Page 21

TEN

TANNER

“Did you know a vagina can stretch to fit a watermelon?”

Lux paused, toast in one hand, knife in the other. “Yeah, I think there’s a club in Midtown where the girls do that as a party trick.”

It was hard to tell if Parker’s sharp inhale, sucking in a particularly crunchy piece of Cap’n Crunch, was caused by shock or by laughter. Either way, I was now slapping him hard on the back in an attempt to stop him coughing.

“Seriously, I’m trying to eat here,” he croaked, wiping away the milk dribbling down his chin before downing a glass of orange juice.

Ace looked up from whichever pregnancy book he’d chosen to read this morning, completely oblivious to the commotion he’d caused. “We’re all eating. It’s breakfast.”

“Then can we not talk about vaginas,” Parker hissed.

“But they’re so fascinating. Says right here that?—”

“Dude!”

“Okay, fine. Listen to this one, then. Did you know the heart grows during pregnancy so that it can pump extra blood around the mom’s body?”

Before you ask why Ace was reading pregnancy books, there’s a small possibility that when they all arrived—all thousand dollars’ worth—I had a minor freak out about being able to read them all in time.

I wasn’t the fastest reader by any stretch, but seriously, I’d ordered way too many.

And while you could argue that they probably all said the same thing, what if they didn’t?

What if one held a vital piece of information the others had missed?

And then I had to decide which book to read first.

It was Parker who came up with the idea to divide and conquer. We’d done it with Cosmo , we could do it with pregnancy books, too, he’d argued, because the areas of interest were almost the same. Almost.

We’d never brought Cosmo to breakfast though, but Ace didn’t seem to want to part with The Dad’s Guide to Pregnancy— from which he’d started reading random facts—so we’d sat far away in the corner at the farthest table we could find.

Unfortunately, being the trendsetters we were, everyone else on the team decided to sit near the corner, too, therefore most of our conversation was being conducted in whispers.

Parker picked his spoon back up and dug back into his cereal like nothing had happened. “Huh, no way. That is cool. I wish our hearts could do that for running bases.”

“We should speak to Doctor Matthews, she could make it happen.”

Doctor Marnie Matthews was the Lions head of baseball science, and resident genius.

Ex NASA scientist, her entire role was to make us better players.

She did this by scrutinizing each element of our game—from how we sprinted to how our muscles moved with each swing of the bat—and monitored it against how our bodies worked under pressure.

She’d designed our uniforms from a material made from thousands of different sensors, each checking for our heart rate, blood pressure, oxygen, and sweat levels so she could adapt in real time during each game.

The results had been impressive, our injury rates were down, and our wins were up.

The Lions had moved from bottom of the standings to one of the top contenders to win the World Series in a matter of seasons.

Every year we’d gotten further and further into the postseason, and this year we were expected to go all the way.

It was no secret that Penn Shepherd—the Lions owner—wanted the Commissioner’s Trophy.

“The doc can’t make our hearts grow. She’s not that clever.”

“Don’t let Reeves hear you say that.”

“Don’t let me hear you say what?”

A shadow fell over the table. I might have groaned, Parker definitely did, as the four of us looked up to find Jupiter Reeves, the Lions’ third baseman.

He might be widely regarded as one of the best players of our (and any) generation, but he was also a colossal dick when he wanted to be, which was most of the time.

Full sleeves of tattooed arms dedicated to his one other obsession beyond baseball—the aforementioned Marnie Matthews—were crossed over the Lions tee, hugging his wide chest. The perpetual glower, the slightly narrowed eyes framed by a fan of creases, and a mouth constantly set on the verge of a snarl, all gave off the appearance of someone who didn’t give a fuck what anyone else thought.

Therefore, it was always wise to stay on his good side.

I still hadn’t figured out what Marnie saw in him, especially for someone with an IQ as high as hers.

Parker’s book of choice— What the Dads Do During Pregnancy —was still unopened and on his lap. Ace slammed his shut and moved it behind him. It would have been less obvious if he’d written a sign and waved it above his head.

“Nothing.”

“Doesn’t look like nothing.” Jupiter’s eyes narrowed further. “Looks like you’ve started a new reading club.”

Ace’s gaze darted around the table. I readied my foot to deliver a sharp kick to his ankle in case he had any thoughts about announcing my news, but I didn’t need to use it.

He sighed dramatically. “If you really want to know, we were talking about vaginas.”

