The back of my jeans was still a bit damp from the snow, but I figured Manning and I were headed to my place anyway. He had to check out from the hotel and his flight wasn’t for a few more hours. I wondered if he had any meetings today, but if so, maybe it didn’t much matter if he skipped them considering he’d be done with the job as soon as he told Tiffany the truth.

That was what I was thinking as I buttoned up my jeans and heard Manning say, “We’re having a baby.”

I glanced up to find him staring at me. The darkness in his eyes struck me first, then how he looked physically pained, sick even, when he swallowed.

A baby? I wondered. Whose baby? What was happening?

Ash from his cigarette had fallen onto his thigh. He hadn’t put it out completely, and a thin trail of smoke disappeared out the window.

He dropped the phone to his side. Slowly, the truth started to pierce the bubble I’d been subconsciously protecting the past few seconds. He’d been on the phone with Tiffany. She’d been trying to reach him for days. He wheezed as if he’d just been sucker punched. The silence made everything surreal, the air so thick that I put my hand around my throat, as if I were choking. I stood still so long that I got dizzy.

It was Tiffany. It was their baby.

The phone started to honk and he hung it up, breaking the stillness in the room. “Lake, listen—”

“Don’t.” The sharpness in my voice surprised even me. “Don’t say it.”

“I have to. Come here, Lake.”

My head pounded. Heat burned up my chest into my cheeks. I’d never been able to think straight around him. Never. Had no control around him. Not even a little. I held the heels of my palms to my temples. “I can’t.”

“That was your sister.” His pants were still undone, and his stomach flexed as he stood from the windowsill. “She’s pregnant.”

I died a little inside. That statement killed off any part of me that was hoping I’d misunderstood. I put a hand up. “Don’t come over here.” I realized that I, too, was topless. I covered my breasts and stepped back, nearly tripping over my duffel bag. My things were strewn on the ground from when I’d dumped them out last night like an impulsive, stupid child. That was what I was. Reckless. Childish. So incredibly naïve to think this could ever work. I put on the t-shirt closest to me, and of course it was Manning’s and it smelled like him, which choked me up.

I got to my knees, grabbing my stupid pink pajamas to shove them in my bag, even though I’d just as soon leave them behind.

“What are you doing?” Manning asked.

Leave. I wanted him to leave. I wanted to leave. I couldn’t even form the word, just kept packing whatever was nearest.

“Lake,” he said, as if saying my name over and over and over would change anything. He came and tried to get the duffel from me. “Stop it.”

“You stop it.” I stood and shoved him away, but didn’t move. “Don’t touch me or my things.”

“I’m as shocked as you are.”

I’d lost him. Again. I’d thought I’d had everything—I’d told him I loved him, not hours ago. I’d never really had him, though, and deep down, I’d known that. Whose fault was it that I’d let him convince me otherwise? “You made me say it,” I said, unable to stop the sobs from breaking through. “You made me tell you I love you.” I threw my weight into my next attempt to budge him, but he stayed put, even as I pushed and pushed. “I got fired for you. I introduced you to my friends. I ignored Corbin to make you happy. And Val, she warned me—she knew this would happen.”

He grabbed my wrists finally, wrestling me against a wall. Locking my forearms over my chest with one hand, he covered my mouth with the other. “Calm down or they’ll think I’m hurting you.”

He loomed over me, larger than life, blocking out everything but him. I couldn’t look at him while he did this to me again. I twisted my head side to side, bucking my entire body to get him off me. “You are hurting me,” I snapped. “You’re always hurting me.”

“I didn’t know,” he said, his voice raised. “She stopped birth control without telling me. I didn’t know, Lake, I swear.”

My eyes landed on the hotel desk phone, remembering the winking red light. It took me back to last night, when I’d seen, with my own eyes, that Tiffany had been trying to reach her husband—and I’d held him tight anyway. Manning hadn’t known about the baby. He hadn’t done this. And I’d known things could fall apart, but I’d pushed forward anyway.

When I stopped squirming, Manning said, “She did it on purpose.”

I blinked at him, panting into his palm. The pain in his eyes, the truth, was enough to clear my haze of anger. This had Tiffany written all over it. All the messages she’d left, the calls from her Manning had missed—maybe she’d even wanted me to know, otherwise why wouldn’t she wait to tell Manning tonight, in person?

