by Alexis James
Sadly, regardless of how crappy he treated me during our relationship or at the end, he is still Emmy’s father. That is most certainly something I can’t change, even if I wanted to. I might regret that he was the one to father my child, but I’ll never regret having her. My life changed the moment I’d learned she was mine and in all the years since then, I’ve done everything in my power to care for her and protect her. Nothing is going to change that. Not Will Leahy, not the guilt that I still carry around. Contrary to what he might believe, I am not that same patsy I was back in college. I can sense bullshit from a mile away. I’m also no longer content to sit back and take what someone throws at me.
What he doesn’t know is that from this moment on I’m in charge. If that means taking legal action to protect Emmy, I’ll do it. I’ll beg, borrow, and steal if I have to, but no one is coming between me and my child, let alone some worthless dude from years ago who still believes I will cower to him.
I’ve got news for Will: I’m a changed woman now. I’m stronger, tougher, and I know what real love feels like. I will no longer roll over and take crap from anyone like I used to, and I’m sure as hell not letting him waltz in here and disrupt my child’s life. My child … mine. The one I gave birth to alone, I might add. The one I’ve taken care of and loved her entire life, while he’s been out there doing God knows what.
Smiling for the first time in days, I whisper, “Bring it on, Mr. Leahy. Bring. It. On.”
I should have been more patient.
I should have given her more time to sort things out.
I should have held my tongue. Should have been more understanding. Should have shown her that I have the capability to accept change.
I should have. I should have. I should have.
I didn’t … and now she’s gone.
The truth is a heavy burden to bear, especially when the truth is staring you right in the face and reminding you what an ass you truly are. My truth is all too real and all too painful to accept. So I do what all grown men do when their heart is breaking into a million pieces: I drink. I drink a lot. I drink so much that I forget to go into work. I drink so much that I spend half the day purging the truth into the toilet and the other half staring at the wall. But when the drinking can no longer mask the reality that is my new truth, I settle for the empty numbness it leaves behind.
Days go by, then a week, and somehow I manage to pull my shit together enough to focus on my job. And focus I do. I spend hours at the jobsite, hammering nails and hanging drywall, just to give my hands something to do. Something that will hopefully stop the relentless shaking that seems to grip me endlessly. Something—anything guaranteed to force me to concentrate on something other than myself and the persistent agony that sits heavily on my chest. Twelve-hour days turn into eighteen hour days and slowly the numbness starts to fade and simmering anger takes its place.
I wish I could be angry at her. Doing that would make it all at least slightly bearable. But my anger, my hate, my outright loathing is centered on one person and one person only. Myself. What I should have done. What I should have said. That’s always followed by the endless things I shouldn’t have done. It’s a relentless loop playing over and over and over in my head until I’m back to numbing it all with alcohol each night.
Working myself to death and submerging myself in an alcohol-induced coma each night does nothing to ease the fear that blankets me constantly. I worry about her. I worry about Emmy. I worry about how all this change has affected each of them. So many times I’ve picked up the phone to call, but have immediately decided against it when the little voice inside my head reminds me loudly that she sent me away. She chose her past over her future, completely unwilling to try to weave both into a life for us all.
I avoid my siblings like the plague. Avoid their phone calls, texts and the repeated banging on my front door every few nights. Avoid Sunday dinner. Avoid the office unless it’s late at night and I can be assured I won’t run into anyone. Each night I fall asleep hoping the next day will be better, and yet every morning I wake to the same heartbreaking emptiness that threatens to cripple me if I give into it.
I can see now why Marco avoided love all is life, Cruz too for that matter. Love scars you, it damages you in ways you can’t begin to imagine. It leaves you … changed, hardened, hateful. I find myself loathing everything now, from the music Sabrina and I used to listen to together to simply the idea of going anywhere we once went together. Mostly I loathe the reflection I see in the mirror each day, the haggard man now sporting a thick scruff from days of ignoring his razor. The man that stares back at me is changed now, in every way, hardened by what he once believed was true. I hate that I’ve allowed my pain to so completely take over my life, despise myself for imploding so completely like I have. I’m not strong. I’m nothing but a weak man drowning in regrets and pain.
