a deep breath. Then swallowed. Then finally said out loud what she’d been thinking about for the past week. “I think I need to give up the penguins.”
Wow. Hearing the words out loud made them feel real.
Ellie looked shocked. “You would give up the penguins for your baby?”
“Of course. It’s what moms do, right?” It was what her own mom had done. “Besides it’s really unfair to the penguins too. I’m not really doing a good job with them. Turns out this is all I know and…it’s not working. Maybe this is the universe’s sign that I’m not one who should have these penguins.”
“Who should have them then?”
“There are a number of people who would take them. I’ve already made a couple calls.”
There were three people in the Galápagos penguin project alone who were interested in adding her penguins to their collections.
“Honey, I don’t want you to feel like you have to do that,” Ellie said, looking concerned. “I don’t know anything about penguins, but I know a lot about diapers and discipline. I can help with those while you raise those penguin babies.”
Yeah, well, there were no penguin babies. But there was a human baby.
And she only had a few months to learn everything she needed to know about him or her.
She’d spent the past nearly ten years, learning everything she could about penguins, even more if she went way back to all the books she’d read as a kid, and, clearly, she still didn’t know everything she needed to know.
She really did like having all the answers.
And according to Ellie—who would clearly know—she needed to get over that.
Jill looked at Zeke. Hold on tight to something that’s anchored deep.
He was laughing and talking with his brother, but he looked over and caught her eye and gave her a wink.
At least she’d gotten that part right.
“Hey, it would be really great if you would stop buying my girlfriend things and doing stuff for her,” Zeke told his brother, as Zeke caught Jill’s eye and gave her a wink.
She’d been talking with Ellie and she looked…thoughtful.
Ellie had that effect on people.
Zander lifted his bottle of beer to his lips. “What do you mean?”
Zeke turned back to his brother. “If Jill needs anything, I’m the guy. Got it?”
Zander smirked. “Look, if my neighbor needs her drain snaked, I’m not gonna say no.”
Zeke narrowed his eyes. “Jill does not need her drain snaked.”
“Not at the moment anyway. I took care of that four days ago.”
“You did not snake her drain.”
“Well, I offered. And I made sure she knows I’m available any time she needs it.”
“Stop saying it like that.”
Zander smirked at him. “Like what?”
“Like you’re talking about more than pulling gross, clumpy wet hair out of her actual drain.” Zeke shuddered as he said it. He could handle blood, vomit, and even animal poop, but wet hair in a shower drain was disgusting.
Still, would he put up with it for Jill?
Absolutely.
“Okay,” Zander said. “Then you probably don’t want to talk about the jelly I gave her.”
Zeke’s frown intensified. “The what?”
“I totally gave her my jelly,” Zander said. “A whole bunch of it. Really sticky and sweet, and—”
“Knock it off.” Zeke knew Zander was just fucking with him but he still wanted to punch his brother in the mouth. Even the thought of another guy messing with Jill raised his blood pressure.
Zander laughed. “Relax. She came over to borrow a screwdriver for a lamp that got delivered and then we talked about Chuck a bit and she mentioned she needed grape jelly. So I traded with her. I got her strawberry, she got my grape.”
“And you gave her a dog catcher’s pole to use on Chuck?”
Zander chuckled. “That girl isn’t going to get that close to Chuck.”
“She said you told her she could at least poke him with it. Dammit, Zander, you can’t have her thinking that’s the way to defend herself with alligators.”
Zander gave him a long look. “Jill’s smarter than that. But I thought it would help her to feel a little safer if she had something in hand.”
He was right, of course, about Jill being smart. Zeke blew out a breath. “Yeah. Okay. I just…”
“You want to be the thing that makes her feel safe,” Zander filled in.
Yes. That was what he wanted. But it made him sound like an asshole out loud. “Yeah. But I don’t want her scared just so I can feel like some big hero.”
“I get it. And I like it. You’ve never gotten to be