Page 88 of Deal Breaker
“You’ve said that,” I snap. “But being scared isn’t a good enough reason. Because this? This is the kind of thing that shatters people.”
Her face crumples.
“I would’ve shown up,” I say, swallowing hard. “I would’ve been at the hospital. I would’ve held her first. Stayed up with her at night. I would’ve been there. For all of it. I would have been her dad.”
Tears spill from her eyes, and I want to catch them. I want to yell. I want to disappear.
I lean against a random car, trying not to slide down it. My voice drops to a whisper. “I missed her whole life.”
Landyn crosses her arms over her chest like she’s holding herself together. “I was young and terrified, and I thought I was doing what was right. You were building a company, and I had no idea if you’d want her or if you’d resent me?—”
“So you decided for both of us?” My voice is hoarse, wrecked. “You didn’t even give me a chance to try.”
She’s crying now. Sobbing quiet tears. Controlled. She always was composed. Even in chaos.
“I’m sorry,” she whispers. “I’ve been sorry for years.”
Silence opens between us, vast and unbridgeable. A pain in my chest makes it hard to breathe. I press a fist to my ribs. “You named her. Raised her. Loved her. And I never got to touch a single second of it.”
“I know,” she chokes out.
I look at her, eyes burning. “You didn’t just keep her from me. You kept me from her.”
She starts to step forward, but I back away, shaking my head.
“I need…I need time, Landyn. I need to wrap my head around this without losing my goddamn mind.”
“I understand.”
I look at her. The woman I’ve never stopped loving. And right now, I don’t know what the hell to do with her. For the first time, I feel like I don’t understand her at all.
There is only one thing I know for certain.
“I want to meet her,” I say again.
Landyn nods, voice trembling. “You will.”
Then I walk away because if I don’t, I’ll break.
The drive home is a blur. I don’t remember backing out of the hospital parking lot. Don’t remember the highway turns or the lights I must’ve sat through. I just remember the sound of Landyn’s voice in my head when she told me we have a daughter.
I pull into the driveway and park the truck in the same spot I always do. The house looks the same. Stella greets me as soon as I open the front door, running circles around my feet. Everything is the same as it always is, but at the same time, something in me knows that nothing will ever be the same again.
I flick on a light. Toss my keys on the counter. Toe off my boots. I’m halfway to the kitchen before I stop, suddenly breathless. I make it to the counter, bracing both my hands on it like I might lose my footing.
She didn’t tell me.
She knew where I was. She could have picked up the phone. Hell, she could have sent me an email. For six years, she watched our daughter grow up without me. The thought of it guts me, but the worst part is knowing that every time we were together over these past few weeks—every smile, every touch, every kiss, every late-night text goodnight—she didn’t say a word. She was keeping this huge fucking secret the whole time. And I knew something was off. I knew she was holding something back. But not this. Never this.
I grab a glass from the cabinet and shakily pour a few inches of whiskey into it, no ice.
Her name is Poppy.
That little girl in the hospital with wide eyes and blonde hair like her mom’s. She’s mine. I didn’t need Landyn to say it. Somehow, I could see it. In the shape of her chin. The color of her eyes. She’s my daughter. And she doesn’t evenknow me. My gut twists so hard it feels like something rips open inside me.
I sink into the couch, whiskey in one hand, phone in the other. I stare at the screen. I want to call her. Demand answers. I want to scream. Fall apart. But I don’t move. I just sit in the dark, glass clenched tight, staring out the window into nothing.
Because I don’t know who I am right now—ex, betrayed lover, man still in love, father—and I’m scared as hell I’m all of them.
