12. Brooks
CHAPTER 12
brOOKS
T he plane ride back to Michigan felt like it took for fucking ever. Then there was the bus ride and since we’d been on this road trip, Silas kept trying to get me to talk about Harlowe, but I wasn’t about to do that until I found out what the truth was.
Though my brothers kept harassing me for being in a shitty mood, Silas never mentioned why that might be. In fact, he’d steered Cobb and Urban away from me when they’d started. My mood didn’t matter. I was playing as well as I normally did, so they could keep their noses in their own business.
Finally, fucking finally, the wheels of the plane touched down in Michigan and we were able to get on the bus, where my leg bounced with adrenaline as I waited. There wasn’t going to be much time. We’d started this road trip in Colorado for three games then had been in Missouri for another three. Which meant today wasn’t a real travel day. We had a game tonight. So I had only a little time before I needed to get ready for it. There was no way I wasn’t going to find Harlowe before I did that.
We didn’t have a team meeting, so once we were back at the field, I grabbed Silas as soon as we were off the bus.
“Get my bag,” I told him. “Take it to my locker.”
“Going to find Harlowe?” he asked with a raised eyebrow and every time he mentioned her, I had to fight the urge to put him in his place. It was like he was playing an exposed nerve like a guitar and it was pissing me off.
“Will you just get my fucking bag and put it in front of my fucking locker?” I stared him down as I waited for his answer.
He shook his head and held his hands up in front of him. “Only because you asked so fucking nicely.”
“I was nice at first,” I said as I walked away, heading toward Cleats & Kegs. The place wouldn’t even be open yet, but that didn’t mean Harlowe wasn’t there. She went in early all the time.
First, I tried the door when I arrived. When it didn’t open, I pounded on it. We’d all at one time or another harassed her for not locking the door when she was there alone, so locked didn’t mean she wasn’t inside. When she didn’t answer, I jogged to my car in the parking garage and headed to her apartment.
By the time I got there, I had to sit in my car and take a couple of deep breaths. This interaction was going to change my life forever and right at that moment, I was angry. Not the best attitude to go in there with, but my attitude was on her for not telling me this and there wouldn’t be much I could do about it.
I had a right to be upset with her.
Why the fuck would she be pregnant and not tell me unless it wasn’t mine? Yes, I’d pushed her off when she came to talk to me at the park but I didn’t know if this was what she was coming to say. Did she even know then? No idea. Even if it was, she should’ve just told me anyway. It was too important not to.
This baby not being mine wasn’t possible as far as I was concerned for one very good reason. She wouldn’t sleep with me then run out and sleep with someone else. That wasn’t who she was. There was no shame in that. I just knew her well enough to be sure of that.
When I got to her door, I knocked loud enough to ensure that she’d hear me no matter where she was inside. After giving her time, she didn’t answer, so I knocked again, this time slightly louder. Finally, she opened the door.
Her copper hair was down in waves and her eyes looked more green today and a lot less gold. She was wearing a pink T-shirt that hugged her body and a pair of shorts while her feet were bare. Nothing about how she looked told me she was pregnant. But why would it? She shouldn’t have been showing yet, I didn’t think.
Without saying a word, I pushed past her and she didn’t protest as she slowly closed the door.
“I heard something interesting before I left for the road trip,” I finally said. Harlowe had her hands folded in front of her as her thumbs fought each other, which was something she’d done when she was nervous for a while. I don’t remember the first time I’d noticed it.
“Yeah?” she asked. “What’s that?”
I narrowed my eyes to her and bit my lips together. She really wasn’t going to tell me. “That you’re pregnant.”
She closed her eyes and blew out her breath. “You heard that? Where? The street?”
“Actually, yeah.” Since we’d been standing on the sidewalk when Camden told us. I folded my arms over my chest and waited.
Her breathing increased as she began shifting her weight from foot to foot. “I am pregnant.”
“What. The. Fuck. Harlowe? Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”
“I tried to tell you,” she snapped. So this was what she came to talk to me about that day outside the field when I responded by being a dick.
“Yeah?” I asked. “Well, you should’ve just told me. Even if I snapped at you. It was that day right? That’s when you were going to tell me then never tried again?” My voice was getting too loud. Yelling at her wasn’t going to do any good and it wouldn’t make me feel better. In fact, yelling wasn’t what I’d wanted to do in the first place. No. It was the adrenaline getting away from me and I tamed that shit for a living, so I could do it now. “Why didn’t you just tell me?” I asked sounding more normal, but I was still really fucking angry. And hurt, though I didn’t want to admit it.
