Page 132 of Blackout-

“Your secret is safe with me,” she says through a chuckle.

“She makes me meditate,” I confess. Patiently, I wait for her laugh, but it never comes.

“Does it help?” she asks instead. The question knocks me off kilter and forces me to accept that it does help me. All the things I thought I was too good for are turning out to be the things I need.

“As much as I hate to admit it, it does,” I reply. “A lot of the things I’m doing here are things I wouldn’t have been caught dead doing and yet, I’m discovering each one of them plays an important role in my recovery.”

She doesn’t say anything and a moment later I hear her sniffle.

“Are you crying?”

“No,” she lies.

“Fuck,” I hiss, tugging at the ends of my hair. “Lacey, baby, I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

“They’re happy tears, Blackie.”

I haven’t given her many of those.

“Happy tears,” I repeat.

“Yes, you sound so—ouch!”

“Lace?”

Panic rolls through me as she remains silent.

“Lacey, what happened?” I ask frantically as I lean forward, ready to jump out of the chair.A lot good that’ll do me.“Are you okay?” I growl, clenching my free hand into a fist.

“I think she kicked,” she whispers.

My chest tightens as a sea of mixed emotions washes over me. On one hand, I’m happy to be on the phone with her while she experiences our baby moving inside of her. On the other, I’m devastated I’m not there to witness her face as it happens.

“Oh my God,” she murmurs. “Blackie, I feel her. I actually feel her.”

I close my eyes and a tear slips from the corner as her laugh fills my ears once more.

“It feels like butterflies.”

Forcing my eyes open, I swallow the lump in my throat and try to find my voice.

“I’ve never felt her before,” she cries. “It’s like she waited for you.”

“Put the phone on speaker and close to your belly,” I rasp.

“Okay…it’s on my belly.”

“It’s Daddy…” The words get stuck in my throat and I lose it. I bow my head as tears fall from my eyes. My knuckles turn white around the phone and I try to compose myself. “I know you don’t recognize my voice…I’ll make it up to you. I swear, I’ll make it up to you and your mother. Until then, go easy on her and…know...know I love you and I can’t wait to finally meet you.”

Holding the phone away from me, I turn my head, pressing my mouth to my bicep, muffling the anguished cry that erupts from my throat…from my fucking soul.

“Blackie?”

Biting my lip, I bring the phone back to my ear.

“Yeah.”

“Are you okay?”

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