Page 172 of Baby Girl
My heart sinks into my ass.
I shoot up to standing. “Oh shit, they’re waiting for me, and they know I’m here. I have to go.”
I look around wildly, trying to figure out what my next move is, but my brain has gone blank.
Oakley yanks me back down to sitting with a laugh. “Breathe, Ems. Let’s close up your bag, then you can get a ride out front and go straight to them.”
Nodding, I quickly fold my letter and gently put it back in the envelope, then zip up my bag and put it on my shoulder.
I pause when Oakley doesn’t stand with me and frown down at her. “Are you coming?”
She shakes her head, still grinning. “Nope. I’m going to stay and see what this hockey thing is all about.”
Nodding, but already having lost interest and just really wanting to get to my daddies, I start shuffling my way past all the people sitting in our row.
It’s not until I’m most of the way up the stairs that I remember Will. Glancing back at the ice, I watch as the players disappear through a corridor that runs under the opposite staircase just as a massive truck thing comes out of a door and the crowd goes wild for it.
And then it hits me—I don’t need to kiss Will to find out what I want.
I already know.
Chapter 88
Derek
My chest is heavy with dejection as I watch the other three hovering over Xavier’s phone from my spot on the apartment’s couch, the tracking app he uses for Emery presumably still open. Raising the bottle to my lips, I take a sip of water, casting my attention back toward the Warriors’ hockey game on the television.
Two to one, Warriors, with William having scored the first goal and assisting his brother on the second—and the first period has only just ended—with the last of the players leaving the ice. At least Emery is getting to watch him play like the future NHL star he will be.
Normally, a freshman wouldn’t be given so much ice time, since they are typically too green for college hockey, but clearly he has been playing with his older brother and friends because he has joined their second line after only a few games.
“I can’t believe she actually went to the hockey game,” Darcy grumbles as he shoves back from his hunched position over the back of the couch and pulls his hair free of its tie. His appearance has grown increasingly disheveled as the night has progressed. “I really thought she would come to us.”
At first, we’d thought it was a glitch that her bracelet wasn’t updating with her phone’s location. I even started to worry that something was wrong and that we were going to have to call Xavier’s friends in again. When her phone traveled in the direction of the hockey arena, my nerves sank into my stomach like a leaden weight.
She chose him.
She really wasn’t able to forgive us or give us an opening to repair our relationship together. We’d had the one person who filled all the broken spaces between us, and we’d broken her. I don’t blame her for not choosing us.
My attention turns internal, and I let their conversation convert to background noise, having nothing to add to the discussion we’ve already had several times, my gaze landing unseeingly on the TV as the camera shows the crowd.
“Has the phone’s location updated at all?” Hudson asks, hands twitching in his lap as he presumably resists the urge to snatch the phone out of Xavier’s hands.
Xavier makes a grunting noise that doesn’t sound promising, so I assume the answer is no.
We’d been able to observe her live location right up until she made it into the arena. Since then, it’s been periodic at best. Xavier muttered something about concrete and crowd size, but he wasn’t worried.
He is worried now, which is worrying me.
Thirty-six minutes since the last update.
Thirty-six fucking minutes.
It may as well be twenty years.
Her message is clear—she doesn’t want us.
“Let’s just go to the arena, pick her up, and bring her back here,” Darcy suggests, but it comes out more like a desperate plea.