It clicked. This wasn’t Manning’s fault. I sagged against the wall and batted my lashes, clearing my vision. The past few days had passed quickly, and yet, they’d thoroughly changed me. Manning and I had felt permanent, but Tiffany had one-upped me in the most ultimate way. There was nothing more permanent than a baby.

Manning lowered his hand. “I swear to you, Lake, if I’d thought there was even the slightest chance this could happen, I wouldn’t keep that from you. You know I wouldn’t.”

I wanted to keep being angry, to scream at Manning and make him feel as hurt as I did. And in the same instant, I was angry for him. Protective. Tiffany hadn’t just taken this from me, but from him, too. “She tricked you.”

“Like I told you last night, we were talking about having a family down the line,” he said, loosening his grip on my wrists. “She thought in her own twisted way, it would be okay to start now.”

“No she didn’t. It didn’t just occur to her out of the blue,” I said, straightening up against the wall. I thought about how I’d feel if I were in Tiffany’s shoes. If it’d been my husband coming to see the woman he truly loved. If I’d been faced with losing him to my sister. I had been through that, but not publicly. Nobody but Val had known about Manning and me when he’d married Tiffany, and that had been bad enough. She wouldn’t be able to hide the reasons for her divorce forever. “You said she did this on purpose.”

He frowned. “We’ve always had shit timing, you and me,” he said, dropping his hands. “But Tiffany . . .”

“Her timing is impeccable,” I said, “and never a mistake.”

“I put in a request to come here in September. It didn’t occur to me that after four years of me hardly breathing a word about you, she’d go to this kind of extreme.”

Three months was enough time to stop birth control, get pregnant, and announce it. I closed my eyes, shedding a few silent tears. “Are you sure it’s yours?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“She has issues around infidelity.”

“Tiffany?” I made a face. “Has she brainwashed you into believing she wouldn’t cheat if the opportunity presented itself?”

He hesitated. “This is a conversation for another time, but I have no reason to believe it’s not mine.”

“What if it’s a false alarm . . . a faulty pregnancy test?” A chill ran down my spine, and I shuddered. “Something she made up for attention?”

“She’s been to the doctor, and if she’s lying about that, I’d never forgive it.” He grabbed his hair, holding it in a fist. “That’d be grounds for me to leave her, and she knows it.”

Everything in me was tight, like I might snap in half. I loosened my fists and dropped my eyes to our bare feet. A sense of relief came over me, as if I’d been anticipating bad news for days. Maybe I deserved this after what I’d done to Tiffany. Manning was right all those years ago when he said he could hurt me just by loving me, but I’d been so sure it was no longer true, even up until ten minutes ago. “You said this was it for us.” My chin trembled. “You said you wanted a family with me.”

“I do,” he said thickly. He brought me to his chest, hugging me with a strength that took my breath away. “I meant everything I said, and I still do.”

I couldn’t move. I just stood there, limp, staring out the window behind him. The mirrored skyscrapers no longer reflected the morning sun like diamonds catching the light. They just looked cold. Dead. Cabs honked ruthlessly downstairs, and there was nothing magical about the December chill freezing my tears. Was this still my New York? It didn’t feel like it.

“You promised.” I shook as the words came out, broken and sharp, shards of the future we’d planned. “You promised no matter what.”

“I still do. I still promise.”

What was he saying? I wasn’t sure he even knew. He was in as much shock as I was, I could tell by the lifeless, stilted sound of his voice. I pulled back. “Manning . . .”

“I’m not walking away from you again,” he said, and his warmth returned. He wasn’t in shock. He wasn’t lifeless. His eyes were melted brown sugar, begging me, loving me, wanting me, still, after all this.

It should’ve changed everything, but in fact, all it did was make things clearer.

We’d been through this before—he’d chosen this. “You could’ve had me so many times, Manning, but you picked her.”

“I settled—I didn’t pick her. Now I choose. I choose you, and I will never make that mistake again.” His hand found my face, and he thumbed the hollow of my cheek. “You told me once love was enough. I didn’t think so, but you made me believe it is.”

“But it isn’t, Manning.” I put my hands on his chest to move him back a safe distance, enough that I wouldn’t cave and give him whatever he was trying to ask for—but instead I curled my hands against his bare chest. “I couldn’t think past the moment back then. I know better now—life isn’t fair.”