Not one of us dared look at another. Next to me, Lux spluttered a cough, but I don’t think anyone else noticed.

“ Vaginas ?”

“Yup. They’re fascinating,” replied Ace with all the enthusiasm of an OBGYN (yes, I’d learned what that was) and not someone who’d spent the thirty minutes we’d been sitting at breakfast reading about the different stages of pregnancy. “For example?—”

“Nope.” Jupiter cut him off with a slash of his hand through the air. “I am not being dragged into this.”

“Wow, that’s the quickest we’ve ever gotten rid of him,” I remarked as Jupiter hurried off to join Boomer Jones and Saint Velasquez on a table four down from ours. From the way the two of them turned around, it was obvious Jupiter had relayed our brief conversation.

“Who knew the great Jupiter Reeves would be scared of vaginas,” Parker drawled once Jupiter was fully out of earshot.

Lux stuck a fork into his egg-white omelet. “He has a point, you know.”

“About what? Vaginas?”

“No, it looks like we’ve started a new book club.” Lux nodded to the one Ace had put back on the table. “And they’re way bigger than an issue of Cosmo . If you’re not telling people until after the ultrasound, maybe we should read them in private.”

“That’s a good idea,” I agreed, reaching for the book Parker had opened only for him to snatch it out of my reach.

“No wait, here’s something.” His finger moved across the page. “Have Millie’s nipples changed color?”

“What the fuck?”

“Says here nipples change color.” He tapped the space he’d been holding his finger over.

“It fucking doesn’t.”

“It does. Actually, it doesn’t specify Millie. It could mean you, too, seeing as you’re the dad. Have your nipples changed color? I don’t think they have, I haven’t noticed in the locker room, anyway.”

“What color do they change to?”

“They don’t change.” My glare moved from Parker to Ace. “Stop talking about Millie’s nipples. In fact, don’t ever talk about her nipples again. I don’t ever want to hear Millie’s name uttered in the same sentence as a nipple. ”

“Hmm.” Ace opened his book back to the page he’d been reading. “It also says right here men can experience pregnancy symptoms with their partners.”

Lux put his fork down, a smirk curving his mouth. “That’s why Tan’s such a moody fucker this week.”

My head snapped around to Lux, ready to go off on him about being wrong.

I wasn’t a moody fucker. But that would be a lie, even if they weren’t talking about Millie’s nipples, I’d still be in a bad mood.

I’d been in a bad mood since we’d left New York a week ago.

Since I’d left Millie lying in the bath.

This wasn’t the first away series we’d been on since Millie had told me she was pregnant, but after laying my hand against her warm belly, I realized how quickly everything would change and how much I was going to miss.

The last time I’d touched her was the day we’d had sex, when she’d been very much not pregnant, yet a week ago I’d pressed my palm to the beginnings of a bump.

A bump I’d put there.

Parker snaked an arm around my shoulder, pulling me in for a side hug. “Leave him alone, he’s mad because he’s not convinced Millie to fall in love with him yet, and he hasn’t seen her nipples.”

I shoved him away so hard his chair toppled. I was tempted to tip it farther, but he was already laughing loud enough to draw attention to us, I wasn’t going to make it worse.

“I didn’t give you this much crap when you broke your balls,” I grumbled, pulling him upright. “And I was super supportive when you went off to the Jungle Kings for your first games back, and I bought you some ‘Welcome Back to the Big Leagues’ Twizzlers.”

I didn’t even care that Parker was trying and failing to hold his face in a serious expression. “You did. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, I’m sorry too,” I replied, letting out a heavy sigh as I turned to Lux. “I’m sorry for being moody, it’s just…I’m going to miss so much.”

Ace glanced up from the book he was still glued to. “Whaddya mean?”

“We still have two months left of the regular season, one month post, and if we get to the World Series—which, let’s face it, we’ll get traded if we don’t—that makes it three months.

That’s three months of traveling while the baby grows.

Three months of changes I’m going to miss.

Every time I get back from an away series, Millie will be different. ”

And there we had it, the source of my bad mood.

Ace opened the book, flicking through to a specific page. “Tan, says here babies can hear in the womb.”

“So? What use is that?”

“Record your voice, then Millie can play it to the bump.” Opening up his phone, he tapped on the screen until he found what he was looking for, and pushed it across the table to me. “WIRED says this one is the best.”