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She nods, her eyes drooping heavily with fatigue.
“Tomorrow we’ll take it easy, okay?”
“Okay.”
I smile and she gives me one back. Leaning down, I kiss her forehead, both cheeks, the tip of her nose, and her chin. She giggles and it makes my heart feel lighter. This is our thing: me kissing her in all those places. It’s something we’ve done for years. It started off as a ploy to avoid going to sleep and it just sorta stuck.
Maisy’s eyes dart past me, widening, before they glimmer with pleasure. I stiffen when I feel his presence step further into the room. Even without Maisy giving him away, I would know it was him. My body’s always been able to recognize his even before he makes his presence known.
He steps up to the bed, and when he remains quiet, I lift my head. He’s not looking at Maisy, bu
t at the picture frame beside her lamp on her nightstand. It’s the one picture I had of him. I had it framed when Maisy was three, and it’s sat on her nightstand ever since.
Sometimes, I’d walk by her room and find her holding the picture, looking at it longingly. Those are the times the guilt would eat away at me and I’d second-guess my decision on keeping her from him. But then the fear of him rejecting her would come next. You never know what you miss if you never had it. That was my train of thought. Yes, Maisy wanted her dad, but if she never knew him, she never had to worry about him not wanting her. I knew that pain intimately, and I refused to take the chance of her feeling it too.
Judge’s questioning eyes fall on me. I know what he wants to know. I never told him that Maisy knows who he is. I wasn’t ready for that conversation, so I kept that bit to myself. My reprieve is up. I’ve got no choice but to tell him.
His gaze turns hard, and I look away from him.
I tuck the covers tighter around Maisy. “I’ll see you in the morning, sweetie.”
“Okay, Mom. Love you. Goodnight.”
My smile is brittle. “Love you too.”
I get up, expecting Judge to follow me. I’m surprised when I look back and find him sitting on the side of the bed in the same spot I just vacated. I leave them alone and go out into the living room. Mindlessly, I wander over to the window that overlooks the backyard. It’s dark out and the porch light isn’t on, but it doesn’t matter. My mind is on other things anyway.
Judge’s reflection appears when he steps into the living room a few minutes later. I blink slowly, take a deep breath in through my nose, and blow it out of my mouth before I turn around and face him. I sag back against the window frame.
Before he has a chance to say something, I start talking.
“I never kept who Maisy’s father is from her. She’s known you from the moment she could comprehend the meaning of the word father. She knows the story of how we met and all the wonderful things that came after that day. I wanted her to know as much as she could about you. Of course, I didn’t tell her how things ended. To Maisy, you’re this amazing man that made her mother happy for six beautiful months.”
I cross my arms over my chest to ward off the sudden chill seeping into my bones.
“That picture you saw is the only one I had of you. If she couldn’t have you in real life, I wanted her to at least have a piece of you. She may not really know you, but she’s loved you for years.”
“She doesn’t know me because you made it so,” he grates out between clenched teeth. “I missed everything because of your decision, Ellie. Every fucking special moment up until now. Those are moments I’ll never get back.”
Tears prick my eyes, and I blink hard to stop them from falling, but a couple manage to escape.
“I’m sorry,” I whisper hoarsely. I’ve never meant an apology more than I do in this moment. “I’m so sorry, Judge.”
He roughly combs his fingers through his hair, then tips his head back. His lashes fall against his cheeks as he closes his eyes. When he brings his head back down and his eyes land on me, I barely hold back a flinch. Had I not been leaning against the window frame, I would have taken a step back at the hostility in his gaze.
“You say you’re sorry,” he states with a hard voice. “Then prove it. Tell me why you kept my daughter from me. Tell me what the fuck I did to deserve that. And don’t say it’s because you were protecting her from my rejection. There’s more to the story.”
I bite my lip and look down at my socked feet. He deserves to know the truth, but that night hurt me in more ways than him kicking me out of his apartment. So much more happened. I still have nightmares.
I walk over to the couch and take a seat, drawing my feet to the edge of the cushion and hugging my knees to my chest. I keep my eyes pinned on the blank TV screen across from me.
“My car wouldn’t start that night, and before we….” I trail off, remembering the tender way he worshipped my body. At the time, I thought it was Judge’s love for me overwhelming him, but that wasn’t it at all. He was saying goodbye. “Anyway, I forgot to charge my phone and it was dead, so I had no way of calling anyone. I stayed in the car for twenty minutes, trying to calm down, before I left to walk to the twenty-four-hour convenience store not far from your house.”
My fingers dig into my calf muscles and I swallow thickly. Judge is somewhere behind me, but he stays quiet.
“I was only a couple of blocks away. I could see the store. There were a couple of cars in the parking lot.” I squeeze my eyes shut, recalling that night so clearly. “I didn’t even hear them behind me, because my mind was still trying to wrap around what happened with you. All I wanted to do was go home, crawl into bed, and feel sorry for myself.”
Judge mutters a curse, but I’m so engrossed in the past that I barely register it.
