Good Boy (WAGs #1)(44)

We switch seats, but Jess doesn’t start the engine. She studies me silently before letting out a heavy breath. “I know what’s going on here, so you don’t have to pretend.”

I furrow my brow. “What are you talking about?”

“I know why you’re upset,” she clarifies.

“Sorry, babe, but I doubt it.”

Jess stubbornly juts her chin. “I do know. Or at least some of it.” A sheepish look crosses her face. “I overheard Brenna and Molly talking in the kitchen.”

Every inch of me goes rigid. Including my neck, which suddenly throbs with pain. Damn it, why won’t that goddamn kink go away? I asked the team trainer to work on it after last practice, but it’s still sore as hell.

“What did you hear?”

“Not much,” she admits. “But enough to put a few of the pieces together. She, um, got pregnant, huh? When you two were together?”

I clench my teeth.

“And then she lost the baby.” Jess’s tone softens with sympathy. She reaches for my hand and squeezes it gently. “I’m sorry. I can’t even begin to imagine what you two went through.”

Another choked laugh flies out, making her eyes widen in alarm. Then they turn to thunderclouds.

“You think it’s funny?” She releases my hand and stares at me in disapproval. “What the hell is the matter with you?”

“Jess.” I clear my throat a couple of times. “Look. I appreciate your concern. And the sympathy. I know it’s coming from a good place, but trust me, it’s misguided.”

“Misguided?” she echoes. “Your ex-girlfriend lost your baby and my sympathy is misguided?”

“There was no baby!” I shout.

She freezes. Silence falls between us, a long, tense silence during which I want to smack myself for opening my big mouth. Fucking hell. Why’d I have to go and say that?

Maybe she didn’t hear?

Yeah, dumbass, she didn’t hear the Godzilla roar that just rocked the Hum-hum.

“What do you mean, there wasn’t a baby?” Confusion etches her pretty features. “But…I heard your sister say that your baby would have been four next month. And how Brenna’s kid and Molly’s kid would have been cousins. I swear I didn’t mishear that, Blake.”

I exhale slowly. “You heard right, okay? But you heard wrong.”

“Is that a riddle?” She sounds exasperated. “I don’t understand. Why would—” Jess gasps so loudly that I actually jump in my seat. “Oh my God! She’s lying to your family?”

“Can we please drop this?” I lean over and tap the steering wheel. “Just drive us home already.”

Jess isn’t listening to me. She looks aghast, biting her bottom lip as she studies my face. “Why does your family think you and your ex were going to have a baby?”

“You’re really not gonna let this go?”

“No.”

I clench my fists against my knees. “They think it because that’s what Molly told them. Because that's what she told me. The start of my rookie year in the pros, she told me she was pregnant.” I fix my gaze out the windshield. “And she lied, okay? She wasn’t preggers, but she said she was three months along, and, you know, that’s when you’re allowed to start shouting it from the rooftops, so I told my family right after I found out. Mol and I were engaged at that point, so they were as thrilled as I was.”

“You were engaged?” Jess blurts out.

“Had a date set and everything.” I snort. “But I guess that wasn’t enough of a commitment. Not to her.”

“I…don’t get it.”

“Not much to get,” I mutter. “She didn’t like all the attention I was getting from other broads. You know how it is—hockey players are gods. It’s like a buffet of hot girls. Not that I ever sampled the buffet.” I swallow down a wave of bitterness. “I’m not a fucking cheater.”

Jess wrinkles her forehead. “Did Molly think you were cheating?”

“She was scared I would. Didn’t matter how many times I reassured her, she didn’t believe I’d keep my dick in my pants. We were getting married, for fuck’s sake, but nope, she still couldn’t trust that I’d stick around.” I fight my rising anger. “So she came up with a way that I’d have to stick around.”

I stop abruptly, pissed at myself for laying all this shit at Jess’s feet. It’s ancient history, and there’s no reason to dredge it all up. Molly and I aren’t together anymore. So what if I still see her around sometimes. So what if I’ve told my family a lie or two. As long as I don’t think about it too hard, it can’t make me angry.

“When did you find out she wasn’t pregnant?”

“She said she had a sonogram appointment. I was supposed to be on the road, but a snowstorm in Vancouver meant our flight couldn’t take off. So I surprised her at the doctor’s office.”

“And she wasn’t there?” Jess guesses.

“Oh, she was.” I can still picture the freaked-out look on her face when I walked into that waiting room. “But there was no sonogram, because there was no pregnancy. She’d made an appointment to ask her gynecologist for fertility meds.”