by Sosie Frost
And she knew it too. Her babbling turned adorable, and those big, chestnut eyes gave me the same charming glance her daddy so often used to make me melt.
She snuggled against me, and I simply held her, letting her nurse, telling her silly stories that Granna used to tell me, and checking the time.
Because I knew what would happen.
It was Friday at five o’clock. The knock rattled the door.
And that was absolutely unfair.
I stood, letting Clue rest on a blanket on the floor while I answered the door.
This wouldn’t take long.
I opened the door. Shepard carried two pizzas—pepperoni and Hawaiian, extra pineapple with red onions.
“So this is what six months of deception gets me?” I crossed my arms. “If you had lied for a full year, would that have earned me some hot wings?”
“I’ll run back now and get them.” Shepard didn’t smile. “How many do you want? A dozen?”
“There’s not enough chickens in this world.”
“Then I’ll bring you mozzarella sticks too.”
I tried to close the door. Shepard stuck his foot in the way.
“Breaded mushrooms?”
“Please.”
“They have salads.”
My throat closed. I wouldn’t let him see me cry, but it was so hard to hide. “What are you doing?”
“Explaining myself.”
“Too late.”
“Confessing my love?”
“Don’t bother.”
The door nearly shut. Shepard’s voice turned haunting.
“I wanted to see my daughter.”
Shepard held up two onesies from the rack—one pink, one blue.
“Wanna place a bet?” he asked. “I bet he’s going to be a boy.”
I didn’t buy it. Neither did the Target clerk. She looked at my belly, shook her head, and I agreed.
“Nope,” I said. “Girl all the way.”
“You’re so sure?”
“I’m growing it. You want to haul her around and take a guess?”
“Girl?” He surveyed the pink, lace, and flowers on the onesie. “I’d like that.”
“You’re going to be outnumbered, Officer Novak.” I winked. “No backup this time.”
“I think I can handle it.”
I giggled. “Famous last words.”
Damn it. “What makes you think you deserve a chance to see her?”
Shepard didn’t look away from me. Those blue eyes spoke a thousand apologies. “Because everything I did, every lie I told, every chance I took to be with you was to see her. I had to be a part of her life. Of your life.” He surrendered with a shrug. “Hate me if you want. You never have to forgive me. You don’t even have to talk to me. But please, Evie…you know how much I wanted her.”
This wasn’t fair.
Who was I to keep a child from her father?
I took the pizzas. “How can I trust you after what you did?”
Shepard closed the door behind him. I shouldn’t have allowed him inside, but we had to do this at some point.
Fight. Break it off.
Say goodbye.
Why did it hurt so much?
“You blame me for Granna’s death,” he said.
“You knew better than to bring your partner inside her house. She knew her rights, and she waved them because it was you.”
“I know.”
“She did nothing wrong.”
“I know.”
“And she was arrested. Humiliated. Panicked.”
“I can’t take that back, Evie. I can’t change it. I did everything I could, but the precinct was against me. The chief hated me for breaking it off with his daughter. The others…”
He didn’t have to say it. They weren’t fond of me. Too many trips into my neighborhood, too few officers returning home.
“I can’t change what happened,” he said. “And I don’t know how to prove to you that I did everything in my power to help her. But I can give you exactly what she wanted you to have.”
“What’s that?”
“A family.”
That damn word. I regretted ever thinking I needed such a stupid thing.
“For six months, all you wanted was someone to love,” Shepard said. “You asked me, pushed me away, searched for them yourself. I didn’t want to tell you the truth about where you came from or who your parents were or what you had growing up. Not when you deserved so much more.”
“So you lied to me?”
“I tried to find a way to make it right. I tried to give you a better life. That’s why I helped with Clue. That’s why I gave you the penthouse.” He sucked in a breath. “I can’t change the past, Evie. But I can give you a better future. And I’m offering it. I’m promising it. Forget what’s happened and the misery that kept us apart. We have so much more that can bring us together.”
“Lies?” I asked.
“Love.”
“Betrayal?”
“Happiness.”
“Regret?”
