Page 75 of Mommy

“Not necessarily, but the judge would want to know why the fucker has no teeth and two black eyes and I’d rather not answer that question in court.”

My mouth falls open and Derek grinds his teeth, gaze once again falling to his plate.

“Derek, how—why did you—what?!” I whisper-yell at him.

He can’t have done that. Even if he knew what that asshole said, why would he go out of his way and⁠—

He chuckles, but his tone is serious when he speaks.

“After what he said? He deserved worse, baby.”

I don’t know how to reply. My mouth is still hanging open, and my mind seems to be stuck in the middle of processing what Derek said.

“So…” He trails off, his gaze lifting to meet mine. Mossy green eyes that send a warm shiver over my skin. “Chino got adopted? How’d it go? Was it like when Viv left?”

The change in topic catches me off guard, but I quickly shake my head.

There was no feeling of loss when Chino got picked up today, just relief and excitement for him to start his new life.

“Not at all.” I say. The tornado in my stomach wants to obsess over what Derek said, but the rational part of me knows that I shouldn’t. If I think about it for too long, I’m doomed to romanticize it. My mind will come up with all sorts of dramatic scenarios, and each one will hurt more, because ultimately none of them are true.

“He was so happy when Liam got him out of the kennel, it was adorable. I think that was the first time I saw him actually excited and nervous.” I lose myself in explaining how everything went down. Usually Chino was a calm and polite dog. Never pulling the leash, never jumping up at staff. Today was totally different. As if he had known that today was his day. We had never seen him so out of control and excited before. It made us all laugh, and when he greeted his new owners—two men with dark hair and polite smiles— at the entrance, I swear I saw both Shelly and Liam wipe their eyes.

“That sounds perfect.” Derek’s voice is soft, and when I look up, he’s smiling, but his eyes are not on me. No, he is looking past me into the living room. To the crate where Posie lies on her side and snores softly. Her stomach has swollen even more and at this point I’m not sure she would even be capable of lying down in any other position.

“You know, it could be any day now.” I murmur.

Derek doesn’t ask what I mean.

“Maybe we should call Samuel and ask him to be on hold for us.”

My head snaps forward and I look at Derek’s face again.

“I can do it.” I’ve delivered a litter before, and everything went fine. I actually didn’t even have to do much.

“I know, I just meant… just in case… something goes wrong and we need help.”

The way he says we has my heart splitting open.

Somehow it sounds like that we didn’t just include me. It sounded almost like he was talking about us as in you and me and Posie. It sounded like he was going to say she needs help. Him and me? We are just bystanders and it doesn’t really matter what we need because this is all about her.

Like this is real.

Swallowing around the small lump in my throat, I nod.

“Sure. I’ll ask him tomorrow.”

Derek looks like he wants to contradict, but then he nods.

Chapter thirty nine

Derek

Coming to a stop at the curb, I lean into the back seat to grab Ivy’s lunch and hand it to her.

She’s about to get out of the door, but I don’t let go of her hand, forcing her to turn back and look at me.

“You weren’t going to leave without a goodbye kiss just now, right?” I pull my face into a disappointed frown, and tighten my grip on her hand. She rolls her eyes, and I pull her closer to my side of the car.