Page 45 of Her Hat Trick Daddies
“Hi, baby! What are you gonna show Momma?” I clap, wide-eyed with excitement.
Instead of climbing or asking for help like usual, she turns andwalksup the stairs. One foot at a time. Steady. All on her own.
“Oh my god, Lu-Lu!” I rush after her, scoop her into my arms, and kiss her cheeks over and over until she’s giggling so hard she hiccups.
Tears sting my eyes. Not just from pride, but from the fear curling in my chest.What if the guys don’t want her? What if I’m the only one who sees what a miracle she is?
“You’re going to grow up too fast for me,” I whisper, wrapping my arms around her tighter, memorizing the feel of her small frame.
But just as quickly, she squirms, eager to be back on her feet, and I let her go.It’s starting already.The slow slip from needing me every second.
“Thanks, Ava. Maybe next she’ll be bouncing a ball or swinging a mini hockey stick down the street,” I joke, wiping at my eyes and laughing lightly.
“You better believe Levi and Eric have been all over that with Trevor,” Ava says with a smirk. “I can see Luna tagging along. Sven, though. He’s been so mellow lately. All he cares about is that everyone’s happy and healthy. Whatever path they go down, he’s good with it.”
“That’s a nice change of pace.” I pause. “Oh, speaking of Eric, he should be right behind me. I saw him in the parking lot.”
“You staying for dinner?” Ava asks, already knowing the answer. “Sven’s making his famous spaghetti.”
“Thought you’d never ask,” I grin, giving Ava a playful bump on the shoulder.
Once the kids are fed and off to their little corner of playtime, I finally tell Ava and the guys what happened today. That at least the guys know who I am now, but they still don’t know the part that really matters.
They don’t know about Luna.
God, I don’t know how much longer I can carry this. It’s getting heavier by the minute. Especially after today, being around Shane, looking at him closely,reallystudying his face…
That’s when it hit me. He has those slate-gray eyes. That rare, stormy kind of gray you don’t see every day.
Just like my little girl.Hislittle girl.
And suddenly, I start spiraling, thinking about the pileup, the chaos, the timing of it all. Was it a sign? A warning from the universe? Some kind of cosmic signal telling me to hold off, or worse, to stay silent?
No. That’s ridiculous. That’s just my anxiety doing what it does best: taking up space and making me doubt everything.
Ava and the guys tell me to trust my gut. They remind me I’m not alone, that if this goes sideways, they’ve got my back. And I love them for that. I really do.
So I gather my things, scoop up Lu-Lu, and head home.
But the minute we walk in the door, she’s fussy, more than usual. Nothing’s wrong exactly, but she fights sleep with every tiny ounce of her being. It takes over an hour to get her down. By the time I do, I’m so drained I could cry.
I consider pouring myself a glass of wine… maybe a bottle. But my days of getting sloshed to cope are behind me. Instead, I run a hot bath, toss in some bath salts, and set the baby monitor on the vanity. She finally stays asleep. Thank god.
As the water climbs around me and the bubbles soften everything, my body and my thoughts, I let my eyes drift closed. And for once, instead of dreading what might happen next, I let myself imagine the best-case scenario.
The guys fall in love with Luna the second they see her. Shane just knows. David and Andy step in without hesitation. We fall into a soft, messy version of “friends with benefits,” where all three of them offer to babysit just because they want more time with her. They dote. They protect. They love.
By the end of it, I’m smiling to myself. My limbs are heavy, warm, weightless.
But it’s all just a dream. A wish I haven’t dared say out loud.
And as soon as I crawl into bed, that little fantasy shatters under the weight of every what-if. My brain doesn’t deliver more daydreams. No, it hits me with the opposite, on loop.
All the ways this could go wrong.
I’m walking the halls of Ball Arena, Luna cradled in my arms. At first, everything looks normal, until it doesn’t. The lights dim.The air turns cold and damp, and the walls twist into something darker, like I’m in a cave in the mountains instead of a corridor.
Still, I reach the press room door.
