Chapter 17
Tate
The blood test confirming paternity hits my inbox a few days after Summer took it. And I just stared at it for an hour or so.
I’m going to be a dad.
I got my one-night stand pregnant and now…she’s having a baby.
My baby.
How the fuck did this happen?
I was careful with condoms. I’m always careful because I never wanted to be in this exact position. But here I am anyway.
It’s been hard to focus on anything, not even the music.
I’m playing like shit, drinking too much, and I’ve been a complete bear to anyone and everyone around me.
The guys are essentially oblivious, but I’ve caught a few glares from Ryleigh.
And poor Kirsten, who’s so sweet in general, looked like I hurt her feelings at dinner last night when I said the hit song she performed with Onyx Knight was a sellout.
I need to apologize but I just can’t seem to get out of my own head.
My last conversation with Summer is playing on repeat, over and over, until I want to scream. Punch something. The only way I can fall asleep is by drinking myself into oblivion, but I can’t keep doing that, so something has to give.
Today we’re in St. Louis, and the girls dragged us to the damn arch. We rode some rickety-ass gondola type thing up to the top and everyone oohed and ahhed over the view. Blah blah fucking blah. I’m standing here at the top of the world, arms folded, wishing I was almost anywhere else.
Except, I don’t really know where I could be that would make me feel better.
It’s not when I’m on stage and it’s not when I’m with friends.
Fuck.
“Dude, could you be any more of a grumpy fuck?” Angus says to me as the girls go into picture-taking mode.
“Fuck you.”
He arches a brow. “Really?”
“What do you want from me? I said I didn’t want to come but they dragged me anyway and—”
He cuts me off by grabbing my arm and pulling me away from the others.
“Look, I don’t know what crawled up your ass but knock it off. You’ve been an asshole for the last week and it needs to stop. For your own good, if not ours. You ever talk to Kirsten again the way you did last night, and Sam’s going to knock the shit out of you.”
“He can try,” I growl.
Angus stares at me, his eyes calculating, assessing.
He knows me a little too well so it’s not a surprise when he says, “Something’s going on. You want to talk about it?”
“Nothing anyone can do, so there’s no point,” I snap.
“Try me.”
“Not here,” I mutter.
“Dude.” His gaze is still sharp but I see the concern etched into his expression.
We’re friends.
Good friends.
Chosen family.
I shouldn’t be taking out my situation on anyone, least of all Angus.
“Look, I’ll apologize to Kirsten. Then maybe later, if you want to go get a beer, I’ll tell you what’s up.”
“Cool.” He nods and goes back to where Ryleigh is taking a selfie with the view of the city behind her.
Kirsten is doing something on her phone and I approach gingerly.
I really was a dick last night.
“I’m genuinely sorry about what I said,” I blurt as I get close to her.
She looks up, surprise on her pretty face. She’s young, just nineteen to Sam’s twenty-four, but she’s smart, beautiful, and incredibly talented. She’s never so much as looked at me cross-eyed so there really was no reason to insult her. I was just in a perpetual bad mood and she was an easy target.
“I’ve been dealing with…something,” I continue when she doesn’t say anything. “It wasn’t fair to take it out on you. I really am sorry.”
“Oh, it’s okay, Tate.” She reaches out and wraps her arms around me tightly. “And if you need to talk—I know you guys don’t like to open up to each other when you’re dealing with emotions—I’m always here.”
Fuck, she’s so damn nice.
“Thank you,” I whisper, giving her an extra squeeze. “And if I ever talk to you like that again, give me a smack, okay?”
She smiles. “Deal.”
“Everything okay?” Ever protective, Sam joins us, sliding an arm around her waist.
“We’re good,” she tells him. “Now come take a picture with me.”
He lets her drag him away but he glances back and gives me a slight nod.
Well, at least one thing in my life is back on track.
Now if I could just figure out what the fuck I’m going to do about the Summer situation, I might be able to breathe again. Or sleep.
* * *
It’s late before Angus and I have a chance to talk.
We meet at the hotel bar and order two beers.
Then we just sit there in awkward silence as I try to come up with the right words to tell him what’s going on.
I need to talk to someone but for some reason I’ve been reluctant to tell the band what’s going on.