“Uh, you didn’t want to talk to me. Remember?” Her cheeks pinked up. “I caught you going into the field and you didn’t want to talk to me. Which… fine. Don’t talk to me. I can do this myself. But if I’m doing this myself, why the hell are you here right now?”
I took two steps toward her, though my arms were now at my side. “Fuck that, Harlowe. I should’ve given you a chance but since I didn’t know what you were there to say, you should’ve tried harder. I should’ve known before my damn sister.”
She rolled her eyes and threw her hands in the air. “You’re right. You shouldn’t have been a dick but you were. You were a dick to me. That’s what matters. You said that because I didn’t want to talk to you before, you weren’t about to do it then.”
Oh. Fuck. Yeah. I remembered seeing her but maybe not my exact words. “Fuck,” I muttered. “You didn’t respond to my text after, so I assumed we were done.” I could’ve known weeks ago that I was going to be a dad and maybe… just maybe it would’ve been slightly better circumstances. “Unblock me,” I told her.
When she wouldn’t meet my eye, I knew she was going to deny it. “Why would you think you’re blocked?”
For one, you told my sister , but I didn’t say that. Instead, I cocked my head and narrowed my eyes.
“Fine.” She sounded exasperated as she stomped over to the coffee table to grab her phone. A moment later, she said, “You’re unblocked. Happy?”
While shaking my head, I said, “I don’t know if happy is the right word, but I’m glad you unblocked me.”
“Doesn’t mean I’ll answer if you call.”
I snorted. “You’re going to have to. I don’t give a shit what you think about me, Harlowe—I clearly heard you when you said in all of your silence, but I got you pregnant. I’m going to be a dad in every single way possible. There’s nothing you say that’s going to change that.”
This argument turned into more of a discussion, which was good. We were going to have to co-parent, even if she fucking hated me.
She glanced away as she pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “How do you know it’s yours? No one could’ve told you that.”
Now the corners of my mouth turned up. “I know you, Harlowe. I don’t need to ask if the baby is mine.”
When she wrapped her arms around herself, it became clear that she wasn’t the most comfortable with whatever she was going to say next, but it’d be my job to reassure her because no matter what else happened in this world, she was going to be the mother of my kid and that meant something to me, even if she didn’t actually want to be with me.
“Do you not want me to keep it?” she asked quietly. “Is that a discussion you want to have?”
I closed the distance between us and set my hands on her shoulders, which felt kind of thin. That’s when I remembered that Camden had said she’d been sick enough to need an IV at the hospital. Fuck. I wish I would’ve known so I could’ve been there to take care of her, but then again, could I have been there? It wasn’t like my job allowed me to run off whenever I wanted to.
Shit. There was a bunch I was going to have to figure out.
“Fuck, no, Harlowe. That’s not a conversation I need to have and since you’re still pregnant, I assume it’s not a conversation you need to have,” I told her. She bit her lips together and shook her head. “Good. If you would’ve been able to tell me that day and I realize it’s my fault that you didn’t, I would’ve been surprised. Shocked. You might’ve had to get someone to scrape me off the sidewalk, but I would’ve been excited too. I’m just upset that you didn’t tell me and that I had to find out from my sister.”
Her face paled as her mouth fell open and her eyes slowly closed. “Shit. Camden.” Though she had to have known it had been my sister who’d told me. Camden had acted like it was a big secret, leading me to believe that Harlowe hadn’t really told anyone else.
“Don’t be mad at her. She didn’t tell me the baby’s mine. She just said she’d been helping you because you’d been in the hospital and of course we all wanted to know why.”
“‘ All ’?” she practically yelled.
“Silas, Urban, Cobb, me—and Amity was there. The other girlfriends weren’t.” After giving her shoulders a squeeze and wishing I could just take her in my arms, I told her, “And she didn’t tell us. Urban guessed when she said you’d been sick on and off. Her face gave her away.”
“I’m not mad at her for that.” She took a deep breath and slowly blew it out like she was trying to calm herself. “She’s going to be the one mad at me.”
“Why?”
Harlowe gave me this look like her entire face pinched together to tell me that I was the biggest idiot in the world. “ Why ?” she asked. “Because if you remember, she has a pretty big thing about not wanting her friends to get with her brothers. It’s literally been her number one friend requirement her entire life.”
“Right.” I took my hands away but didn’t move from where I was right in front of her. Harlowe was so damn sexy with the curves and the hair and the way her eyes lit on fire when I’d had her naked. But that wasn’t what this was about anymore. She didn’t want to be with me, which I hated, but I had to put my wants aside to make sure my kid had the best life possible.
