Officially Over It - Lani Lynn Vale Page 0,56

my hand and I curled my fingers around her neck, massaging it lightly.

She groaned and leaned into my hand farther, and I turned back to look at my parents.

They were both staring with small smiles on their faces.

“What?” I asked.

“Nothing,” they both said in unison. “Nothing at all.”

“Now, let’s talk visitation.” Mom turned to Hannah. “Let’s go visit tomorrow.”

“You can’t come in just yet,” Reggie said. She looked over at me with worry clear in her eyes. “After his setback today, we want him to get a little stronger. But, I assure you, as soon as he’s able to have visitors, I’ll let you know. The second I’m aware of it.”

They spent the next thirty minutes talking about Dare and cooing over pictures on Reggie’s phone—who surprisingly had quite a few photos—while Travis, Dad and I went out onto the front porch to talk some more.

“How are you really?”

Travis’ question startled me.

“I’m okay,” I admitted. “Surprised. Excited. Pissed off.”

“You’re having feelings for my girl,” Travis continued.

I looked Travis straight in the eye and said, “I’ve always had feelings for your girl.”

Travis didn’t look surprised in the least.

Dad snorted loudly. “We know that, nimrod. You’ve only been fighting so hard against it that you couldn’t see it. You and Reggie were so fucking convinced that you hated each other that neither one of you took a step back and thought about why you were so hell-bent on hating each other. There’s a fine line between love and hate, and y’all crossed into the love category a long time ago. Both of you really love to hate each other, though, so neither one of you were willing to admit your feelings. We knew you had it bad for each other. It was only a matter of time before you figured it out for yourself.”

I didn’t know what to say to that.

“You think she has those kinds of feelings for me?” I asked.

We hadn’t lied about why we’d gotten married. We didn’t lie to our parents, no matter how much easier it would’ve been had we just lied about it.

“I think that my kid loves you so much that she’s willing to marry you to save you,” Travis admitted softly. “I think that she loves your kid, even when she should hate what it represents. And I think that, if you love her right, she’ll be your biggest champion, just like her mother is mine. And Raven is Wolf’s.”

I felt hope bloom in my chest.

I wanted that.

I wanted what everyone else had.

Always had.

“Now,” Travis said. “Let’s talk about who and what we’re going to press to get that baby home and in your house and not Eerie’s.”

Chapter 20

When I said I was normal, I might’ve exaggerated slightly.

-Text from Reggie to Nathan

Reggie

Two weeks later

Other than the setback the day that Eerie had thrown her attitude around for all to see, the baby had done surprisingly well.

I’d started calling him Darren instead of his ‘legal’ name. Dare for short.

And the entire NICU staff had started that as well.

Today was the first court hearing that would be hammering out a custody schedule for the baby. The judge would also be hearing about why we wanted to change the baby’s name.

I sat biting my nails as I looked at the judge staring hard at Eerie. She was kicked back in her chair, glasses perched on the end of her nose, just glaring.

Swayze got up and walked a pamphlet of information up to the judge, a sweet, older woman that looked like she would take no crap. Honestly, she looked like Mrs. Claus with her white hair, rosy cheeks, and quick smile.

“What have we got?” Judge Barron asked.

“The information you requested,” she said. “It’s all there.”

Over the last couple of weeks, Wolf and Silas, as well as a few other people, had been busy.

They’d dug up every bit of information they could on Eerie, the doctor, and Eerie’s attempts at keeping the baby a secret and put it into a nice, pretty little bow for the judge to read with her own two eyes.

Swayze had also laid out a very eloquent case for the judge to decide on.

“Ms. Foster,” Judge Batista said softly. “Were you aware that your contract was legally binding when you signed it?”

Eerie looked like she wanted to throw up.

“I just wanted to have a baby,” she said softly. “I wanted a kid. Is that bad?”

That also didn’t answer the question.

She knew just as well as I did.

“It’s not a bad thing to want a