Then one afternoon, while bouncing Hailey in my arms, I decided to give him a quick call. I simply wanted to know whether he would be coming home for dinner that evening.
“Probably not,” Liam snapped the moment he answered.
“Okay, I was just wondering if I should cook,” I replied, caught off guard by his sharp tone.
“Can you stop checking up on me?” he interrupted harshly. “I’m working right now.”
I swallowed the hurt in my throat and kept my voice steady. “Okay.”
“Love you,” I added quietly after a brief pause, hoping to soften the tension.
He didn’t answer me. I looked down at little Hailey, who was sleeping peacefully in her crib nearby, and placed my phone beside her baby bottle. That was when something caught my attention on the screen. The call timer was still running because he had failed to press the end button. I was just about to tap the screen myself when a sound came through the speaker. It was a woman laughing softly.
