33. Chapter Thirty-Three Kieran
Chapter Thirty-Three: Kieran
I stayed in the closet a little while after Julian left. I heard them make plans to meet up for breakfast, then the delighted squealing of their little girl. When the front door closed, I heard the murmur of voices as he and Rosie got into the car.
I watched through the slats of the door in the closet.
Ruby didn’t move at first. She just stood there, breathing—shaky, uneven breaths like she was trying to keep herself from falling apart. Then, finally, she exhaled sharply.
“Okay,” she said. “You can come out now.”
I pushed the closet door open slowly, stretching my arms over my head as I stepped into the room like I had all the time in the world.
“Well, that was fun.”
She glared at me. “I am so glad you’re enjoying yourself.”
“Not the word I’d use. This window guy sounds like a jerk.” I smirked, leaning against the closet doorframe. “But it’s cute that you think I wouldn’t have walked out if I wanted to.”
Her jaw clenched.
“Kieran.”
“What?”
“You need to leave.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You in a hurry to get rid of me?”
“Yes. Alek is coming over, and I’m meeting Julian and Rosie for breakfast. I need you to get out of here as quickly and quietly as you can.”
Ruby didn’t look at me. She kept her eyes on the floor, like she was trying to push me out with sheer will. I let her have a minute. Watched the tension in her shoulders, the way she pressed her lips together, the tremor in her hands.
“How are you feeling? How’s your neck? Your head?”
She closed her eyes tightly. “It hurts. Everything hurts. Are they done?”
“Yes. You’ll never see my men again.”
“Okay,” she replied. “I guess I should thank you?”
“No thanks necessary, sweetheart,” I replied, winking at her. “Only coffee.”
I sighed like this was all some huge inconvenience and pushed off the doorframe, stretching again before walking past her, heading downstairs like I belonged there.
Ruby followed, her bare feet padding quietly against the hardwood. “Kieran—”
I ignored her, moving into the kitchen like I owned the place.
Coffee first, arguments later. I pulled open a cabinet, found the mugs exactly where I expected them to be, and poured myself a cup like I’d done it a hundred times before.
They had one of those fancy Espresso machines that made scheduled coffee.
Lucky me.
Ruby followed me downstairs. “You have to get out of my house.”
“I just got you out of a pickle. At least do me the courtesy of a cup of coffee.”
She swallowed. I looked at her bruises. No wonder Julian had noticed them. They were bad.
She stood in the doorway, arms crossed tight over her chest. “I’m serious.”
“So am I.” I took a slow sip, watching her over the rim of my cup. “Unless you want to start another fight, you might want to let me drink my coffee before I go.”
A car approached. We both ignored it, glaring at each other.
She huffed, but before she could say anything else, footsteps pounded back toward the house.
The back door swung open.
Rosie.
My stomach clenched before I even knew why. She ran in, breathless, curls bouncing as she bolted toward Ruby. “Mami! I forgot my bunny!”
Ruby turned, instantly softening. “Mi amor, your bunny doesn't need to go with you to breakfast.”
“What? He's hungry. Do you want Carty to starve?”
"Sweetheart, he'll be okay…"
Rosie pressed her hands against her chest like she was making some kind of solemn vow. “Please.”
Ruby sighed but smiled, brushing a curl from Rosie’s face. “Okay. Did you put it in the bedroom? Grab it quick before your dad comes inside to look for you.”
That was when Rosie looked at me.
It should’ve been nothing. Just a kid glancing my way. I wasn’t supposed to feel anything. I didn’t want to.
But something in my chest twisted. Tightened. Locked up.
The breath left my lungs like a punch—sharp, silent, brutal. A hit I never saw coming. Her face…her fucking face. The shape of her mouth. The color of her eyes.
Green. Not Ruby’s warm brown. Not Julian’s dark hazel.
Light green. My father’s green. Cam’s.
Mine.
And then she moved—some small, fidgety adjustment, a twist of her mouth in thought—and I felt it again. That crack down the middle of me. Something about the way her little hands fluttered as she spoke, the way her brow furrowed when she concentrated—
I’d seen that before.
Not on her.
On my family.
I gripped the edge of the counter. The ceramic coffee mug burned into my palm like a brand.
“Hi!” she chirped. “Who are you?”
“I’m Kie—”
“This is my friend,” Ruby cut in, sharp. “Key.”
Rosie blinked. “Like a house key?”
“Like a musical key,” I said automatically, my voice too calm, too even.
Ruby’s throat worked as she swallowed. “Go get your bunny, tesoro.”
“Wait,” I said, eyes locked on the kid. “How old are you, sweetheart?”
“No, Rosie—” Ruby stepped in, voice too fast, too brittle.
“Seven and a half!” Rosie beamed, bouncing on her heels. “We’re having a princess party.”
