down again, I muttered, “God, what is wrong with me?” Fuck, I was exhausted from my own brain doing this to me. Lowering my hands, I looked at Maddox. “What the hell does it mean when thinking about my relationship fucks me up like this?”
“Maybe it means you and your guy need to talk some things through.”
I swallowed. “What am I supposed to say, though? There isn’t a lot of middle ground here. He and his kid… I can’t have one without the other, you know?”
“I know. I get that. He has to take care of his kid, but remember, you gotta take care of you. Look out for number one.” He paused, and his voice was soft as he added, “I know you’re into this dude. But man, this is stressing you out so bad, you ended up in the hospital today. If this thing you guys are doing is freaking you out this much, maybe tapping the brakes isn’t a bad idea.”
I shook my head. “No, I don’t want to do that. I’m…” I couldn’t say out loud that I loved Devin. I didn’t know why. When did anything in my head ever make sense? “I want to be with him.”
“I didn’t say ditch him. Just tap the brakes, you know? Slow things down a bit and make sure you’re both on the same page. It isn’t like you have to elope with him next week, right?”
“True.”
“So talk to him, slow things down, and…” He shrugged. “See how that goes. If that’s not cool with him, then… I mean, maybe then you have your answer.”
I cringed inwardly. Maddox was right. I just needed to slow things down, and Devin and I needed to talk about everything. Being a boyfriend intimidated me enough—I wasn’t ready to be a stepdad.
Except dating Devin was a package deal. And he’d made it clear that the package deal part was non-negotiable. He’d been emphatic about it, and I didn’t blame him after other people had obviously bailed. Fact was, it was either Devin and Dallas, or nothing.
Which made sense. He was looking out for his daughter, and he’d obviously been burned a few times in the past by people who couldn’t or wouldn’t commit to more than being his boyfriend.
So if I couldn’t make that commitment…
I exhaled. That didn’t really leave many options, did it?
“You good?” Maddox asked.
No. I was so far from good I didn’t know how to explain it. Instead, I forced a smile. “Yeah, man. Good talk.” I bumped his fist. “Thanks for checking on me.”
“Any time.”
Now I needed to get some sleep, get in touch with Devin, and figure out where the hell we went from here.
If there was one thing I was getting sick and tired of doing, it was deep breathing.
This morning, after fighting exhaustion and restlessness all night, I’d reached out to Devin, and tonight, he was coming over after work. All day long, I’d had that same edgy feeling that had segued into yesterday’s panic attack, and all goddamned day long, I’d been telling myself to breathe and doing everything I could to keep myself together.
I wanted to see him. I always wanted to see him. But oh God, I was nervous as hell. Maddox and I had talked a lot about what I should do and say, and about how if Devin were a reasonable guy—which he absolutely was—he’d understand. He knew how hard being a single parent was. Wouldn’t he also understand how hard it was to approach being a stepparent? Maddox had had the same worries and reservations, and so had his wife, but they’d made it work. Why couldn’t we?
Besides the part where I’m on a hair trigger for a panic attack just from thinking about it?
Deep breaths. Deeeeep breaths. More stupid deep breaths.
Tonight, we’d talk. That was all we could do, right? Just lay it all out, talk about it, and decide how to move forward. It wasn’t like one of us had cheated or done something terrible. We were just finding our footing and figuring out what we were doing. It made me nervous to think about because everything made me nervous, but I could do this. I’d be a lot less stressed once I did it. Hopefully.
But as I let Devin into the condo, my stomach dropped into my feet. Even as he greeted me with a gentle kiss, everything suddenly felt all wrong.
One look at him, and holy shit, my heart was doing what it had been