“Don’t,” he said.“Don’t say anything.We’ll deal with the name thing later.What about custody?We live next door, so it shouldn’t be a problem.Am I listed as a father on the birth certificate?”
He was moving too fast.All this talk about living arrangements and legalities.“Yes, but we need to deal with this later.”
“Why?Are you going to disappear again?”
“I didn’t come all the way back just to leave.I had planned to have a life here with my daughter.”
“My daughter.”
“Our daughter.”What was going on with him?Why did he have to—
Control.He was trying to control an uncontrollable situation.Of course.What else would Adam do?
She rose to her feet and moved next to him.When he didn’t step back, she risked putting a hand on his arm.His skin felt warm to the touch.Alive.The black hairs tickled her palm.Stubble outlined the strong line of his square jaw.The young woman who’d left him would have been allowed to touch that skin and stubble, but she wouldn’t have appreciated the contrast of smooth and rough, warm and cool.She wouldn’t have noticed the shape of his mouth, or that his muscles coiled when he was tense.She hadn’t learned that losing, even if by choice, was hard to get over.
It had been nine years and Jane still hadn’t gotten over Adam.
“Billie is our first priority,” she said.“We have to tell her that you’re her father.”
He stiffened.“Father.How am I going to be her father?I don’t know how.”
“You’ll be fine.”She was about to go on with the logistics of where and when to tell Billie, when he cut her off.
“What if I say something wrong?What if she decides she doesn’t want me for her dad?”
She stared at him.Adam Barrington,theAdam Barrington, expressing doubt?
He shrugged out of her touch.“Why are you looking at me like that?”
“I’m surprised you’re worried.”
“Why wouldn’t I be?I don’t know Billie that well and she doesn’t know me.What if she doesn’t like me?”
“She adores you.”
“Maybe.”
She shook her head.
“What?”he asked.
“I was just thinking I wish you’d been like this nine years ago.”
“Like what?”
“Insecure.Scared.”
His eyes met hers and for the second time that night she saw into his soul.“You scared the hell out of me, Jane.”
The confession came nine years too late.
“Hell of a day,” she said, blinking frantically and ordering herself not to cry.
“You’re telling me.”He sighed.“Tomorrow, over breakfast?”
“Okay.”
“What do you want to say?”
