Page 63 of Xavier

I shook my head.

While I wanted to believe her, I didn’t know how true that really was when everything finally boiled down to it. Perhaps Kate had the intention to do so back when it first happened, letting the dust settle long enough with the case before bringing it to me because of her genuine—and now proven—fear that I’d do something irrational.

But there wasn’t any excuse now that it was almost an entire year later since the actual incident.

“Don’t blame her,” Dan was saying. “It’s not her fault.”

“Shut up, Dan,” I snapped. I really wasn’t in the mood for the fucking peanut gallery to be weighing in on this. “Your fucking church. I’m blaming whoever the fuck I want.”

He had no rebuttal to that. Thankfully.

If he opened his mouth again, I really was going to end up taking out all of my aggression on him. Which wasn’t going to fair well with asking Kate to let me see Dexter again. In her eyes, I was already on thin ice from the drinking and being out of Dexter’s life.

Which... now I supposed the odds were even.

“You’re not bringing him back to that fucking church,” I said, slowly standing. “Or any of them.”

She shook her head, looking up at me. “I haven’t, I swear.”

For the roles to reverse like this so suddenly was jarring. NowIwas on the side of the disappointed parent looking down at the fuck-up that caused out son harm and pain.

Perfect Kate was no longer so perfect.

Letting out a long sigh, I let my anger fade into numbness. At this point, there was nothing that could be done. No matter how much I yelled and screamed at Kate over it, she couldn’t wave a wand and go back in time to fix any of it.

That ship had come and gone along with the priest who was, hopefully, now rotting in a hell I no longer believed in but could for this occasion.

At least Dexter was safe from him.

Dan moved closer to us in order to pick Kate up off the driveway. She was still staring at me with those big doe-eyes of hers that I’d gotten so used to seeing during our first few years of marriage. She’d looked to me to be her leader when I’d had no clue what the hell I was doing. She’d put her trust in me in more ways that I probably deserved at the time.

And now here we were, standing face-to-face while we were both lost.

I didn’t want to hate her, or blame her, despite my anger. Eventually, I’d probably forgive her, even though for now, that seemed like a very distant wish.

Whatever happened at this point and moving forward, we needed to do it together. No more of this bullshit with us fighting for control over the other. Clearly that wasn’t working for either of us.

“Kate.”

Her uncertain stare was all I got in return.

“I need you, going forward, to meet me halfway. We can’t keep doing this. I’m tired of being left out of things that are important. I get that I wasn’t the best dad around the past decade, but I’mhere now. We both fucked up. I need you to stop holding my past over my head, just like I’m choosing not to do so with you right now.”

She swallowed visibly.

I held my hand out to her. “We’re going toactuallyco-parent from here on out.”

Slowly, she placed her hand in mine, shaking it. “Okay. No more hatchet.”

“No more hatchet,” I agreed, squeezing her hand.

CHAPTER 24

Xavier

“How’re you holding up?”Gage asked.

Shifting the ice pack resting on my forehead toward the crown of my head was the only thing that was relieving the pressure from this god awful migraine that had cropped up the second I’d climbed into my car and left Kate’s house.

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