Page 41 of Your Soul to Keep

His fingers tightened around mine. “Steady, sweetheart.”

I gave my head a shake and smiled falsely.

He scowled. “Don’t do that. I don’t want polite Shae. Don’t hide. I want the real you.”

I huffed and narrowed my gaze on his. “How real do you want it, Gabe? Want me to tell you how much I despise the fact that you had a child with someone else? How I despise myself for walking away even as one part of me scoffs at the idea that we ever would have lasted?”

Unperturbed, he leaned in. “All of it. What else do you got?”

I blew out a slow breath. “I feel sick. No one warned me.”

“Did you ask?” he retorted.

I shook my head sharply, the end of my ponytail hitting me in the face.

“Hiding your head in the sand won’t change anything.”

I held up one hand while attempting to disengage the other. “I don’t want to know.”

“We were never more than friends, and the relationship was casual. She didn’t want to be a parent. I did. She had the baby and eventually signed away her rights and left her with me.”

My heart skittered in my chest.

A girl. He had a little girl.

Oh, God.

What’s her name?

How old is she?

Does she have your eyes?

I wanted to know everything and nothing at once, so I focused on the mother. “You don’t ever see her?”

For the first time he looked uncomfortable. “She visits a couple of times a year.”

I cocked my head to the side. “And is your relationship with her just as ‘casual’ when she’s here?”

He tipped his head back, watching me from beneath hooded lids. “She stayed with me the first couple of times. After that, I ended it and now she books a room at the resort like any other visitor.”

I ground my teeth together. This shouldn’t have bothered me. Did I not live a whole life that didn’t involve him?

We were only kids, for fuck’s sake!

“What about you, do you have kids?”

Yes.

Three.

“No. I don’t have any children.”

Silence stretched between us as I momentarily lost myself in the past.

When I finally looked up it was to find him watching me closely. I read the question in his eyes before he opened his mouth.

I shook my head minutely.

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