“I know about the baby,” I said, not willing to spend any time going back and forth. I wanted the truth to be out between us.

He didn’t even flinch. “What baby?”

If he weren’t breaking my heart, I might have been impressed. “I know about the baby you had with Sharonne.”

He gave me a long look and then a long sigh. I couldn’t believe it. Finally, he was going to tell me the truth.

Then, he said, “You know you’re being ridiculous.”

I blinked a couple of times because that was not what I expected. “What?”

“You’re saying that I had a baby with some chick named Sharonne?” He chuckled, though it was a sound filled with pity — for me!

“So you’re saying you don’t know anyone by that name?”

“No, that’s not what I’m saying. But I am saying that I have two children and they are both,” he pointed toward the ceiling, “upstairs in their beds right now. I do not have another child and frankly, Ginger this is getting a bit old.”

“Old?” I popped up from the sofa, forgetting about all of that civility. “You know what’s old, Jeremy? What’s gotten old is First Ladies from other churches coming to me and telling me what’s been going on with my husband, what’s been going on behind my back.”

“Is that what this is about? Gossip from women? You’re right that is old. That’s as old as time and you need to stop listening to these people. You know everyone is going to be coming for us now. The news is out about this.” He reached over to the end table and grabbed papers that I assumed were the Amazon contract. He waved the pages in the air. “We’re about to be multi-million dollar stars and folks all over this city will be coming for us, trying to shoot us down.”

“Do you think Sonya Douglas, Reverend Douglas’s wife is a liar who’s trying to shoot us down?” There was a little twitch in his eyebrow. I continued, “Because she’s the one who told me. I don’t know who told her.” I paused. “Maybe her husband? Maybe you confided in him.”

Again, a pause. Then, “I don’t know where she got what, but what I know is that you know me. You’ve known me for a long time.”

“I thought I did.”

“And so, you have to trust me. But even if you don’t....”

I leaned back a little. “What’s a marriage without trust?”

He shook his head. “At this point, you and I are a team. We’re in this together and both of us need to have a single focus. Both of us need to cut out all the noise. We don’t need to listen to anyone or anything. Both of us need to ignore it all.”