Chapter 14
SLOANE
I can't stop shaking.
Tucker is staring at me like I just told him hockey season is canceled, his mouth slightly open, those blue eyes wide with shock. We're standing in his ridiculously expensive apartment with its floor-to-ceiling windows and uncomfortable-looking furniture, and I just told him I'm pregnant.
With his baby.
I want to take it back. Not the pregnancy—that feels like the answer to a dream I never imagined could come true after my divorce. But I think I regret telling Tucker about it. I should have waited. Should have figured things out on my own first. Should have—
"Are you okay?" he asks again, and the question surprises me. Not are you sure, or how did this happen, or any of the dozen defensive reactions I'd braced myself for. Just a genuine concern about my well-being.
“I’m…fine," I manage.
He blows out a deep breath and squints. I stop myself from admitting I haven't told Mel yet, haven't made an appointment, haven't done any of the practical things I should be doing. But I know I want children, and this pregnancy seems like the answer to a lot of hurt I’ve experienced over the past decade. I just need to focus, study, create some stability. Telling Tucker about this was an item on a checklist, that’s all.
"When will you see a doctor?" His voice is urgent, almost demanding.
"I don't know. Soon. I'll make an appointment."
"I'll come with you."
The automatic assumption makes my spine stiffen. "You don't have to do that."
"I want to." He takes a step closer, and I take a step back, maintaining the distance between us. He notices, stopping immediately.
“Tucker.” I hold out my hands, palms up.
"I think you're a young, professional hockey player whose life is exactly where you want it.
" I gesture around his apartment. “You’re focused on selling shitty condoms that clearly don’t work.
And I'm telling you it's okay. But you don't have to pretend you're excited about this. "
I thought Josh stole my opportunity to be a mother when he went behind my back and stopped his fertility. And now I feel like I’m stealing parenthood from this man, Josh’s teammate, who’s been nothing but good to me the few times we’ve been together.
And who also hollers my name, drunk from a riverboat full of equally drunk hockey players, parks in front of the curb cut, and knowingly sleeps with his co-worker’s ex-wife–me. The two of us are a bomb about to detonate, and if I don’t put my foot down, we will destroy everyone in our orbit.
Tucker runs a hand through his hair, and I notice it's still damp.
I know that he showered after a workout.
And I know what that body looks like naked and wet.
He's wearing athletic shorts and a T-shirt that clings to his chest, and even now, even with everything falling apart, my traitorous body remembers what it felt like to be pressed against him.
"You're right," he finally says. "A baby wasn't part of my plan. But neither were you, and you’re changing everything.”
I don't know what to say to that.
"I will be involved, Sloane. I am this baby's father. Not just some guy who sends child support checks. An actual father."
The words should be reassuring. Instead, they cause panic to rise in my throat. "I can't recreate the dynamic I had with Josh."
He recoils. “First of all, I don’t even know what that means. But this isn’t about Grentley. This is about my kid.”
“No man will take my choices away from me again.” My voice rises despite my efforts to stay calm.
“I have already done the song and dance where a man’s choices determine my life path.
First, the man who killed my father, then my husband.
I spent years adjusting to a man’s needs while all mine got shoved away.
Never again.” I’m shaking now, outraged.
Tucker takes a step back and shakes his head. “Sloane. I’m not— I would never ask you to change anything.”
"Then what are you saying?" I challenge. "Because from where I'm standing, you're already making plans and decisions. 'I'll come to the doctor with you.' 'I want to be involved.' What about what I want?"
Tucker opens his mouth, then closes it. Takes a breath. "You're right. I'm sorry. What do you want?"
The question catches me off guard. Josh never asked what I wanted. He told me what made sense, what was logical, what we should do.
"I want to finish school," I say quietly. "I want to build a career in public health. I want to be the kind of person my grandmother would be proud of." My hand moves unconsciously to the sun pendant at my throat. "And I want to raise this baby without losing myself in the process."
"Okay." Tucker nods slowly. "Then that's what we'll do."
"We?"
"You said you don't want to lose yourself. I get that. But Sloane, I grew up in a family where everyone supported each other. My dad left pro hockey to stay home with my brothers and me when my mom ran for judge. This doesn't have to be you sacrificing everything while I keep living my life."
“Your dad retired to be … a dad?” I hadn't known that. Hadn't known anything meaningful about Tucker's family.
"Yeah.” Tucker laughs. “Family is everything to him.” Tucker's expression softens.
"I'm not saying I know exactly how this will work.
But I'm saying it doesn't have to be like it was when you were growing up.
Your grandmother working two jobs, doing everything alone.
