He already knew the answer, though. Deep down, he had always known it. “From the moment I first held her, I would have done anything for her. If that meant being her father when she wouldn’t otherwise have one, I’d have done that. If it meant stepping aside so her real father could step in…well, I did what I had to do. For Hannah.”
Kelsey’s eyes watered again, and she pressed the heels of her hands to her eyes to wipe away the tears. “Damn. You really are the best guy. I hope your supermodel deserves you.”
I don’t deserve her.
The thought hit him so hard he nearly stepped back.
What the fuck was he doing?
A woman he’d casually cared about had had a baby that wasn’t his, and he was ready to die for Hannah.
The woman he loved was having his baby, and he was…
Being a damned fool.
Nick’s eyes closed as self-loathing washed over him.
When he’d heard Taylor was pregnant, seen her with Bradley, he hadn’t been able to think.
Instead of seeing Taylor, the woman he loved, he’d been seeing his past. Reliving that moment when he’d found out Hannah wasn’t his, and completely terrified of having to experience it again.
Seeing Kelsey, though, he realized that the contrast between her and Taylor was startlingly clear.
Kelsey wasn’t a bad person, but she was a cowardly one. One who’d avoided confrontation, avoided hard realities. She’d convinced everyone around her that she was sweet and kind, when really she was just scared. Scared of doing what was right because it was hard.
That wasn’t Taylor.
Taylor hadn’t been scared of a single thing in her life. If she’d had even the slightest doubt about whose baby it was, she’d have ripped Bradley’s and Nick’s hair out herself and marched it in for prenatal paternity testing. She’d have grabbed the entire situation by the balls, owned up to every difficult reality.
How had he thought for even a second that it would be otherwise? That his beautiful Taylor would be anything other than brave?
Nick clenched his teeth harder.
She was brave, but not unbreakable. He’d hurt her. How could she not be hurt? At that moment Nick hated himself so much he wished he could die.
When his eyes opened, he wasn’t even embarrassed to find they were slightly damp.
“I’ve gotta go,” he said roughly. “Kiss Hannah for me, ’kay?”
“Wait, Nick, are you okay?”
No.
But he didn’t bother to explain anything to Kelsey. He had more important things to worry about.
Like getting his family back.
Chapter 32
“Okay, Twinkie, how can we be so bad at this?” Taylor asked, petting the dog, who was chewing a bone next to her hip. “We’re smart ladies. A simple chest of drawers shouldn’t defeat us.”
She and the dog sat in the middle of Nick’s room. At some point in the past week he’d come by while she was at work and collected some of his stuff, so it was mostly just furniture that remained.
His room wasn’t as big as hers, which didn’t give her much space for furniture assembly. Not that it mattered. It was probably time to accept that she simply was not literate in Ikea directions.
She’d ordered a crib and changing table already assembled, to arrive closer to her due date. She hadn’t wanted to risk setting her baby on anything that she herself had put together, out of fear for the poor child’s safety.
But for some reason it had felt important that she get hands-on with something for the baby. She wanted to make something for her son or daughter.
The more she stared at the directions and their indecipherable illustrations, the more she realized she should have opted for taking up knitting. A cute pair of booties had to be easier than this crap.
On the plus side, at least it was preventing her from thinking about Nick.
Mostly.
Sort of.
Nope, not at all.
She sighed and rubbed Twinkie’s head. “It’ll pass, right? I’ll get over him?”
“I hope not.”
The gruff voice came from the doorway, and Taylor whipped her head toward the sound just as Twinkie lost her mind over Nick’s return.
He came back.
Taylor was every bit as excited as the dog, but she kept her voice carefully cool and impassive. “What are you doing here?”
Instead of answering, he toed one of the billion pieces of particleboard that covered nearly every inch of the floor. “Another bookshelf?”
She looked away. “Dresser.”
Not that it’s any of your business.
She stopped herself from saying the childish add-on out loud, but it didn’t really matter. The coolness of her tone spoke volumes.
Or maybe not, because instead of wisely beating a retreat, Nick entered the room, stepping around the pieces of furniture. He kicked them aside until there was just enough room for him to sit beside her.
Twinkie had apparently decided there wasn’t enough room for all three of them and the disassembled dresser, and she’d gone into the living room.
Or maybe she’d remembered that Nick had abandoned them, and she was punishing him. The thought pleased Taylor.
Without saying a word, he picked up the directions and began flipping through them. She had a painfully wonderful flashback of the night she’d been trying to put together her bookshelf. Another attempt at self-therapy, only that time she’d been sulking over Bradley.
Pathetic. In hindsight, she recognized that night for what it really was: the first step in realizing that Nick Ballantine was ten times the man Bradley was.
At least she’d thought he was.
But good men didn’t accuse their pregnant girlfriends of having someone else’s baby and then walk out the door.
Wordlessly he began gathering the pieces he needed for the second step (she’d completed step one on her own, but just barely).
She wanted to tell him to get out.
She didn’t. She told herself that the only reason she wasn’t ordering him out was because she wanted the dresser put together.
So what if it provided a moment of guilty pleasure to soak in the sight of him?
He looked…well, okay. He didn’t look great.
He had shadows under his eyes. The scruff on his jawline was even scruffier than usual. His hair was a mess, his shirt was wrinkled.
Nick looked as miserable as she felt.
Still he said nothing. Neither did she. She simply watched as, piece by piece, he put together the dresser that would eventually hold her baby’s tiny clothes.
Their baby’s clothes.
Was that why he was here? Was he just resigning himself to the fact that if the stupid paternity test came back with his name on it, he’d have a child?
Because as much as she was hurting, as much as her heart wanted to push away from him, there was no way she’d keep Nick from his child. However involved he wanted to be with their son or daughter, she’d welcome it.
Just so long as he kept his distance from her.
Still he didn’t look at her. She forced herself to look only at his hands, watching as he quietly, competently assembled the dresser, until all that was left was the handles.
He gathered them in one hand, along with the screwdriver, but instead of putting the finishing touches on, he held them out to her.
Her eyes watered, because he understood. Understood her need to contribute something for the child she couldn’t yet hold.