“Leo. I’m so sorry,” I said, turning in his arms and resting my head on his chest, wrapping my arms as tightly as I could around his waist.
“It’s all good, Sugar Snap. Because I got that fantastic kid out of the whole deal.” He held me just as tight, his chin resting on the top of my head, where he now dropped a kiss affectionately. “It was a mess for a while, sure—the gossip columns were brutal, and I wouldn’t wish that hell on my worst enemy. But once the lawyers got involved and a settlement was reached, it was a done deal. She had the baby, she held Polly exactly three times, and we haven’t seen her since. My accountant tells me the checks are still cashed monthly, and that’s the only contact I have with her.”
The backs of my eyelids prickled, wondering how this woman could give up her own child for a check.
“But after that, things got so much better. I quit my job after talking to my father, explaining that I just couldn’t be a part of that scene anymore. And I’m grateful my name afforded me the opportunity to take over the farm and really grow something incredible.”
“Pardon the pun,” I chuckled quietly.
“Once Polly was a few months old, I started spending more and more time up here, getting things ready, building the house we live in now, and apprenticing at the farm I’d visited that weekend when everything exploded. I hired a few people to help me out around the property, started turning over the fields, and a year after Polly was born, we moved out of the city and into the country full-time. I didn’t want her growing up the way I did, and with the Page Six mentality swirling around my family and speculation about where Polly’s mom might have gone, I knew it was better to remove ourselves altogether. It rocked the Maxwell boat a bit, and I don’t see my family as often as I’d sometimes like, but my family is really all about me and Polly now, and this life we’re creating together.”
“Sure. That’s got to come first.”
“Polly did really well here, and even though people in this small town read the same magazines as they do in the city, they seemed to kind of . . . I don’t know, watch out for us. I found a great nanny, a few actually, and if I wasn’t with Polly, she had really great people with her. It’s a great town to raise a kid.”
I smiled.
“Everything revolved around Polly, and the farm. And after everything that happened, the absolute last thing on my mind was getting involved with another woman.”
“You never even thought about it?” I asked, twisting in his arms to look up at his sweet face.
“Sure, I thought about it,” he admitted sheepishly, a different kind of pink coloring his cheeks now. “But never wanted to risk upsetting this life. Never wanted to trust anyone with Polly, after I saw her own mother throw everything over just for money.”
“Mmm-hmm,” I said, something low, and unexpected, twisting in my stomach.
“And then you showed up,” he said, forcing my chin up to look him in the eyes, which were soft. “And Polly was away at summer camp for the first time. And I had a summer where I could just . . . relax. Be a guy. Get a little starstruck over some L.A. chick.”
“And I made sure to tell you a thousand times I was leaving at the end of the summer,” I sighed, as the last puzzle piece clicked into place.
“You sure made it easy for me to simply enjoy,” he said, his voice heating up and heating me through. Nuzzling my neck, he pressed a kiss just behind my ear. “But something happened that I wasn’t expecting.”
I held my breath, waiting to see what he would say.
“It became more than just a summer thing—don’t you think?”