“Forgiveness.” He stepped forward, taking my hands. I tugged them away, but he didn’t let me go. “I’ve never known loneliness like this before, Evie. Because we had something special, and it’s gone. I ruined it. But we can make this right. We belong together.”
And it seemed for all the world like he was right.
I met him as a scared, misguided girl treading on the wrong side of the tracks.
Twenty hours of community service later, and I didn’t just have a hard-ass on my case who arrested me for something stupid—I had someone in my life who cared. A friend. Someone watching out for me. Buying me college textbooks. Bringing me food during finals. Calling to check in during bad weather and meeting up with me for lunches because we understood each other so well.
We were two completely different people who shouldn’t have fallen in love. And for so long, we had been separated by an engagement. I’d loved him, and it broke my heart every second of every day that he didn’t know how I felt.
Until the day he did. Until the day we could be together.
And from then on, we’d never parted. Not until that arrest. Not until our worlds crashed together and everything we had built crumbled under the weight of his badge and the danger of my streets.
I thought we could survive anything.
And maybe we might have. If the accident had never happened and my mind hadn’t shattered with love and loss and confusion.
But not now.
Never now.
I brushed at a tear. Missed. He knew what it meant. He cupped my cheek, and a strong thumb wiped the tear away.
“Evie…don’t.” His voice broke. “Don’t say it. Don’t say anything. We’ll try again later. I’ll wait. As long as it takes.”
No words came. What could I have said?
“I can fix this.” He promised.
What was there to fix? I shook my head. Clutched my heart. Held back the tears.
We were over.
And nothing could change that.
Ever again.
Except her.
Clue’s delighted squeal was a shrill greeting. We both gasped as the baby coo’ed, plopping down at our feet.
She had crawled.
Chubby hands over roly-poly legs. Crawled for the first time.
To reach for Shepard.
To greet her daddy.
His eyes widened. He reached down, picking up a baby so happy to see her daddy that she instantly cuddled against him, wrapping her little fists in his shirt. She babbled, cooed, shrieked, and buzzed, sharing with him in her own special way all the interesting stuff he had missed since he went away.
I turned, covering my mouth before Clue saw me cry.
“God. I can’t do this, Shepard.”
“I’m only asking for a chance—”
“I can’t say goodbye to you.”
He stilled. His hands tightened over the baby. “What?”
“You don’
t know how hard it was to be apart from you. Every day and every night, I was alone except for the baby growing inside me who must have seen my heart breaking. I thought of calling you every day. Driving to your house. Committing a damn crime so you’d come to get me.”
“Evie—”
“The only way I could survive was if I did everything I could to forget you.”
The truth hurt, made even more painful by how the accident granted a wish I never should have made.
“I went to bed every night praying I’d forget your name,” I said. “I woke up every morning hating that I remembered what it was like cuddling beside you. I wanted to forget you, Shepard.”
“Evie.”
“I did forget you…but I couldn’t stop loving you.”
Shepard rushed forward, pulling me into his arms. We smooshed the baby, but she didn’t care. The game was too much fun, and she tugged at both of us to hold her tighter.
Just the way she liked to be held.
The way I deserved to be hugged.
The way this family should have proven their love.
“I love you, Shepard.” I kissed him, hard, crying over the words I hadn’t spoken for so long. “I love you. I love you.”
“I love you both. Love you enough to do everything in my power to be with you.”
“You don’t have to do anything.” I pulled him closer. “Just say you want me. Just promise me you’ll stay. Just…give me this family.”
Shepard’s voice warmed. “I’ll do you one better.”
“How?”
“I’ll give you the future.”
He tugged a box from his pocket, offering it to me. The diamond ring inside was modest, beautiful, and bordered with aquamarines…Clue’s birthstone.
“Marry me, Evie,” he said. “We talked about it before, and I always put the job first. But nothing is more important to me than this family. And I’ll prove it every day—whether you remember it or not.”
“Believe me.” I stared into his eyes before losing myself in his kiss. “I couldn’t forget you if I tried.”
Epilogue
I still couldn’t get the soup right, but Granna’s recipe was time honored and practically depression-era. I didn’t expect to figure it out before I had grey in my hair like her.