“I don’t care what lies ahead, how bumpy the road is about to get. I made you a promise, and I’m keeping it.” The longer we stood there, the more determined he looked. “It took me too long to say it, but now . . .” He moved his forehead against mine. “I can’t imagine not telling you every day that I love you so fucking much. I trust in us.”

I worried it was too late for that. This wasn’t about trust or love anymore. I believed Manning thought we could make this work, but there was one thing Manning cared more about than me, and that was doing the right thing. That was why I’d lost him the first time. And the right thing for him was not letting his child grow up with a bad father the way Manning had—or without a father at all. “This is it. We’re over before we even began.”

“No, Lake,” he said softly, shaking his head. “I . . .” He ran the tip of his nose along mine, his lips brushing my cheek. “I’ll find a way. Trust in me, in us.” He kissed the corner of my mouth, whispering. “I’ll find a way. I will.”

I trembled with his loving words, with the sense of hope he’d finally found, even if it was too late. My hands were red, fisted against his chest, but I still couldn’t push him back. “There’s no way around this, Manning.”

“What if you’re pregnant?” he asked.

At that, I lost my breath and had to look away. A part of Manning could be growing inside me already, something nobody could take from me, not even Tiffany. After this week, I wanted it, but not like this. I had no choice but to live with the pain of losing Manning, but I could never have his child now. And I did have a choice there. “I can’t be pregnant,” I said.

He put his hand against the wall, keeping me where I was. “You don’t know that.”

“I can’t,” I repeated, shaking my head. For once, fate was on my side. What I’d thought was irreversible, actually wasn’t. “I won’t. I’ll take the morning-after pill, and if that’s not enough . . . I wouldn’t keep it.”

“Don’t you fucking say that.” His entire body vibrated, but he wasn’t angry. He was pleading. I recognized a breaking heart when I saw it. “If you’re pregnant, you know I’ll tear down the universe to be with you.”

I did know that, and I refused to get him that way. Maybe that was good enough for Tiffany, but I wanted Manning to have chosen me from the start—not because I’d trapped him into it. Manning, at his core, was a good man. And at my core, I loved him above all else. I could never ask him to leave his child, to not be there with Tiffany every step of the way. “Go home,” I told him. “Be with them.”

“Lake.” He slid his hand under my hair, but I shied away from him and kept my eyes down. He didn’t belong to me, and he never had. “Don’t pull away now that I can touch you,” he murmured. “I don’t know how or when, but I’ll come back to you. You and I have a life here. I’ve seen it, and so have you.”

On a dark beach over four years ago, Manning had made misguided sacrifices out of love. I hadn’t understood it then, but now I had to decide if I’d let Manning put himself through this. If he left Tiffany, she’d do everything in her power to hurt him—and she held all the power now. She had his baby. I could ask him to leave her and he would, but she’d turn him into the bad father he was already terrified of becoming.

He was right. I’d seen a life here with him, but I didn’t anymore.

I worked up the courage to look at him, my Manning.

“I love you,” he said, tilting my head up by my chin to kiss my forehead, the bridge of my nose, my mouth. “I love your sweet watermelon lips, your unrelenting kindness, even to those who’ve hurt you, your strength to move here all by yourself.” He got to his knees, his head at my breasts. Kneeling before me, Manning took my waist. “I love this body, and the family it will give us. The sky seems dark now, but that’s how light shines through. I promise you, Lake, I will make this right.”

I didn’t stop him. I let him hold me. I let him bury his face in my stomach. I could’ve stayed there the rest of my life listening to him tell me he loved me. I looked up at the ceiling to stem the tears I didn’t want him to see. He might take that as indecision, and it wasn’t. When I’d breathed through the urges to cry, I lowered my eyes and put my hands on his cheeks. I could’ve sworn I felt wetness there. “I love you, too,” I said. “But I can’t do this to you.”

“Yes you can. It’s not like it was that night on the beach. I’m older now. Stronger. I know I’m not my father.”

“She’ll take that baby from you, Manning. Can you live with knowing you’ll have no involvement in its life? That you won’t get to raise, love, and pick your baby up every morning and put your baby to sleep each night?”

“I’ll find a way,” he repeated, even though he knew—he had to know—this was the only way.

