“You remember me?” he asked.
I choked out a disturbed sound, realizing this guy didn’t know a thing about me, only the tiniest tidbits we’d shared that night. “Yeah. I remember you.”
He nodded quickly, and he looked to the tea glass like he was reading tea leaves, searching for answers through the anxiety that weaved around us. “I…I was in town about a month ago. I’d stopped by the grocery store to grab something to drink on my way back out to Poplar. I saw you in the parking lot as I was leaving.”
He peeked up at me.
A barbed-wire ball rolled in my stomach.
I could barely nod.
He roughed a shaky hand over the top of his head. “I’m going to be honest…it took me a second to place you. Where I knew you from, but the second I did, it punched me in the gut because you had this little boy hooked to your hip, and my mind instantly started calculating.”
He stalled out, his throat bobbing as he swallowed. “I was too shocked to do anything. I just sat there like an idiot as I watched you drive away. I tried to shake it off, but I couldn’t stop the nagging at the back of my head telling me that little boy might be mine.”
A shiver rolled, head to toe, and I tried to form a response, but he kept going like he was trying to fill the discomfort with words.
“You have a sign in the back window of your car. I had some business back here in Time River again today, and when I drove by, I…I couldn’t do anything but stop because I need to know.”
I gulped around the razors in my throat. “I tried to find you. After I found out I was pregnant. I went back to the bar where we’d met at least ten times, but I never saw you.”
He nodded like he accepted the confirmation. “I don’t hit bars all that much. It’d just been a bad day and I hadn’t wanted to be alone. Same as you, I suppose.”
“Yeah.”
He looked down, his fingers slipping over the condensation that dripped down the sides of his glass, a war in the way his shoulders tensed and his entire being clenched.
“He’s cute,” he finally rumbled toward his tea.
I thought it might have ripped my heart out of my chest. “He’s my world.”
He still wasn’t looking at me when he mumbled, “Can I…take some time to process this? I don’t know…”
“You don’t have any obligation—”
“But I might like to meet him.” His claim sliced through the middle of me, stilling the words on my tongue, and the only thing I could do was give him a trembling bob of my head that was spinning with so many things it’d become a blur of dread.
Would he want to become a part of Kayden’s life?
Try to get custody?
Change everything that we knew?
And would it be better for Kayden if he did?
Was I being selfish by wanting to protect what we had, this life that we’d built? Selfish because this was Kayden’s father and he had a right, even if I didn’t want him to have it?
God, I was getting ahead of myself, but I didn’t know how to stop the spiral.
Trey stood and dug a five out of his wallet for the tea he hadn’t even taken a sip of.
“That’s not necessary.” It was hoarse.
He shrugged a shoulder as he studied me. “Thanks for being honest with me. I didn’t know what I was going to find when I came in here. Good to know you’re just as sweet as you were that night.”
Disquiet gusted, and I couldn’t say anything else as he ambled out. The second he disappeared, I turned, raced into my office, and slammed the door shut.
I covered my mouth with my hand, but it wasn’t enough to silence the cry that erupted.
FORTY-ONE
RYDER
It was after nine by the time I pulled my bike up in front of my mother’s old house. My childhood home. Warm lights glowed from the windows, and a comfort hit me like none other. Eagerness and anticipation bubbled in my blood, thinking about Dakota waiting inside.
I couldn’t wait to get to her.
I’d had a couple actual legitimate meetings, and the joy and pride I found in my work thudded through me in a beat of satisfaction, while the rest of me had wanted to say fuck it all and get to her as fast as I could. Bummed that Kayden would already be down for the night but also excited that meant I had Dakota to myself.
I figured if I felt this way every day of my life, then things weren’t going to turn out so bad.
I hurried up the walkway and put my key in the lock, calling out, “Honey, I’m home,” as I opened the door.