Hopefully that’d be a long time from now.
Clue bounced in her high-chair, giving me a surprisingly toothy grin. Not that I hadn’t already noticed my baby transformed into a milk-shark a month ago. Those chompers were more than enough reason to wean her once she hit that magical one year mark.
And it was coming soon.
Within a week.
And somehow, it felt like my birthday too. Or an awakening. One year of love, loss, and reconnection.
Or maybe the kiddo made me overly emotional while she chucked Cheerios off the high-chair.
“Mama.” The cereal dropped to the floor. “Mama.”
This was the new game. I stooped to one up, earned her giggle, and then watched as she threw it again.
“Mama!”
“I should never have let your father teach you this.” I thwarted her next throw with a kiss. She giggled and bounced. “Why don’t you throw his dinner around?”
On cue, she made grabby hands for the bowl of soup.
That wouldn’t go well.
“No, no. That’s not for you.” I offered her another handful of Cheerios. Half ended on the floor. Three stuck to her forehead. It was progress. “The soup is for the boys.”
If they’d ever come in from the street. I texted Shepard.
Get in here. Soups on.
It took only a minute before the herd stampeded into the house. Clue screeched at the sight of her father, demanding hugs and cuddles and all the attention. Shepard wiped his brow of sweat first. He tossed the football to one of the young boys he hauled in tow.
Shaun was still shy—twelve years old going on fifty. He didn’t trust the cop, and for the right and wrong reasons. The outreach program was still new, and he had been through enough with his father’s incarceration. He blamed Shepard and most of Ironfield’s men in blue, but we were winning him over one warm meal at a time.
It was amazing what a safe home, good dinner, and positive mentor could do for these kids.
Granna had been right all along.
Not that I’d ever doubted her. I only hoped I could live up to her standards.
“Smells good.” Shepard kissed me on his way to the powder room. He led the three boys to the hall, instructing them to wash up. “I’m starving.”
“Me too.” Rex, the fourteen-year-old wannabe police officer said. He still mimicked most of what Shepard did. All he needed was a good influence. “I could eat a horse.”
“You ain’t never seen a horse.” His brother, Eli, older, wiser, and harsher, snapped.
“I have to!”
“Did not!”
“Yeah, I did!”
It took mere seconds for the boys to throw down. Rex punched first. Eli dodged. Shepard attempted to separate them.
And I stood in the hall, hands on my hips, staring all the boys down.
“There’s no fighting when soup’s on the table.” I pointed the spoon at them. “Got me?”
Food was a better motivator than even Shepard’s influence. The boys murmured an apology and washed up.
Granna would have been proud.
She also would have demanded that I smack some butts with the spoon, but she had always been old school.
Shepard left the kids at the table to help me set up. He hauled Clue into his arms and gave me a deeper kiss.
“I think this is working out,” he said.
“Me too.” I tickled the baby. “Rory even said some of the Rivets were eager to help. We could do some joint efforts with the outreach program and Family First.”
“Sounds like you’re gonna be busy.”
“Gotta earn that social sciences degree.”
Shepard stared at me. “You’re amazing. You’re doing so much for these kids.”
They needed it. Someone. Anyone. A little love, some discipline, and a chance to do good.
“Someone should have carried on Granna’s legacy.”
“You’re going to do fantastic.”
“Yeah?” I grinned, tugging him closer. “You think so, Detective Novak?”
“I do, Mrs. Novak.”
I liked hearing it as much as he liked saying it.
But our kiss was interrupted by a dining room full of hungry young boys. I gestured for him to take the soup in. He brushed my cheek with his hand instead.
“I couldn’t be prouder of you, Evie.” His voice lowered, serious and awe-struck. “You have no idea how much I love you.”
“I think I do.” I gave him a sexy wink and sensual kiss. “But you could always prove it to me.”
“Oh yeah?”
“I say we eat dinner, take the boys home, then return here to celebrate.”
“Celebrate what?”
“Us.” I smiled. “This. Our perfect life.”
“You think it’s perfect?”
“Not just perfect.” I hugged the baby and stared into his eyes. “It’s unforgettable.”
The End
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