“Did you really not know?” I ask. I hate asking, but I need to know. Liam shakes his head, his eyes focusing on something… anything but me. When he meets my eyes, I can see the pain, he’s telling the truth.
“I found your agent or whatever and called,” I start, hating that I have to relive this time of my life. A time when I felt so desperate to reach him, when I needed him the most and he wasn’t there. “I left message after message until someone finally called back and said that you told them that you didn’t know me.”
Liam reaches for my hand. He pulls it to his forehead. “I didn’t know. I would’ve come home and done things the right way.”
“Noah doesn’t know. He knows that Nick isn’t his dad, but sometimes it’s just easier for him to tell people that he is. I don’t want him hurt, Liam and I’m afraid that if I let this happen you’ll disappear tomorrow.”
“I won’t. I know my word is shit to you, but I’ll do anything to prove it. I want to be his dad. He’s supposed to be ours, Jojo, and I fucked that up.”
I can’t keep the tears at bay when he says things like this. No wonder he’s a freaking song writer and makes millions of women fall in love with his music.
“We can tell him tonight, if you want—”
“I want to, but—”
“No, Liam, no buts. I just told you I don’t want him hurt.”
“It’s not like that. I have to go back to L.A. and I was going to leave tomorrow, but he asked me to come to his game so I cleared my schedule for the week so I can stay and see him play. I'll have to go back for work, but once he knows, I can come back once a month to see him. We can figure out the rest from there.”
I knew his lifestyle would dictate how much of a dad he was going to be. I’m not sure if I thought he’d move back here or not.
“I know,” I say softly. I want to say what about me, but I have Nick and he’s been really great to me and Noah. “I’ll go get Noah so he can start hating me.” Liam reaches for my hand, pulling me back down.
“He won’t hate you; I won’t allow it.” I nod and release his hand. I take a moment to compose myself before calling for Noah. He comes thundering down with a smile on his face. He looks just like Liam when he smiles.
Liam looks up when we walk into the room. If I didn’t know better I’d think that he’d been crying. We sit down, Noah in between us. He looks at Liam, then me, smiling.
“We’ve got something to tell you.”
CHAPTER 19
LIAM
“Okay,” Noah says. I can feel his leg start to swing under the table. Reaching down, I set my hand on his knee, calming his jitters. Josie shifts in the chair, leaning closer to Noah. I do the same thing, although I’m not sure why. I look at her and raise my eyebrow. We didn’t discuss who was going to tell him. I think it should be her. I can’t see myself blurting out that I’m his dad. My luck it would come out like Darth Vader – minus the respiratory issues.
Josie clears her throat and smiles at Noah. “Remember when you asked me if Liam was my boyfriend?” Noah nods, his leg starts up again. I realize I’m not going to be able to keep him calm. Hell, I’m not even calm. I just have years of practice in stoicism.
“Well, Liam and I dated for a long time in high school and then he went away to college and things didn’t work out for us, but…” Josie stops and clears her throat. I know this must be hard for her, remembering how good we had things until I screwed everything up. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, sweetie.”
“Tell me what?” Noah breaks in. His eyes are drawn in. I can tell he doesn’t like to see his mom cry. He puts his hand on her shoulder and rubs it.
“Liam is your dad, baby.” Josie sobs. My leg slams into the table as I get up, rushing to her side. I fall to my knees, pulling her into my arms. Her tears wet my neck, her cries muffled. I know I shouldn’t, but I have to. I kiss below her ear, her cheek.
“Everything will be all right. I won’t leave. I promise,” I whisper with each kiss. She brings her face up, her eyes wet, red and puffy. My hands cup her face, pulling her closer. I kiss her full on lips. Lips I’ve missed for so long. When she starts to pull away, I want to hang on, but she’s not mine and I shouldn’t have kissed her, not like that.
“I’m sorry,” I say. She nods and wipes her face with the back of her hands. I move back to my seat without looking at Noah. He just saw a man kiss his mom.
A man she’s not engaged to.
I risk a look at Noah, he’s smiling. I’m not sure why, but he looks like a kid in a candy store.
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you when you asked before,” Josie says. Her fingers thread through his hair which seems to relax his jittery leg.
Noah shrugs. “I already knew.”
Josie and I look at each other, stone faced. Our heads both turn slightly as we look at Noah. “What do you mean you knew?” I ask.