His eyes were red, tired. My heart split down the middle. It was just like Manning to try and carry the burden for us. He hadn’t asked for this baby, but if he couldn’t do right by it, it would kill him. I shook my head. “You need to be a good father,” I said. “And that child needs you. Tiffany hasn’t always done the right thing, but she didn’t deserve any of what we did to her this week.” I opened my mouth to end this, but nothing came. I couldn’t send him away. Words bubbled up and fizzled over and over, until I had to accept this wouldn’t get any less excruciating. I wavered, but I got it out. “It’s okay—I’m giving you permission to go.”

“I don’t want permission,” he said, swallowing. “I want you. I love you. What about you?”

I didn’t know. My heart was being surgically removed in the middle of a hotel room, and I felt each acute incision and snip. But I’d done this before and had come out the other side, so there had to be some way through it. The moment Tiffany had gotten pregnant, I’d lost a little part of Manning. A part she would forever own. I could never compete against a baby, and I shouldn’t have to. “I don’t want to be second best, and I don’t deserve it.” My voice broke, and I steadied it. “You know I don’t.”

“You’ll never be second best, Lake. I never loved Tiffany a fraction of the amount I love you.”

“I’m talking about the baby.”

With that, defeat crossed his face. It hurt me more than it should’ve. I wanted to be mad, to make him suffer and tear out his heart like he had mine but he’d already suffered. His heart hurt, too. I didn’t want that for him. He was having a baby and it should’ve been the happiest news of his life.

He reached into his pocket and showed me the mood ring. “I found this on your dresser. I was going to give it to you at the airport the way I’d planned to years ago, before I was arrested.”

I took the ring and inspected it, though there wasn’t much to see. It didn’t change colors just by holding the band. “It was in your things from the courthouse,” I said. “I thought maybe . . . maybe it was for me.”

“Maddy had one growing up. She loved jewelry. I got it off a woman in the bar that night we rode around in the truck.”

I dropped my hand to my side. “I’m sorry I took it.”

“I bought it for you,” he clarified. “I wanted you to have one like Maddy’s, since she’d loved it so much.”

“Then I kept it safe for you,” I said and held it out for him. “But it’s not mine, and it never was.”

“Keep it while I’m away. It’s my promise to you. I’ll be back. I’ll love you. I’ll make your apartment into our home. I’ll eat your Christmas dinners. I’ll be a father to your children.”

I stopped myself from accepting his gift and taking the future I was owed. I wanted to ask him to stay and experience all the colors of the mood ring with me, to light me up when I was dark and live in rainbows when times were good. But I had to let that go, and he needed to let me go, so I said, “If you have a daughter, you can give it to her.”

I’d never seen Manning cry, but he’d come close when he’d told me about Maddy in the truck years ago, and I could see he was close now. He hugged my stomach to his chest. “Don’t do this, Lake. Remember what you tried to tell me all those years ago? Love is enough.”

“I’m sorry,” I said quietly and tried to move, but he tightened his grip on me. “Manning, you have to let me go.”

“I can’t.”

“You have to.” I pried his fingers off, set the ring on the nightstand, and finished packing my bag while he watched. There wasn’t anything left to say.

When I had everything, I put the duffel over my shoulder and faced him. He stood at the foot of the bed with bloodshot eyes, taking up all the space and air in the room. I wasn’t sure when I’d see him again. I couldn’t envision ever going back home now, not with what I’d have to face, so maybe this was it. My chest felt as if it were being drawn into itself like a corset to which Manning held the strings. I didn’t want to say goodbye. I wasn’t ready.

He closed the space between us and cupped my chin like he was going to kiss me. I wanted him to, but I didn’t think I’d survive it. He wasn’t mine to kiss anyway, not that he ever had been.

“Birdy,” he said.

For the briefest moment, I was sixteen again, fighting my impulsiveness, choking back words I shouldn’t say, hiding my love for him. I looked away, and after a moment, turned and left the room.

In the hallway, I couldn’t breathe. My chest constricted so hard, I was sure any moment it’d squeeze my heart right up into my throat. But it didn’t. The heart was a muscle, and it could be trained. With every injury, it got stronger. So I put one foot in front of the other and resisted the urge to turn back for the only man I’d ever truly love.