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Ziggy

Holt orders dinner in from a local Middle Eastern restaurant, plus mashed potatoes and rosemary potatoes for me from the deli. I end up eating half of his food on top of most of my potatoes while we snuggle on the couch with my favorite TV show playing, which he says was his brother’s favorite too.

It’s been quite the day.

I thought for sure everything was doomed when I didn’t pay attention to the extra cars on the street when I got home.

And my phone had died, so I missed all of Holt’s texts telling me not to come home.

But— “Are your teammates always so nice?”

He grins down at me. “Not on the pitch.”

“ Off the pitch.”

“Unless it’s Fletcher and Silas, yes. ”

“Do you think they can be subtle enough? With their plans?”

They left after the soccer game was over, all of them declaring they would take every opportunity to sing Holt’s praises anytime they’re in the headquarters office.

And they took all of my gratitude with them.

Even if they fail, they care. They’re cheering for us.

I didn’t realize how much that would mean to me. But after everything with Abby Nora, I haven’t had a lot of faith in people.

If you can’t trust your best friend, who can you trust?

Apparently a ragtag team of rugby players.

Holt sets his plate aside and stretches out, pulling me closer. “Guess we’ll find out.”

I lean my head on his chest, listening to his beating heart. “Mom wants to introduce me to some business guy Dad has other dealings with.”

His pulse kicks up under my ear. “Ew.”

“That’s what Miranda said too. But also, I figured out one of Dad’s biggest issues.”

He kisses my hair. “Is it overcome-able?”

“Maybe. I got the impression he’s worried that we’d come second after the sport. That he thinks all of you would put rugby over relationships and family and everything else.”

He rubs his pec. “Great to hear our club’s owner thinks so much of us. Or maybe expects that much of us.”

For real. “You literally gave up your career in Europe to take care of your brother. I don’t understand why he can’t see that. And if you’re gone for games?—”

“Matches.”

“—if you’re gone for matches, how’s that any different from a businessperson going on a business trip? You come home?—”

“Usually only one night away.”

“—and you cannot possibly work your bodies and have practices fourteen hours a day and still play games— matches on the weekends.”

He chuckles. “You’re half right.”

“Where am I half wrong?”

“It’s not all about practice time. We also watch a lot of match video to study our opponents. Spend a lot of time doing community service and volunteer work for visibility. Help sell tickets. Do photo ops. Help the social media team. It’s a full-time job during the season. Sometimes more.”

And the season starts in February.

Right after the baby’s born.

“But when Crew’s down with a cold, Porter and Tatum step in and cover for him. If Fletcher twists an ankle, believe it or not, Silas steps in to do the public appearances that he doesn’t want to limp around at. And when Silas’s girlfriend had a baby five years ago, the coaches sent him home with match video so he could be around to help Brittany with Hallie and watch when he had time.”

I snuggle closer to him. “Because you’re a family.”

“Because we’re a family,” he agrees.

It makes something flutter low in my belly.

I freeze.

Wait.

Wait .

“Ziggy?” he murmurs.

There it is.

There it is again.

A flutter .

Low in my belly.

Right about where Tater Tot is sitting.

“I think I just felt the baby move,” I whisper.

No.

No way.

It’s too early. I’m a first-time mom. I shouldn’t—but I can.

“Where?” His hand shifts to my stomach.

“I don’t think you can feel it yet, but oh my god .” I move his hand right over where I’m feeling the tiniest of bubbles popping inside me. “It’s right there. That’s the baby .”

It could be gas, but I don’t think it is.

I think it’s actually the baby.

I wait, but there aren’t more.

Still, my eyes are wet and I can’t stop smiling.

This .

A kind, gentle man cradling my belly while my baby kicks inside and our dog snoozes on the floor in front of us.

Family.

Home.

This is what I’ve been searching for.

“I should call my mom,” I whisper, grateful for once that I should call Abby Nora isn’t an immediate next gut reaction.

He kisses my hair again, inhaling deeply against me. “I’ll be quiet.”

“I’ll tell her I heard you saved an old lady from a burning building.”

He chuckles, the reverberations of his chest against me almost as joy-inducing as feeling my baby kick for the first time.

I don’t want to move.

Not when I’m wrapped in love.

And I swear that’s what this is .

He wouldn’t put his career on the line for anything less.

Would he?

“We’re going to make this work,” I whisper.

He rubs his hand over my belly. “One way or another.”

I lift my head to look at him, and I lose my breath.

Has anyone ever gazed back at me with that much adoration?

If they have, it hasn’t registered.

But when Holt looks at me, I feel like I’m not just the center of his world, but like I am his world.

And it’s scary and beautiful and nerve-racking and soothing all at the same time. “What did I do? What did I do to make you like me?”

He cradles my head with one hand while he continues gently rubbing my belly with his other. “You stayed.”

“Anyone would’ve stayed.”

He shakes his head. “Not the way you did.”

