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“It had everything to do with you!” Lexi cried. She bent and snatched her purse off the ground and tucked it back on her shoulder, just to have something to do with her hands other than flapping them about like a crazy squawking chicken. “It had everything to do with you and the fact you said you never wanted kids! I didn’t want to hurt you. I didn’t want to be standing here having this fight because I knew how it would go. There was no scenario where this worked out. There really never was. We were on borrowed time, Curtis, no matter how much we might have enjoyed it.”
“You enjoyed it?”
Lexi rolled her eyes in exasperation. She couldn’t believe Curtis was going to do this. Now. Freaking now, on top of everything else. “Of course I did,” she snapped. “That should have been obvious.”
“I thought it was. Which was why I was even more confused when you just disappeared.”
“I’m sorry,” she snapped. “I thought I was doing the right thing. I didn’t want to hurt you, but there was more to consider than just us. I had to do what I did. Now that you know- I- I don’t want anything from you. You can go on with your life and pretend like this never happened. I don’t want your money. I don’t want your time. I don’t want to lock you into trying to do the right thing, because there is no cut and dry right thing here. I just want the baby to be happy and know that he or she is loved. I don’t want a father who isn’t a father at all, popping in and out of its life. That’s no way to live at all, so just go ahead and walk away. You’re free, Curtis. I don’t need your help and I don’t want it either.”
“No?” One dark brow rose, but that was all the expression he would allow. “What about my love?”
“Your- what?” Lexi choked. “Your love?” She chuckled low under her breath. “Uh- we both know that’s not possible.”
“Why?” Curtis frowned. His deep blues sparked with emotion and genuine confusion. “You don’t think it’s possible for me to love or you don’t think it was possible given that we weren’t together for very long and not in any official capacity?”
“All of the above,” Lexi sighed. She just wanted to get into her car and drive down the block where she could pull over and lose her shit in private. It was exhausting trying to hold the tears back. Her throat felt scorched and her eyes were on fire with the pinpricks of impending tears. “I don’t care how long we knew each other. I don’t care how good we might have been together. I don’t care what we did or where it was going. That’s over now. You don’t want to be a father and I’m pregnant. That’s all that matters now. It’s a giant hurdle we’d never get over, so please, just go and save us both a lot of heartache and headache.”
“So that’s it? You think I would just abandon my own child? You think I would abandon you?”
Lexi’s eyes flew back down to her feet. There was so much pain in Curtis’ voice, it turned her heart to ice. “I don’t know,” she admitted. “I debated with myself for days about what to do. I- I didn’t want to think so, but I also knew what you said. You were honest and adamant about it. And I knew your past. I knew that you’d been hurt by women who wanted to use you. I chose to leave because I couldn’t risk you thinking those things about me. It would have destroyed me to know that you did.”
“You never gave me the benefit of the doubt, you know that, Lexi,” Curtis snorted-sighed. She couldn’t look at him, but her hands balled into fists at her sides. “I’ve always had to prove to you that I was something I wasn’t. This time is the only time I think you’re right.”
“What?” Her eyes flew back to his face and her stomach cramped at the pain she saw etched all over it.
“I can see how you thought that disappearing was best. I’ve never given you any hope that I’d welcome the news or that I’d want a child. I did say that I’d been used in the past and you knew me well enough to consider that. I can see why you left, but I wish you would have had a little more faith in me. That I’d know you were different. That you would have known that I never would have thought you were capable of doing any of those things. I wish you would have come to me and at least talked it out. You didn’t though, and I had to come find you. I’m here. I’m here now and I’m not going anywhere.”