We have resources. We can figure this out. "
The we keeps throwing me. Josh always said we, too, but it usually meant I should do whatever he'd already decided while he kept emotional distance.
"You can't be an active parent when you're on the road twenty weeks a year," I point out, and I watch his face fall.
He sinks onto that fancy couch—the one that's clearly designed for looking at rather than sitting on—and drops his head into his hands. For a long moment, he's silent.
"You're right," he says finally, his voice muffled. "I don't have an answer for that."
The admission surprises me. Josh would have had a dozen answers, a dozen ways to explain why it would all work out, why I was worrying for nothing.
"I just need you to be realistic," I say, more gently now. "I appreciate that you want to be involved. But I can't build my life around your schedule. I can't be the one who adjusts everything while you keep doing exactly what you've always done."
"I hear you.” He looks up at me, and there's something raw in his expression. "But I'm not asking you to adjust everything. I'm asking you to let me try. To let me figure out how to be a father even with the travel, even with the complications. Other guys on the team do it. It's not impossible."
"It's not impossible for them because they have wives who handle everything while they're gone," I counter. "I'm not going to be that person, Tucker. I'm not going to be the one who gives up everything while you get to keep being T-Stag the Party Animal."
He flinches at the nickname, and I know I pressed a nerve. "I don't want to be that guy anymore."
I snort. “Sure. Because we met under such wholesome circumstances.”
He emits a low growl and stares at his expensive sneakers. “Sloane. This is all coming at me really fast. But I want you to know I will change. I will absolutely become the man who deserves to be this baby’s father.”
The sincerity in his voice makes my chest ache. I want to believe him. Want to believe this isn't just panic talking, that he really means it.
But I've been here before. I've believed promises that sounded beautiful in the moment and turned to ash in reality.
"I need time," I say. "To process this. To figure out what I'm going to do."
"Okay." He stands, keeping his distance like he's afraid of spooking me.
"But Sloane? I meant what I said. I want to be involved.
I want to be at doctor's appointments, I want to help with whatever you need.
I know I have to earn your trust. I know I've given you every reason not to believe me.
But I'm asking you to give me a chance to prove I'm different than you think I am. "
I'm too tired to argue anymore. Too overwhelmed by everything that's happened in the past twenty-four hours.
"I'll text you when I make the appointment," I say. It's not a promise, exactly, but it's something.
"Thank you." The relief on his face is almost painful to witness.
I head for the door, and he doesn't try to stop me. Doesn't ask me to stay, doesn't make any more promises he might not be able to keep. He just watches me go with those blue eyes that have haunted my dreams, and I can't tell if the expression on his face is hope or fear.
The drive home is a blur. I keep expecting to feel something—panic, joy, terror, excitement—but I'm just numb. I told Tucker. He knows. And now I have to figure out what comes next.
Mel's not home when I arrive, which is both a relief and a disappointment. I'm not ready to talk about this yet, but I also desperately need to.
I drop onto my bed, still in my yoga pants and oversized sweatshirt, and pull out my phone. I should call the therapist I was seeing when the divorce process started. Should tell her what's happened and get her professional insight on how to navigate this situation.
Instead, I open my calendar and try to calculate when this baby might arrive. The dates bleed together.
My statistics textbook sits on my nightstand, a silent reminder of Monday's exam. I should be studying. Should be focusing on school, on building the future I keep saying I want.
But all I can think about is Tucker's face when I told him. The way he immediately asked if I was okay, if I was healthy. The way he said this is my baby, like it was the most natural thing in the world.
My hand moves to my stomach, still flat beneath my sweatshirt. There's a baby in there. Tucker's baby. And mine. A tiny cluster of cells that will become a person with his blue eyes or my green ones, his blond locks or my curls.
A person who will need me to be strong, to be stable, to be everything I'm not sure I know how to be.
"I can do this," I whisper to the empty room. "I can do this alone if I have to."
But a small voice asks what if Tucker really could be different than Josh, than my own father, different from the playboy persona he's shown me? Tucker speaks of having a father who sounds like make-believe to me, when I never even got to meet mine.
It’s always been what’s driven me in my studies. I am called to help people make different choices, and I can only do that if I get serious about finishing my degree now that there’s a deadline where things are going to get exponentially more complicated.
I reach for my statistics textbook, determined to pretend, at least, that I'm preparing for Monday's exam. The formulas and definitions swim before my eyes, meaningless symbols that have nothing to do with the chaos of my actual life.
I make it through three pages before my eyes start to close. The exhaustion I've been fighting all week finally wins, pulling me under despite the textbook still open on my lap and the late afternoon sun streaming through my window.