Sunday morning, two weeks after my entire life has changed, finds me waking to the sound of persistent knocking on my front door. I glance at the clock and growl out a curse. Who the fuck comes visiting at 7:30 am on a weekend? And furthermore, why the fuck would anyone believe I’d be up this early?
Tugging on a pair of sweats, I stalk to the front door and throw it open mid-knock, my tirade dying on my lips when I see who is standing on my doorstep. She’s staring up at me with wide, hopeful blue eyes, teeth chomped down on her lower lip. She looks just a bit apprehensive and a tad bit nervous, but the slight lift of her chin tells me that she’s as strong as I always knew she could be.
“Hey, kiddo. What are you doing here so early?”
“Can I talk to you?”
Taking a step back, I usher her inside and watch silently as she moves into the apartment. She takes it all in, from the sink of dirty dishes to the haphazard pile of mail and newspapers strewn across the counter to the copious empty beer bottles and half bottle of tequila perched on the coffee table.
“Wow, Roman, you’re a slob.”
I want to tell her that I’m not usually this way, that heartbreak has a way of removing all other priorities from your life … like housekeeping or hygiene. I can’t tell her that. Hell, I can’t tell her anything. Or nothing that will matter anyway.
“Can I get you something? Make you some breakfast?” Although the thought of food makes me want to puke, my father-like instincts quickly take over.
Father-like. Yeah … right. Like you were ever a father figure in this girl’s life.
“No thanks. I’m fine.” She drops her backpack on a barstool and moves toward the slider, pulling it open and stepping out on the balcony. I follow, keeping a careful distance between us so that she doesn’t feel closed in or pressured to speak.
“Hey, kiddo, I gotta ask. Does your mom know you’re here?”
Nervous blue eyes dart to mine. “No. Maya brought me over.”
“You should probably let her know.”
“Can we talk first?”
What the fuck am I supposed to do now? My first instinct is to say yes, to give her this opportunity to get whatever it is off her chest, but the pseudo father in me knows that I have an obligation to let her mother know what’s going on. Who knows, maybe Sabrina doesn’t want her talking to me anymore.
“I’ll make you a deal. You call your mom and let her know you’re here. Tell her I’ll bring you home after we’ve had a chance to talk. You can stay as long as you like.”
She hesitates briefly. “Yeah, okay.”
“I’ll be back in a sec.”
The thought of sitting there listening to her talk to the woman who has turned me inside out is more than I can deal with this early in the morning, so I busy myself with making a pot of coffee and throwing on some clothes, take my time brushing my teeth and splashing some cold water on my face. When I finally stroll back out to the balcony, coffee in one hand, glass of juice for her in another, she’s curled up in a chair with her chin propped up on her hand.
She takes the glass and murmurs her thanks. As I settle down
next to her, my gut churns uneasily thinking about what Sabrina must have thought when Emmy told her where she was. I hope she doesn’t think I’m to blame for this, although I doubt at this point it would change anything between us. There is no us anymore, regardless of how much I might want there to be.
“You look like crap,” Emmy states, eyes darting sideways.
I shrug. “Thanks.”
She takes another few sips then grips the glass in both hands, and whispers, “You and my mom aren’t seeing each other anymore, are you?”
My heart clenches painfully. “No, kiddo. We aren’t.”
She nods. “Yeah, I kinda thought so.”
Fuck this shit. I may not be this kid’s dad, but I love her. I love her like I would my own and even though she’s trying real, real hard to make me believe she’s unmoved by all that’s happened, I can see how conflicted she is and how uncertain she feels about everyone and everything in her life. “You know what, Em? Even though your mom and I … well, even though we didn’t work out, that doesn’t mean I don’t care about you.”
She spits out a laugh that is anything but happy. “Yeah right. I’m not stupid, you know. You might care about me now, but as soon as you get another girlfriend you’ll forget all about me and move on.”
