Page 25 of The Final Faceoff
I shake my head, gripping the armrests to ground myself. “Is that why you didn’t call me? Because he doesn’t want me around?”
Her brows knit together. “Leif.”
My pulse thunders in my ears. This is what it feels like to lose her. I can’t breathe. I can’t think. And then?—
She snorts. She actually fucking snorts.
“Leif, get a grip,” she mutters, standing and shoving a hand through her hair. “I’m pregnant, Leif. That’s the crisis. Not some imaginary boyfriend.”
I blink at her, my brain desperately trying to rewire itself.
No guy.
No boyfriend.
She’s not dropping my sorry ass. Nope.
It’s just Hailey. My Hailey in the middle of a crisis. Then it clicks. This isn’t just my Hailey anymore. It’s Hailey and a baby.She’s freaking out because she thinks she’s alone on this one. Like I’ll let her do it on her own.
This. This is something I can handle. “Okay, what’s the plan? Are we keeping the baby?”
ChapterTen
Hailey
Penalty Shot: You can Never Dodge This One
I stare at him.
Not a blink-and-look-away stare. Not a quick-flick-of-my-eyes, trying-to-figure-out-if-I-misheard-him stare. No, this is a full-body shutdown, brain short-circuiting, what-the-actual-fuck-did-you-just-say kind of stare.
Because I wasn’t expecting that. Not even a little. Out of all the worst-case scenarios my brain has obsessed over in the past few days—how this will implode my career, derail my future, redefine my entire existence—I never stopped to ask myself the most basic, most fundamental question of all:
Am I keeping the baby?
And the answer crashes into me immediately. Like it’s been there all along, waiting for me to notice.
Yes. Of course, I am.
It doesn’t matter that I didn’t plan for this. It doesn’t matter that I don’t have a five-year roadmap, or even a five-minute one. It doesn’t matter that I’m a walking disaster who can barely keep a houseplant alive, let alone a human being.
It’s already decided.
And maybe that should scare me, but weirdly, it doesn’t. Not really. The fear is there, sure. Pressing against the edges, whispering all the ways I could mess this up—but it doesn’t change anything. Because this is mine. A part of me.
Which is why it takes a second—too long—to register exactly how he phrased it.
Are we keeping the baby?
He said,We.
Notyou, Hailey.No, there was definitely aweimplied there.Weas inus.
My lungs seize.
I rewind the conversation, sure I misheard, but no—there it is, clear as day.Are we keeping the baby?
I barely breathe.