He’s wrong.

Other people would’ve stayed with him.

Wouldn’t they?

“All my life, I’ve been the guy who takes care of everyone else. But you—when you made me breakfast that first day I was back—when you didn’t have to and shouldn’t have, when you stayed—that wasn’t a little thing. That was an everything .”

“It was a spite breakfast,” I whisper.

He grins. “Everything I didn’t know I needed. But exactly what I needed. Besides, I was already long gone after watching you with that chicken.”

I laugh. “Stop.”

“It’s true. I watched you with that bird, and I wanted to know how I could get you to want to keep reaching for me even when I was filthy and on the ground and better left for the crows the same way you kept trying to get to that chicken. That’s dedication. That’s commitment. It’s admirable as hell.”

He’s not mocking me.

He’s serious.

The baby flutters again, and I squeal and put my hand over his.

“Again?” he asks.

“Again,” I whisper. “I felt it again.”

He leans in and kisses my neck. “I love watching you be happy.”

Happy .

I am.

I’m happy.

And it’s such a stark difference from when I wasn’t happy just a few hours ago.

When I wasn’t happy after I discovered my best friend wasn’t so best after all.

When I’ve been scared at how fast my life has changed, even knowing I actively chose to keep the baby when I could’ve instead decided now wasn’t the right time to be pregnant, and stayed on the ship, and kept living the same life I’d mostly enjoyed for years.

“Everyone was staring at me at brunch today,” I tell Holt. “Me and my family, but I know it was mostly me. They know I came home pregnant and alone. They know what Abby Nora thinks of me. They know what happened with her brother-in-law. It was like being the whale shark in the aquarium. I was the beast spotted in the wild who blew up her whole life and came home to take a pity job from her parents. You could practically hear them thinking that I got pregnant on purpose so I could have what Abby Nora has. Or that it was only a matter of time before I fucked up my life.”

“You don’t think you fucked up your life, do you?”

“It’s hard to not feel like a complete loser when I’m at my parents’ club. But here? No. Here, I’m safe. Here, I’m okay.”

“Good. Also, I think I know a few guys who would be happy to solve the club problem for you. They’re super subtle.”

I giggle at the image of the Pounders all invading the Heartwood Valley Owners Club to try to make me feel better. “Do you know why I decided to stay pregnant and keep the baby?”

“Felt right?”

“Because I always thought I’d find someone and settle down and have a family, but I realized I hadn’t dated anyone seriously ever . When I was in high school, Dad was—well, he was exactly what you’d expect. No boy was ever good enough. There was a guy in culinary school, and I thought we might have had a future, but he called it off not long after I told him I loved him for the first time, and I just—I didn’t date again.”

“At all?”

I shake my head. “Not really. I started to think I had unrealistic expectations, or that I was too picky, or that I was too difficult, but ironically enough, not that my stepdad had trained me to think no man would ever be good enough for me. And I worked all the time, and so when I realized I was pregnant, I knew this was my last opportunity. My only opportunity to have kids of my own unless I waited and went the sperm donor route. I shouldn’t be pregnant. We used a condom. I had an IUD. But I am . It’s like this was supposed to happen.”

His hand stills on my belly and I feel him swallow.

“I decided I was never having kids after I had genetic testing when Caden got sick,” he says quietly. “Didn’t want to pass that down. So I—I had a vasectomy. I won’t have kids. Not genetic kids.”

I look up at him again.

“You’re not a substitute,” he adds quickly. “You’re not a shortcut to something I didn’t think I’d ever have. It scares the ever-loving fuck out of me that you don’t have any idea what kind of genetic diseases or disorders the baby might have. But being afraid of losing something isn’t a reason to deny yourself the chance to be happy while you have it.”

I brush his hair off his forehead. “Loving people is scary.”

“Terrifying.”

“They leave you for all kinds of different reasons.”

“But sometimes, they stay and remind you what matters. Why they’re worth fighting for even when it might mean sacrificing something else.”

“I’ll fight for you,” I whisper. “You make me feel loved.”

“You are loved.”

My eyes are hot and wet. “So are you.”

He kisses me, and the rest of the world fades away.

I love kissing this man. I love touching him. I love when he pulls me onto his lap and tugs my shirt off and strokes my back and unhooks my bra.

I love when he cradles my breasts and plays with my nipples.

I love running my hands all over his broad chest and shoulders, up his thick neck, to hold his face while I kiss him back .

I love the feel of his thick, heavy erection between my thighs.

And I love knowing that when we wake up together tomorrow morning, the world outside might not be fully right yet, but inside, here, in this house, we will be right.

We’ll convince my dad that this is okay.

We will.

Because love shouldn’t ever be wrong. It’s rare and it’s beautiful and maybe it won’t last, but why shouldn’t we have it while it does?

That’s all I want.

I want Holt for as long as we make each other happy.

And I’m planning on that being forever.