Depositing my cup on the table, I reach for her hand. “That’s not ever gonna happen. You and I … well, we might not be related by blood, but you’re my kid. You’ll always be my kid.”
Emmy’s eyes fill with tears as her glass joins my cup on the table. “Do you really mean that, Roman? ’Cuz I don’t want to hear a bunch of shit promises that you think I need.I need the truth.”
Rising, I stoop in front of her chair and gather both hands in mine. “The truth is that I love your mom and I’ll always love her. And even though we didn’t work out, well…” my breath hitches as I attempt to force the emotion aside “…I love you, kiddo. I want to remain a part of your life, if you’ll let me. If your mom will let me.”
Biting down on her lip, the tears roll in waves down her face. “I want everything to go back to the way it was.”
“Yeah, so do I, but life doesn’t work that way.”
She nods, far too wise and knowing for someone who is sixteen. “How are you doing?”
I shrug. “I’m getting by. Don’t worry about me.”
Her brow lifts. “Yeah, that’s not gonna happen. You look like shit, your apartment is a craphole and you’re drinking too much.”
I throw her a dark look. “Don’t swear.”
She scoffs and tightens her grip on mine. “Yes, Dad.”
Warmth surges through me. “I wish, kiddo. I wish.”
Her intense blue gaze meets mine directly. “Look, Roman, we both know that Will guy isn’t my dad. For almost seventeen years, he’s ignored me. You knew me five minutes and you wanted me. That’s what a real dad is.”
My heart skips a beat … then another … and a weird sense of happiness takes over the place where only misery had been for the past few weeks. “That’s true.” Playing the Devil’s advocate is not something I relish, especially when it involves another man staking claim on what is and has been mine. “But maybe, you know, maybe that guy wants to try to make up for his mistakes.”
Emmy rolls her eyes and watches me as I resume my seat. “He doesn’t. He can’t even talk to me. He just gets all weird and mutters stuff and even when mom tries to get us talking it just feels weird.”
The thought of that guy … of the three of them together … makes me want to scream. “Well, um, maybe it just takes him a while to warm up.”
She shoots me what I interpret as a “you’re such an ass” look. “Seriously? The guy tracked me down after seventeen years and now he can barely ask how my day was? There’s something weird about this guy, Roman.”
“Just give it some time, kiddo.”
“Fuck time,” she mutters.
I throw her a glare. “Knock it off. I don’t like you talking like that.”
“Why not?” she retaliates. “You do.”
“Yeah, well, I’m an ass. And I’m a dude.” Lame, Moran. Really, really lame.
She laughs out loud and shakes her head. “You’re crazy, you know that?” Her laughter quickly fades and suddenly the strong, cocky girl she just was has faded into the background and has been replaced by a terrified little girl. “Please don’t leave me, Roman. Please be the one person I can count on to tell me the truth.”
My hand finds hers again. “You can always count on me. You know that.” Pain grips my chest and my throat, sending tears to my eyes. “I’ll never leave you, kiddo. Never. No matter what changes in your life, I will always be here for you.”
She nods, rises from her chair, and curls up in my lap, sobbing out her pain into my neck as I grip her tightly in my embrace. Even though I’ll never legally be her dad, the protectiveness I’ve always felt toward her has now doubled. I’ve so easily sat back for two weeks and accepted Sabrina booting me out of her life, out of both their lives. If that’s what she feels she deserves, then I can’t change her mind. I’m not about to try to make someone love me, but that will not deter me from protecting this girl—this child who wandered into my life and became mine in every way that matters. Regardless of what does or does not happen with me and Sabrina, I have to be the one with no agenda other than Emmy’s welfare. I don’t have unnecessary guilt to fall back onto as Sabrina does or a driving need to right what’s been wrong like that ass-wipe Will does. I have to put my pain and misery aside and focus on what’s important: Emmy and her heart.
“I love ya, kiddo.”
