I suck in a breath, trying to find a way to explain. “Kade, I didn’t do it to be spiteful, I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t want to derail the path that your life had taken so I took it upon myself to tell no one. I was so young and it just seemed like the right choice at the time. Maybe it wasn’t the right thing for me to do, and if I made a mistake them I’m really, truly sorry. I never wanted to hurt anyone…”
For a second, I think I might be about to get through to him, but then he explodes again.
“But I’ve been back!” he shouts. “I’ve been back for ages. You could have told me.”
“But like I said, I wanted to check. I wanted to know that this wasn’t going to turn into something horrible.”
Tears fill my eyes at the same time they do his. This is not where I wanted this day to end up. This is all so very wrong. “We told each other that we love each other last night, and now I learn this.”
“I was going to tell you today. That was my plan,” I insist, desperately wanting him to understand. “I’ve just been sitting downstairs working out how to tell you in a way that doesn’t cause… well this!”
“That’s so convenient. Just as I’m calling you out on your behavior, you were going to tell me.”
“I was, I swear.” I fall back onto the bed, wishing I could change everything. I want to go back to last night when everything was absolutely perfect. “I promise you, I wanted to tell you everything.”
Kade paces the room, shaking his head every so often. I can see the frustration and the anger rolling off of him in waves. All I want to do is leap up and hold him, but I know that will send him over the edge. The way that he’s feeling right now will send him right over the edge. I have done the worst thing to him that anyone ever could. I can’t blame him for feeling like he does but I need him to understand.
“Please, Kade,” I beg him. “Please try to
understand why. I didn’t want this to turn out like this. I just wanted to have a calm conversation about it. As far as I knew, you weren’t ever coming back. I didn’t think that you would. You were off travelling the world, doing goodness knows what… and back then, back when I found out, I was all messy myself. I didn’t know what to think. You know, I had a huge decision to make, I didn’t even know what to do about the baby that was growing inside of me, it was all so hard.”
“But you knew,” he says, not letting me off the hook that easily. “You knew about Logan, you were given the choice. I didn’t know. My family didn’t know. We have a child in our midst and none of us knew.”
I glance towards my bedroom door, really hoping that Logan can’t hear us, I don’t want him to find out in this way, but Kade seems to take my glance to mean something else. His shoulders hunch up around his ears.
“Do you want me to go? Is that what this means?” The anger bubbles, I can see it inside of him. “You want the inconvenient ex who has just come back into your life to vanish? Then fine, I’ll go.”
I leap up as he storms towards the door and I grab onto his arm. If I let him go now while things are so up in the air then I might not ever get the chance to speak to him again. I cannot leave it like this.
“No, please, Kade. Don’t storm out. Let’s talk about this. Let’s discuss it properly.”
He gives me the coldest look that anyone has ever given me before. The sad part is, I know that I deserve it. “Lucie, you lost the chance to speak to me about this a million and one times.”
I fall back, hit words hitting me in the chest like bullets. He really does hate me now, and not only that but he knows and he doesn’t want to spend any more time with Logan. He doesn’t want to talk to his son, he doesn’t want to try and be a father, I guess this is my worst nightmare coming true. This is why I’ve kept it inside and I haven’t told him, because now me and Logan have both been rejected which is the worst thing ever. He doesn’t want either of us. The truth is now out and he doesn’t want to know. It’s the toughest pill that I have ever had to swallow, it sticks painfully in my throat, leaving me speechless.
As he storms out, and he slams the door behind him, the tears flood from my eyes. I fall to the ground and I cry and cry and cry. I think I must leak all the water in my entire body out of my eyes. I can barely control myself, my shoulders shake, the bones in my body rack, I’m a freaking state.
Just as it was finally getting started with me and Kade, it got shattered all over again. Fate has leapt back in and destroyed us again. Only this time it’s for good. If Kade doesn’t want Logan, then he doesn’t want me either. We’re done. I cannot believe it, I can’t believe that he has turned us both away, I never thought that he would be that sort of man. He’s surprised me with his behavior, but I suppose I have with mine as well. We’ve both turned out to be not the people we were supposed to be which is a shame. The only person who is going to be hurt in all of this is Logan. He doesn’t deserve either of us to be such terrible people. He’s such a sweetheart, he deserves the best in life and he doesn’t have it from either of us.
Oh God, I feel so terrible for my boy.
31
Kade
The fact that my suspicion was correct eats me up, I can barely stand it. My head churns with the information. I get Lucie’s explanation, but it still stings a lot. I wasn’t good enough for her back then, she didn’t tell me because she didn’t think that I could handle it, and she didn’t tell me now either. She obviously still doesn’t think that I’m the sort of man who can hack being a father. That utterly sickens me.
I stare at my house, knowing that I should go back there to fill my mom in. I’m sure she’s on the edge of her seat, needing to know the truth about her grandchild’s identity but I cannot face her yet. I just can’t hack the idea od seeing her and telling her that we’ve all lost out on four long years. It may even be worse for her because she’s been around and not known or maybe it’s better because at least she saw him grow up.
Fuck this, I think with a desperate shake of my head, Fuck all of this. Fuck everything…
I can’t handle it, I feel the old me creeping back up, the version of myself I pushed back a long time ago. I need to block life out, I need to just forget, I need to not be me, so I turn my back on my house and I head towards the bar instead. There’s one not too far from here at all and I know that I won’t be able to chill out until I feel that familiar sensation of alcohol sliding down my throat. I don’t even need something expensive, anything will do by this point. As long as it shuts off my racing brain it’s all good. I have to be okay by Monday morning, that’s it. I have all of tomorrow to recover from whatever mistakes I make.
I shove my hands into my pockets and I walk towards the bar with my head on the ground. I don’t want anyone to stop my right now, there isn’t a single face in the world that I want to see right now. The one person that I usually want to hang around with all the time is the person who’s made me feel this way.
Urgh, Lucie, I think with angry burning hot tears in my eyes. How could you do this to me?
I step foot into the bar and I inhale the musky scent of alcohol, loving the way it floods me with relief. This is exactly where I need to be right now. I move towards the bar and I make myself smile at the guy working behind there. “A beer, please,” I grumble pitifully. “I don’t care what. Anything, whatever.”