He chuckled. “Isn’t she everyone’s?”
“Yes, but this time it was unfortunate because she came barreling toward me yelling ‘Mommy, Mommy’ while I was standing with her father—who, until that second, had no idea she existed.”
Daisy covered her cold cheeks, the blanket sliding to her waist. “At first, he was confused. When he talked to her, he looked… enchanted, like he knew her from somewhere but couldn’t place her. Then he asked her age and—” Daisy swallowed. “It clicked. This clear, awful understanding crossed his face, and it broke me. He looked at me like I was the scum of the earth. I couldn’t even explain. I told him to leave, which he easily did.”
Her tears came jagged and hot. Matt lifted her into his lap and cooed her like a child until her sniffling eased.
“Sounds like you had a rough night,” he said softly. “But if this guy is still some deadbeat musician from before, maybe he’s gone. Scared off.”
“I don’t think he’s that guy anymore. And he never knew he had a kid.”
“I get that, Daisy, but all I’m saying is he’s probably some pathetic loser who—”
“He’s not.”
Matt blinked, surprised at her defense of the man she’d only ever described as a screwup.
“There’s so much you don’t know.” She ashamedly looked away.
“Then explain it to me, Daisy. Please let me in.”
Daisy drew a steadying breath. She’d never laid out the years before motherhood and she’d never planned to. But last nighthad made secrets impossible. “He was never a deadbeat. He was talented. He made it big. He’s still… really famous.”
Matt went still. “Would I know him?”
Daisy nodded and waited a beat before she said, “Amelia’s father is Jameson Kingston.”
Matt swallowed and studied her face for any hint of a joke. But when her austere expression never once faltered, he knew this was no laughing matter. Daisy waited for him to speak but realized that he was processing her revelation. She wanted to respect the time he needed to come to terms with the fact that the little girl he loved was the daughter of the most sought-after rock star of their time. After three long minutes, he looked back. “Start from the beginning. I need to hear everything. And I need you to be honest with me.”
While unraveling her past was the last thing she wanted to do, she owed him that. “Okay, the beginning. Well, I guess it began my freshman year of high school when I saw this boy with bright blue eyes…”
Daisy spent most of the morning giving Matt a very detailed version of her past, answering every question. She began at fourteen, when she met Jameson and his cousins, then traced the years that followed: the music, the tours, the dizzying rise of fame that swept him up and carried them both along. And she ended at eighteen, with the night she walked in and found him in bed with his manager. She told it flatly, almost as if she were detached from it after all these years. She needed to believe that, even if it wasn’t true.
When she finished, Matt closed his eyes and let the new sun warm his face. Then he did the strangest thing: he laughed.
She didn’t see what was funny, but waited it out.
When his chuckles settled, he placed his forehead on her shoulder and mumbled, “So you’re telling me, that Jameson Kingston, international rock star, was not only your first love but also fathered your child?”
She nodded, even though it was rhetorical.
“How is a man supposed to compete with that?”
“There’s no competition,” she said, brushing her lips against his.
He held her for a long moment, then whispered, “I don’t know how to process all of this, Daisy. But I’m here. I’m not going anywhere.”
After picking up Amelia from Daisy’s parents, they spent the rest of the weekend together, void of worry about their uncertain future. They stayed in, played video games, watched movies, and overindulged on pizza. Amelia adored Matt; she clung to him like a monkey and trailed him like something shiny.
Sunday night, she followed him to the door, head low. “Why can’t you spend the night, Matt?”
He looked at Daisy, then crouched. He gave the same answer as always. “Maybe another time, sweetie.”
“You always say that. And I know you stay when I’m not here.”
“Who told you that?” Daisy asked, annoyed.
“Nani. She tells me everything. She says I’m a young lady and can handle adult things.”