“I love you too, Roman.”
Long moments go by and eventually her tears dry and her tiny body relaxes against me as she falls asleep. I have a hunch she’s as sleep deprived as I am, if the telltale dark circles under her eyes are any indication. Slowly getting to my feet, I pad silently into the apartment and down the hall, depositing her gently in the middle of my bed and pulling the covers over her shoulders. She sighs, nestling down onto the pillow where her mom once slept. And even though my shattered heart will probably never begin to heal anytime soon, I am grateful that Emmy risked everything to come here today. Knowing she loves me and wants me in her life is a bittersweet victory, but it’s one I will cherish for as long as she remains.
Her mom … Well, that’s another story. Conflicting emotions about Sabrina are a constant I’ve yet to get used to. I love her … I hate her … I want her … I want her to stay far, far away. Regardless of what I feel about her or what she feels about me, none of that matters if this child isn’t happy. I’d gladly hand over my own future happiness if it meant Emmy would continue to laugh and smile and find joy in each day.
Guess I am a dad after all.
A knock sounds at my door a few hours later and with a muttered curse I hurry to open it. Emmy was still dead to the world the last time I checked, and while I’m sure there is more we need to discuss, right now what she needs more than anything is a safe place to lay her head. Without saying so, I know part of why she was seeking refuge at my apartment is because here she’s untouchable. No constant questions and worry from her mom. No threat of dickface Will making an appearance and demanding she speak with him. Here she has me, my silence, my shoulder to cry on if needed, and more than anything my protection.
My sister Bella stands with her hip cocked, arms crossed, throwing me a hard look as she storms into the apartment without an invitation and demands, “Where the hell have you been?”
I’m quick to shush her, pulling her into the living room and saying softly, “Keep your voice down. Emmy is sleeping in the other room.”
Bella frowns. “Why is Emmy sleeping here?”
“Long story. What do you want?” Worry for my child—yeah, MY child—has me short tempered and none too willing to shoot the shit with my sibling.
She sets her purse on the counter and plops down on the end of the couch, kicking off her sandals and pulling her legs unde
r her ass. “I want to know where the hell you’ve been, why you’ve been avoiding all of us, and how come you look like warmed-up shit.”
I throw her a smirk. “Good to know I’m warmed-up shit. Cold shit, well that’s another situation entirely.”
“Knock it off. Tell me what’s going on. The last time we had a chance to talk was the day you bought Sabrina the ring.” Her eyes wide in horror. “Oh God, that’s it isn’t it? She said no?”
With a heavy sigh I take a seat at the opposite end and run my hand through my too-long hair. “No, that’s not it. I never got a chance to ask her.” My regrets are many, but I regret more than anything my impulsive purchase, something that now haunts me each and every day.
“Come on, big brother, talk to me. Tell me what happened and why Sabrina’s child is sleeping in your apartment.”
I give her the abridged version of our split and Emmy’s appearance at my door early this morning. Typical Bella, she shows no outward sign of reaction, just the occasional nod and a few questions. She doesn’t need to say much of anything to me, she can read me like a book—which is part of the reason I’ve kept my distance, kept the truth from her and my other siblings. I don’t need all the questions, and I sure as hell won’t be able to handle any sympathy. I’m destroyed enough without feeling like I can just let go and give in to the pain that won’t go away no matter how much I want it to.
“How can I help?” she asks.
“You can’t. Just keep it to yourself for now, okay?”
“But won’t they be curious or ask questions at work?”
I shrug and get to my feet. “Yeah, probably. Which is why I’m staying out of the office during the day and only going in late at night.”
“Good lord, Roman, you can’t live like that. Just tell them. Or let me tell them.”
Tears burn once again, and I stubbornly blink them away as I turn my back on her. Crying will solve nothing, and I’m just enough of an arrogant ass to refuse to give Sabrina the satisfaction of knowing she’s broken me so completely. No, I’ve gotta face this shit head-on, deal with it in the only way I can, which is keeping my distance from everyone.