“Yeah. Right.” When Harlowe snorted, she said, “Any chance we can keep this between the two of us? Not tell anyone? You could visit the baby once it’s born on the down low?”
She wasn’t serious. I knew that by the tone of her voice and the fact that this wasn’t a serious suggestion. “Not even a single chance,” I told her because there wasn’t any world in which I’d keep my kid a secret.
“Right.” She sighed. “Can we not maybe tell her today? Let me figure out how to do it?” She leaned against the arm of the chair and I moved in front of her.
“We don’t have to tell anyone today.” There was plenty of time for that. I’d rather figure out a few things first, anyway. How we were going to make this work between the two of us was the top priority because as much as I wanted Harlowe, as much as my feelings had fucking exploded this week thinking about raising a baby with her, my feelings didn’t mean shit when it came to what my kid needed.
I wasn’t going to be my dad. There would be no forcing the kid into baseball or anything else simply because I wanted them to play. They’d make their own life and if they happened to love baseball and wanted to play, I’d do whatever I could to support that, but the same was true if my kid wanted to be a dancer. I just wanted them to be happy. Or her. I wasn’t putting a preference on that.
“We’re going to figure out how this is going to work, which means we have time before anyone has to know. Clearly, she already knows you’re pregnant, but everything else can wait.”
“Thank you,” she said quietly. “I’d just like to be the one to tell her. Hopefully minimize the fallout.”
“You don’t have to be afraid of my sister.”
She burst out with a laugh and that smile was a god damned sight for sore eyes. “I kind of do, Brooks. She’s my best friend. The only friend I confide in… who knows most of my life. I don’t want to lose that and she’s cut people off for less than getting pregnant by her brother.”
I waved my hand as if that didn’t matter, but I knew to her that it did. She hadn’t had the best home life. Nothing abusive, exactly, but Camden was the sister she’d never had. I got that, but this was different.
“All right,” I told her. “I won’t say anything to anyone until we decide to, but I have to tell you Silas put it together almost immediately, so we shouldn’t wait long. Secrets don’t last in our family.”
Her eyes widened. “How in the hell did Silas put that together? Did you tell him about—”
“No,” I said, cutting her off. “I didn’t tell him shit. It was my face when Camden told us. Apparently, it has subtitles that he was able to read.”
She pinched the bridge of her nose then looked up at me. “Yeah. OK. We won’t wait long, but I have to figure out how to make her not hate me.”
“ I’ll make her not hate you,” I promised. When she was about to protest, I said, “I’m her big brother. I can make her do things.”
She laughed again and it looked like some of the stress I’d seen in her when I’d arrived had started to fade. “It’s so cute that you think that.”
Now I had to laugh too because she was right. I couldn’t make Camden do much, but in this case, I’d pull out everything I had to force her not to hate Harlowe. I’d take the blame for it all if necessary. Gladly.
“All right.” I swallowed hard. Leaving her right now was the last thing I wanted to do, but I had to get to work. “I have to get to the field for the game tonight.”
“Right.” There was no animosity in her answer. Nothing that told me she would rather I call in sick—which I absolutely couldn’t do—to hash this out tonight. A woman had told me that once before, though.
Harlowe had been around our life long enough to know how it worked and for now, she wasn’t complaining about it.
“Come to the game tonight,” I told her after I’d walked over to the door and had my hand on the doorknob.
“What? No. We aren’t telling people yet.”
I furrowed my brows. “You think you being there will tell people that you’re having my baby?”
“No… I just meant… I usually wait for Camden to ask me to go with her and even then, I barely ever say yes . I never suggest it and I don’t want her to be suspicious if I did.”
“Well, that’s weird,” I told her because one of the things I’d decided in the last week was that—other than my feelings—I wouldn’t hold back with her.
“It’s not weird.” She slapped my arm. “You just don’t understand girl friendships.”
Nodding, I said, “Well, that, I can agree with.” I reached out and touched her arm again because I couldn’t help myself and she didn’t pull away. That was a good sign. “I’ll make sure she asks you, but just accept. I think even Everly’s going to be there because it’s a night game and we’ve been gone a week.”
“All right,” she told me. “We did all hang out together and they all do know I’m pregnant, so that won’t be weird.”
“You hung out?”
She cringed. “We did and I know way too much about your brothers now.”
My loud laugh echoed into the hallway of her apartment building as I opened the door. “I’ll see you there, then. And I’ll try to figure out how I can bring you home after so we can talk some more.”
For once, she didn’t even try to talk me out of it.
I’d take the win where I could.