighed and ran his hands through his hair.“They want me to go coach.”
Okay.Okay, that wasn’t great, but it wasn’t evil.It made him a little queasy, in fact.“All right.What do you want?”
“For them to fucking pay out my contract.”JP growled the words out.“I told Derek to negotiate for as much as he can get me without the coaching.”
“Okay.Okay.”He shifted closer, holding JP’s gaze.“Do youwantto coach?”
“I don’t know… I never thought about it before, but it would be a way to stay in the game, you know?”
He nodded, his heart just heavy.Still, he knew what he had to do.What he should have done last time.“If that’s what you want, then you’ll have to tell them we’re coming with you.The babies and I deserve to have you when you’re home.”
He hated it — hated the idea of uprooting the twins and starting over — but he hated the idea of losing JP again even more.
But JP shook his head.“I’m not coaching in Florida.If I do coach it’ll be with a team closer to home.Like a lot closer.That’s why I told Derek to get me the best payout deal he can.If they’ll only pay me half of what’s left on my contract, I’ll take it.There’s teams here.”
Ian stared, then he swayed, actually close to passing out.
Oh.
Oh, thank God.