Almost like if I don’t tell anyone maybe it’s not real.
But those test results in my inbox are definitely real.
I have the charge on my credit card to prove it.
Since I can’t come up with any words, I open my email and pull up the one with the test results. Then I pass the phone to Angus.
He’s a smart guy. It might take a minute, but he’ll figure out what it is pretty quickly.
“What is…” He stops, squints, and then his expression shifts slightly as he reads. “Oh, shit.”
“Exactly.” I take a pull from a bottle of Sam Adams Summer Ale.
Summer.
Fucking Summer.
One minute I’m furious with her and the next I want to kiss her.
It doesn’t make any fucking sense.
“So what are you guys going to do?”
“I have no idea but apparently she went to the abortion clinic and couldn’t go through with it.”
“Okay. So you’re going to have a baby.”
“I guess.”
“You guess?” He looks confused. “Either she’s pregnant and keeping it or she’s not.”
“I don’t know!” I snap, guzzling the rest of my beer and then setting the bottle down with a thump. “I haven’t talked to her.”
“Since when?”
“Since…the day she told me she was pregnant. A little over a week ago.”
“You haven’t talked to her in a week?” He looks mystified.
I shake my head and motion to the bartender to bring me another beer.
“Why not?”
“We didn’t…” I sigh, staring off at nothing. “The last phone call ended kind of abruptly.”
“What does that mean? Did you hang up on her?”
“Not exactly, but I just said we’d talk after we got the results of the blood test and then hung up.”
“Why would you do that?”
“I was freaking out, okay? I was careful so I don’t know how this happened and she won’t have an abortion so I don’t know which way is up!”
“You’re feeling pretty crappy right now, huh?”
“You think?” I give him a dirty look.
“So imagine how bad she feels.”
“What?” I stare at him in annoyance. I assumed he’d be on my side.
“She’s the one who’s pregnant. Her mom has Alzheimer’s. She lives paycheck to paycheck working in a diner in Bumfuck Nowhere, New York. Living in a house you said was falling apart. Does she even have health insurance?”
“No.” I stare into my beer bottle, a prickle of shame creeping through my subconscious.
“And what is she going through physically? Has she been sick? Morning sickness? Bleeding? A lot of shit can happen early in pregnancy. And you haven’t checked on her?”
Another prickle of shame.
Fuck.
I really am an asshole.
I’ve been so caught up in what this pregnancy means for me—and my life going forward—I haven’t stopped to think about her.
I should have.
This isn’t the man I want to be. It’s not the man I am.
My father is a verbally abusive prick who never gave my mom’s needs a second thought.
Despite my lifestyle, I never wanted to be that kind of man.
Not to a woman I’m hooking up with, not to my future wife, not even to the woman who unexpectedly got pregnant with my baby.
“Tate, man, for real?” Even Angus sounds disappointed.
“I know,” I mutter. “I fucking know, okay? I feel like shit about it but I’m really freaking out.”
“I know it’s not ideal, but if she’s pregnant and going to keep it, then you have to think about coming up with a plan. Wishing that it didn’t happen isn’t productive.”
“What do I do?” I ask quietly, lifting my gaze to his. “I’m scared.”
“Of what? I mean, take out the obvious part about how you’re not in a relationship with her. What scares you the most?”
“That I’m going to be a shitty dad who prioritizes his career over his child. Because there’s no way I’m walking away from the band.”
“Of course not. But being in the band doesn’t mean you’re going to be a shitty dad. It just means you’re going to have to sacrifice. Less parties, more time on video calls. Less disposable income, more money for Summer and the baby.”
“I don’t know how to do that.”
“That’s why you have to talk to her. In fact, you need to get your ass on a plane and go see her. See for yourself how she’s doing and make sure she knows you’ve got her back. I know it’s hard for you too, but you have us. A career that’s going well. Money coming in. What does she have?”
Nothing.
The word hits me like a physical blow, and I wince.
She doesn’t have anything. Or anyone.
And at the end of the day, she didn’t get pregnant on her own.
One way or another, no matter how inconvenient the timing is, I have to be there for her. Even if she doesn’t want me around after the way I’ve behaved.
Without another word, I open my phone and start searching for a flight.