“Cool,” I said, trying not to let my voice shake. “When’s your birthday?”
Ruby's silence said everything.
“March first,” Rosie chirped. “I like my birthday ’cause it’s also a sentence!”
The ground dropped out from under me.
March first.
I did the math in my head and felt the world tilt.
Julian wasn’t her father.
I was.
I was .
She’d kept my daughter from me.
All this time. All these fucking years.
“Go get Carty, Rosie. Right now. Through the front door,” Ruby said, her voice shaking—not with fear. With something closer to panic. “I don’t want your dad to worry.”
“Okay. Nice to meet you!” Rosie said, waving. “You can come to breakfast! Daddy said the more the merrier—”
“Now, Rosalia.”
Her tone turned the girl quiet. Rosie nodded, padded away up the stairs. I stood there, frozen.
“You have a very polite kid,” I said.
Ruby’s jaw locked. “Yes,” she said flatly. “My kid. My kid is very polite”
The room narrowed around us. All I could hear was the rush of blood in my ears.
“Don’t you mean our kid?” I hissed.
Ruby stared at me.
She didn’t deny it.
The world tilted and shook and oh my fucking God…I was a father.
“Eight years,” I said quietly. “You kept this from me for eight fucking years.”
Ruby didn’t so much as blink.
This…this was the secret she’d kept, the whisper that seemed to tease the corners of her lips every time we got close.
“I kept nothing from you. You disappeared. You ghosted me,” she replied. “You didn’t want to hear from me. Nothing made me think you would’ve wanted to hear about that.”
I clenched my jaw, anger rolling through my body like lava. “I bailed on a situationship. Not on a child,” I said. “You didn’t get to make that choice from me.”
She tilted her head up to look at me. “You left, Kieran,” she said. “You didn’t call, you didn’t text. You blocked me everywhere. There was no explanation. You just…left my life. How long should I have kept chasing you? With news that could’ve ruined your life?”
“You didn’t get to make that call.”
“Yes, I did,” she said, dropping her voice to a whisper. “I did what I had to do. My body. My child. You left. It’s so simple, actually.”
“What the hell, Rub—”
“I’m going now, Mami!” Rosie said from the hallway. “See you at the restaurant.”
“Okay, tesoro,” Ruby replied, her voice surprisingly steady. God, it felt like she was fucking unbreakable sometimes. I couldn’t help but admire that, even through my anger. “See you in twenty.”
The door clicked shut behind Rosie. Neither of us moved. The silence crackled.
I stared at her. Waiting. Hoping for any kind of explanation that might soften the blow, something to keep me from doing what I already knew I was capable of.
“Get out of my house,” she said.
I laughed. One sharp bark of disbelief. No humor in it. Just rage.
“That’s all you’ve got?” I asked. “You keep my daughter from me for eight fucking years, and now I’m the one who’s supposed to leave?”
Her jaw set. “I was protecting her.”
“Don’t feed me that shit.”
“I did what I had to do,” she snapped. “I would do it again.”
I stepped forward. She held her ground, but her eyes gave her away—she knew what this was now. Knew how close I was to snapping.
“I want to get to know her.”
“No.”
“She’s my daughter.”
“No,” she said again. Calm. Cold. “She’s Julian’s daughter.”
Everything inside me went still.
Julian’s daughter.
Like I didn’t fucking exist. Like I hadn’t just watched my own child walk into the house I was never allowed to be part of. Like some other man had earned the right to raise her, protect her, hear her first words.
I saw red. My hands curled into fists, every inch of me burning.
“I will fight you on this,” I said, low and dangerous.
She tipped her chin up. “Try. I’m the DA.”
“And I just helped you commit multiple felonies,” I said, voice rising. “You think you’re untouchable? You think I won’t blow this whole thing up if you try to cut me out?”
“It was self-defense,” she said, too fast.
“You were unconscious,” I shot back. “Everything after that? The body, the cleanup, the cover? All me. All on your watch.”
Her breath hitched.
“Who do you think a jury believes?” I said. “The grieving father who just found out his daughter was stolen from him? Or the shiny new DA who buried a corpse in her backyard?”
“Do you know how many people voted for me? Good luck finding a jury in this city who doesn’t like me. Don’t fucking threaten me, Kieran.”
“I’m not threatening you,” I said. “Not yet.”
She took a step back. Just one. But I saw it.
I saw the fear.
“You don’t get to decide what kind of father I would’ve been,” I said, quieter now. Quieter was worse. “You don’t get to erase me and hand my daughter off to some other man like I was never here.”
“You left,” she whispered. “You disappeared.”
“And you kept my kid,” I said. “Don’t pretend one cancels out the other.”
I looked at the stairs. At the door. At the place where Rosie had stood.
“She has my eyes,” I said.
Ruby didn’t respond.
“I want time with her. You’re not shutting me out again.”
“And if I do?”