Page 89 of Time Out

Tears in my eyes.

His own were shimmering. The anger had changed to something else, and he threw his arms around me and yanked me to him until I was sitting across his lap. I buried my head in his shoulder and sobbed.

For my sister, who would hopefully get safe. For my own past he now knew way too much about. For the secrets I’d hidden that would now have to come out, and for the mess I was going to make of his own current life.

I cried because I’d felt more kindness from his dad and Mama B and Dave in twenty-four hours than I had from my own parents in twenty years. I cried for all of it, and as the tears slowed, I pressed my hand to my stomach. Sniffed.

Took Davis’s hand at my back and moved it on top of mine.

“I’m so glad you’re the man who’s going to be the father of my baby, Davis. So very glad I don’t have to live with that fear anymore.”

He cleared his throat and held me tight. “No one should have to live with that fear, Maggie.”

Chapter 27

Davis

I had to unleash it. I had to get the fury boiling beneath my skin and tightening every muscle in my body somewhere else so I could be the man Maggie, and hopefully soon, Ruth needed.

Fortunately, my dad was a big man with even larger shoulders and wouldn’t collapse under the weight of it, so when I saw him in the kitchen making eggs and bacon and toast for breakfast like it was his home, I gave it all to him.

He took it, jaw clenching and white-knuckling the spatula as I told him about Maggie, the past I’d known about before, and the phone call I sat through. All she’d given me before was a skeletal outline compared to that conversation.

“That’s how you know she isn’t lying. She wouldn’t risk that.”

“It wasn’t at first, but yeah. That’s what made me one hundred percent certain.” Because she might not have thought about it, but I had the night she told me about her family’s show. Hell, I’d thought about it as soon as Dawson mentioned his sister watching that same show. Given her past and the media attention she’d already lived through, she would not have walked back into my life for attention or money.

She’d want to stay hidden, and I figure knowing who I was actually kept her away, might have been one of the reasons that sent her running that first night.

“That’s not really the point though,” I told my dad as he grabbed a pair of tongs and flipped the bacon.

“I know. But I’m thinking on that part and how sweet she is for you instead of wondering if I need to get home so you can take care of that girl when she gets here without me around or if I need to call your mom and get her down here so she can live here. That cruel… sadistic… what in the hell is wrong with people? Men. To treat women so damn horribly when it’s women who give us kindness and help teach us empathy and compassion. Who give up so much of who they are, their bodies, to carry our children, to raise our families and take care of homes and families, all while most of them still work careers. I don’t get it, son. Never have.”

Thank God I’d been raised by a man like him and not someone like Vince.

“I don’t know what to do either.” My hands were braced on the counter, arms tight and tense. Telling my dad what was going on had eased some of it, but I knew as soon as I saw Ruth, it’d all come rushing back. There were more secrets Maggie was hiding, or rather more nightmares she didn’t want to talk about. There was so much more going on than I’d ever considered and now her need to make it on her own with absolutely no help made sense.

How many times had she been refused the simple privilege? How many times has he been told she couldn’t do a thing without a man?

The very idea she’d lived that way for so long and had been willing to take my help in small measures so far suddenly meant everything.

She trusted me.

I’d make sure to treasure that trust for as long as she let me.

“For now, let’s eat breakfast.” He set bacon on a plate as he said it. “Perhaps with good food, we’ll have a better understanding of what comes next for you two.”

“Thanks, Dad. For being so incredibly awesome about everything.”

“I love you.” He shrugged and wiped his hands together. “It’s that simple.”

For him, it certainly was.

Behind me, soft footsteps echoed from the hall, and I glanced over my shoulder. Maggie was there, dressed in clothes she would have had to grab from the guest room. Loose-fitting sweatpants that hit at her shins and dressed in a black sweatshirt, she had her hair piled on top of her head, and color was back on her face.

A gift after that phone call.

“You okay?”

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