Page 81 of Finding You

He laughed. “If you feel like shit, that’s something you have to work out on your own. I do forgive you, and I want to figure out how we can be good parents to our daughter because she’s amazing, and she deserves better than we’ve given her.”

Katie let out a slow breath. “Okay. I…yeah. I guess.”

He hesitated, hoping there might be an apology coming, but he knew that was probably too much to ask for. “I still want to go to court to finalize everything. I have to protect myself. My rights. But I’m not ever going to take her from you. I wouldn’t trust you with my heart again, but I trust you with her.”

Katie made a soft noise in the back of her throat. “And what? You want to hear the same from me?”

Dallas laughed again. “No. I trust myself with her, and that’s what matters. But I want to be able to communicate. I want to know that if something comes up in my life, I can rely on you to step in. And I want to know that if something comes up in your life, you’ll rely on me first.”

“You want me to take her this weekend, don’t you?”

She had always been good at seeing through him. “Yes, I do. My b-boyfriend”—he tripped over the word a little, but it still felt good to say—“he has a family thing, and he wants me to meet them. If it gets tense, I don’t want Audra subjected to that.”

“Are they homophobic?” she asked. It wasn’t the question he was expecting.

“I think they are, yeah.”

“That fucking sucks.” She sighed, then said, “I can keep her. My mom and I were going to do some shopping, and she loves riding around in the carts. And I think it’ll help me. I’m still a little freaked-out from when you kept her on my day.”

Dallas pinched the bridge of his nose. “I know. And I don’t want to point out how you kept her from me without my permission more than once, but?—”

“No, I…yeah. I know I did,” she said very softly. “My mom kind of pointed that out, and I’m sorry.”

He almost had to sit down. It was the first sorry he’d gotten since before the divorce. “Thank you. And if we can keep doing this, we can get better at this whole thing. We used to be friends once.”

“Yeah. Then I was the asshole who slept around.”

“You were,” he said. When she made a noise of protest, he laughed at her. “I’m not going to sugarcoat it, Katie. I might understand why you did it, but finding you with him was one of the worst days of my life.”

“But you didn’t love me,” she said as though she knew.

Dallas swallowed thickly. “I wasn’t in love. But I did love you. And you’re the mother of my child, so I’ll probably always love you in that way.”

“I don’t deserve that.”

Dallas shrugged. “Maybe. Maybe not. That’s up to you to decide. Anyway, I’ll be in touch, but I’d like to have Audra Wednesday night if I could. I’ll be gone Friday to Monday, and I’m going to miss her.”

“I’m working, but my mom can meet you with her after school,” she said.

It was reasonable. Maybe almost too reasonable, and he was afraid to hope. But at the same time, in spite of everything, he couldn’t help it.

“Would you ever want another?” Kylen’s finger was tightly wrapped in Audra’s fist, and she was fast asleep on her little cushion. The four of them had sprawled out in front of the TV for a dinner picnic, and Flora was dozing off in her little rocking chair near the corner of the blanket.

The question was one he’d asked himself a few times, and before this, the answer was always no. But now…

“I don’t know,” he admitted. He reached out and brushed the edge of his finger along Audra’s hairline. She pursed her lips and squeezed down on Kylen’s finger. “You?”

“I never thought the opportunity would come up,” Kylen murmured. “I kind of thought it would just be me and Flora forever. And then when she goes off to college, me and some cats.”

Dallas snorted and leaned over, brushing his nose against Kylen’s temple. “You’re too good of a man to spend your life alone.”

“True,” Kylen said, then winked at him, “but I also didn’t want to waste my time settling for someone who wasn’t completely right for me.” Dallas wanted to ask if he could be that man, but things had still been a little tense between them. And they’d had almost no time alone to talk. “I don’t think I’m opposed to having more. But I’m also happy with just this.”

Just this. Just Flora? Or him and Audra too, and all the good and bad that came with them?

Kylen turned his head and smudged a kiss against Dallas’s jaw before easing his finger from the baby’s grip. “I have to get my little monster to bed in a minute, and you have to get home so you can get some sort of sleep before work.”

Kylen was right. Dallas needed the rest because there was only one more day and one more night before it was time to meet the family. Before it was time to flaunt the hell out of what they had. He wasn’t sure if Kylen was going to pretend, but Dallas wouldn’t have to. He wouldn’t need to act when it came to loving this man. He was already so far gone.

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