I hit Send and stare at the screen. A physical ache builds between my ribs. The space inside me where Chloe belongs is empty. I wonder if she has holes inside her shaped like me.

I’d like to be in that hole.

I grimace. That’s not what I meant.

And yet...

Minutes pass. No reply. Shit.

Twenty minutes pass and I realize I am no better than my teenagers, breathlessly waiting for the next Snapchat post from a crush.

With a sigh, I return to work, happy to have some communication with Chloe. At least we “talked.” She knows I’m here. She can find me when she’s ready.

If she’s ever ready.

The words on the first contract in front of me blur. I feel my pulse in my eyes. The first delivery date for five designs is egregiously soon. Slash. The terms for failure to deliver are draconian.

Slash.

I need to take out my frustration somewhere.

My red pen’s half empty by the time I make it through the twenty-nine pages of this mess.

Bzzzz.

I leap across the desk and read:

sorry. diaper blow out. typing one fingered with baby on arm

God, I want to see her. I take the leap.

I’d love to meet her, I type.

An eternity passes in the form of one minute. Then two. Five.

Finally:

Tn8?

I’m reasonably fluent in textspeak, but this is a new one.

Yes, tonight, I reply, assuming.

k

Tn8 and k are my new favorite words.

I’ve got it bad.

Chapter 15

Nick

“Utterly inappropriate baby gift?” Charlie asks, as if we are in a countdown.

“Check.” I humor him.

“Her ex’s strap-on dildo you bought for her on an online auction site where people assume she’s a porn star?”

I frown. He’s not wrong, technically.

“Check,” I say softly, tapping the table next to the box in question for emphasis, jaw tight.

“Condoms?”

“Charlie,” I growl.

“What? I was about to ask if you’d choked the chicken in advance so you don’t jump the gun when you finally do the two-backed nasty, but I thought that was little too personal.”

“Thank you for your exquisite tact.” I shoot him a sour look. “And all those mixed metaphors.”

He shrugs. “So?”

“So what?”

“Did you?” He makes a hmph sound in the back of his throat, the noise suggestive and inquisitive at the same time.

A perfect encapsulation of my brother.

“None of your business.”

He grins. “Smart man.” He frowns. “Unless being old changes that.”

“Changes what?”

He lowers his voice. “Maybe instead of worrying about jumping the gun, you need Viagra?” He gives me a once-over. “You are six and a half years older than me. Plumbing changes.” He frowns, looking down at his own pipe.

My response makes me realize where Elodie got her eye roll.

“No.” Hell, no. Hell, no on many levels. “I’m going to meet a newborn, Charlie. Not sleep with her mother.”

“Babies nap. You could have a little afternoon delight.”

“Babies also wake up and scream bloody murder. Trust me. I know this. Simone and I should have named Jean-Marc ‘cockblocker.’”

Charlie’s in the middle of a swig of ginger ale. He begins choking.

I grin.

“Wait ’til you have kids.”

“It’ll be a long wait,” he gasps.

My front door opens, and in walks a giant black hole whose gravitational pull yanks at my wallet.

“Speak of the devil,” Charlie says, as my youngest chucks a hockey-sized bag across my threshold, his face buried in a phone screen.

“Dad?” Jean-Marc doesn’t look up. “Can you help me with that?”

Charlie grabs the bag, then gets yanked back to the floor. “Jesus, JM! Or should I call you CB?”

I give Charlie a dirty look.

He winks back. “What’s in there? Gold?”

“Close. Textbooks. A bunch of my new friends weren’t patient enough for the buy-back at the university bookstore, so I paid them out. Need to list them online at a profit and make bank next semester.”

Says the kid who cries poor all the time.

He finally finishes his business online and approaches me for a hug. Jean-Marc is dark like Simone, but with a Grafton male body, which means tall and lean. He’s a good two inches taller than me now. Did the kid grow in the last two months?

“How’s school?” I ask, realizing my cheek is brushing something on his chin that approximates a beard. He’s only been at NYU for a handful of weeks. There are no grades.

He pulls back and laughs, blue eyes like mine practically glowing. “Straight A’s so far.” He shoots me a defiant look. “I didn’t give permission for you to see them, by the way. You know about this law called FERPA?”

“Yes. You’re eighteen now. I don’t have the legal right to see your grades unless you give permission.”

“Cool, huh?”

“Saved my ass when I was an undergrad,” Charlie says.

“You got into Yale Law, Charlie.” Jean-Marc says with a worshipful tone. Haven’t heard that directed toward me since he was eleven.

“Yep. Bor-ing. Who wants to spend their days in classes and research, all cooped up in a...” Charlie’s voice fades out as he catches my eye. “I mean, great job with the 4.0.” He winks at my son.

Jean-Marc laughs, then looks at me. “Who’s the present for?”

Before I can answer, Charlie says, “Your dad’s girlfriend’s new baby.”

My son frowns. “Girlfriend? Baby? I go away for a few weeks and everything changes. Do I have a little sister now?”

I cock one eyebrow, gut clenching. I know he’s joking, but the teasing puts me on edge in a disarming way. “No need to play dumb. Elodie told you.”

“No. Amelie did.” He laughs. “Elodie chased you down in bed with a chick. Amelie won’t let her live it down.”

“Woman. Not chick.”

He shrugs.

“And she has a brand-new baby?” His look makes it clear he thinks I’ve gone off the deep end.