"Exactly! See, honey, I knew you'd come around. You've always been so reasonable—"
"So," I cut him off, my voice flat, "it'll be much easier to just change Baby's name instead. Like we originally agreed. He'll be Abbott Pruitt."
The smile froze on Irvin's face. He shot to his feet, his voice cracking with anger.
"Absolutely not!"
When I just stared at him coldly without responding, he forced himself to calm down, switching to a tone of pained sincerity.
"Greta, be reasonable here. My family has had only sons for three generations! If Baby takes your surname, our family line ends. How am I supposed to face our relatives? How are my parents supposed to hold their heads up?"
I took a deep breath. "So when you promised my parents—two children, one surname each—that was all bullshit?"
Confronted with the accusation, Irvin's face turned the color of raw liver.
"Greta Pruitt! Why do you have to be so aggressive? That's not the same thing at all! Besides, if you'd been capable of giving me a son the first time, we wouldn't be dealing with any of this!"
My blood turned to ice.
"Irvin, do you have any basic knowledge of biology? The father's chromosomes determine the baby's sex!"