Page 70 of Sweet Twins For My Brother's Best Friend

“Hi, Mrs. Jackson. Come in, please.”

I open the door wider and wave her in, putting a smile on my face even though I don’t feel it. I feel a sick wave of anxiety instead, settling into my stomach.

Piper shoves the dog food into my chest and pulls her cardigan off to hang it on my coat rack before crossing her arms. “So. Where is she?”

“Who?” I ask jokingly, but the withering look she gives me straightens me out quickly and zaps me of whatever humor I had hoped to bring to the interaction.

“Sorry. She’s in the bathroom taking a test now.”

Piper looks up to the sky, her green eyes silently begging for help, recognition, something.

“This is a nice place you have here, Christopher,” Piper tells me, walking in circles.

She stops when she sees the small pile of pregnancy tests. “We haven’t seen you at the house in a while. Where have you been?”

I shrug anxiously. “Just. Busy. Life.”

“You have been busy, haven’t you?”

Hannah’s mother is shorter than she is and much shorter than I am.

She peers up at me. Despite her stature, she’s intimidating. I sense an anger within her that’s just waiting to be released.

Sighing, I sit on the couch. “I get it,” I tell her, pulling imaginary hairs off my shirt. “Busy. Ha ha.”

“Do you find this funny, Chris? Hannah might be pregnant, and she’s onlyjuststarted her life.”

“I find this intimidation act funny. Come on, Miss Piper. You have known me since I was a little runt.”

She sighs and sits down beside me. Her fingers drum on her thighs. “I have. And you’ve been like family, but I can’t condone this.”

“Condone?” I ask, the word slipping from my mouth like a dirty word. It feels wrapped in fire in my mouth.

“What does that even mean? What can’t youcondone?Me and your daughter being together?”

“You really did it this time, Chris. You have been in our lives for years. Why would you do this to Tyler?”

She spits out the words ‘do this’ like I hit the family dog with my car.

“What’s wrong with us being together? And…to Tyler? What have I done to Tyler?” I ask her, more harshly than I mean to.

Her head tilts at my tone, the look of a woman who is daring me to keep going. I resent the question.

What about Hannah? What about what I’ve done to Hannah? I took her virginity and maybe got her pregnant. Her entire life is on hold until we have answers, and her mother’s question is about Tyler?

I watch her green eyes, so much like Hannah’s, light up with excitement at my response.

“What did you do to him? How do you think Tyler would feel about this, Chris? You betrayed him.”

How will Tyler feel? Who cares howTylerfeels right now?

I laugh bitterly, throwing my head back. “Betrayed him? You’re joking, Piper.”

“Mrs. Jackson,” she corrects me through gritted teeth.

“Fine. Mrs. Jackson, there is no way you think this is abetrayal.I simply won’t believe it. You know me. I would never betray Tyler. He’s been the only constant in my life.”

I sit, comfortable in my own haughtiness, positive about my role and my morality, until Miss Piper asks, “Well, then I assume he knows about the two of you? Or, on second thought, have you lied to him about it?”

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