“He’s with Hattie,” Lottie noted firmly.

“He isn’t Corbin,” Ryn put in.

Oh yeah.

Right.

God.

How could I forget?

Corbin, Pepper’s ex, cheated on her to the full extent of the definition of cheating (and then some).

In other words, he’d moved in with her, committed to her, had a baby with her, and kept fucking his ex-girlfriend through all of that, and obviously, she didn’t know.

The ex-girlfriend didn’t know.

But getting away with it for years, he eventually got lazy, left a trail Pepper followed, there were a variety of nasty confrontations, and boom.

Suddenly she’s a very young single mom, her ex is pissed that she rained on his parade, he takes it out on her, uses their daughter as a weapon, and insult to injury, Pepper’s parents made members of the moral majority look like hippies. They’d washed their hands of her when she moved in with Corbin out of wedlock, without washing their hands of her, since they intermittently got in her space to share she was going to hell.

“I know he isn’t,” Pepper said to Ryn.

“And Auggie isn’t Corbin,” Lottie added.

“I know he isn’t,” Pepper repeated to Lottie, a wee bit more impatient this time.

“So, what gives?” Lottie asked. “I mean, she shoots, she scores, three times, babe,” Lottie reminded her of the wins she’d had with Evie and Mag, Boone and Ryn and me and Axl, doing it pointing to herself then Ryn and me.

“It’s more complicated when you have a kid,” Pepper said.

“It is not,” Ryn returned. “You’re being chicken.”

“I’m not being chicken,” Pepper snapped.

“I’d make chicken noises, but I’m above that,” Ryn said to Lottie.

Lottie laughed.

Although that was funny, I was seeing they weren’t getting this wasn’t a funny moment for Pepper.

I kept my gaze on Pepper and suggested quietly, “Maybe we should lay off.”

“Yeah, that’d be good,” Pepper said curtly.

“As far as I know, you’re not Benjamin Button,” Ryn told her. “You dig what I’m saying to you?”

Pepper stepped back from us.

Yup.

This wasn’t a funny moment.

I braced.

And it was a good thing I did.