“Are the girls getting ready for softball?” I ask instead, giving us both a moment of reprieve.
“We’re already doing clinics for the spring. I’m about to kiss all my free time goodbye.”
I nod and smile because I know he coaches at least one of the teams and they host big team dinners a couple of times a season.
“I’ll be sure to catch a game when I can.”
“They always love seeing you.”
“I’ve watched them grow up,” I say with a shrug, knowing I’ve purchased something from every single fundraiser that’s come across my desk. My lips twitch knowing they’ll all be repaying the favor in a few years.
The caseworker appears in the doorway. She looks tired, but hell, most of us are.
“Do you know if Hayden Teal is working? He’s next on my list.”
My chest tightens as Damien points toward the nurses’ station.
She’s about to go when I hear myself say, “I’ll ask him.” She nods and I don’t know why, but I just need to be the one to do it. I knew Hayden and his husband had been approved to be foster parents, but as far as I knew, they hadn’t had a placement yet, emergency or otherwise.
Hayden looks up when he hears us approach, his eyes widening.
“Is everything okay?” he asks and I nod.
“Are you and Everett able to take the baby tonight?”
He stands abruptly, the chair rolling backward across the tile. “Yes, of course,” he says to me before turning to the woman on my right. “We would be honored to take that little one as soon as she’s ready.”
The woman smiles, and it’s a mixture of relief and happiness as if moments like this help ease the others.
The entire scene has knocked the breath from my lungs, but that is nothing to watching Hayden embracing his husband when Everett arrives. Their love is palpable, and no matter how long the baby remains in their care, I know she’ll be safe.
Adored.
Loved.
I letmy head fall back against the headrest and let my eyelids flutter shut. I’m exhausted, the adrenaline crash blindsiding me enough to knock me on my ass.
I should get out of the truck and go inside, but the silence of the truck feels like a weighted blanket, soothing the ache in my chest, and I just want to stay here a bit longer. The events of the last eight hours roll through my mind like a movie that has my heart breaking and soaring in equal measure.
The lights are off in the house save for the one I know glows softly over the sink.
The problem with letting someone into your world—your home—is that you can’t just walk in and unwind without concern for another person. There’s an expectation I don’t know how to navigate yet. Being alone, you don’t have to explain yourself to anyone and you don’t have to apologize for the things you say.
You can justbe.
But that’s no longer an option.
Not with Nessa and Remi on the other side of the door.
Taking one last steadying breath, I push out of the truck and put my boot on the ground.
20
NESSA
Iwatch from the shadows as Jensen sits in his truck in the driveway. The clock on the wall says he’s been out there for at least twenty minutes, and I’ve debated just as long if I should go into my room or wait for him to come inside.
In the short time I’ve known him, the work he does is only second to breathing. He’s confident—sure—but I know with absolute certainty that something happened tonight that has him unable to carry on like everything is all right.
