Chapter 29 #2
If I wasn’t holding Blake, I’d probably fall off my stool. I heard what he said just fine, but disbelief has me asking to repeat his last statement.
This whole situation is clearly killing him, but not in the way I’ve witnessed in Emmett.
Tucker’s persona is protective and guarded, whereas Emmett’s has always been a battle of will, a pure display of vulnerability.
And that realization sends my mind reeling, wondering what the fuck must be going through Emmett’s head as he pounds the Brooklyn streets, rain now beating against the sidewalks.
My arms hold Blake a little tighter.
Dropping his head into his hands, Tucker releases an exasperated groan. “Say something, Billie. For fuck’s sake, please say something.”
I open my mouth to give him something. In the end, only silence materializes.
He pulls at the roots of his dark hair; meanwhile, I’m still fighting to believe that this is all really happening.
“Did you meet someone else?” he asks, cocking his head at my front door.
“Nope,” I simply respond. My dating life is really none of Tucker’s business.
He puffs out a breath. “Huh, okay.”
As Blake finishes up her feed, I refasten my top and climb down from the stool, heading for the bedroom so I can set her down for a nap.
To do that, I need to pass Tucker, and just as I feared, he catches my elbow, stopping me in my tracks.
“Do you want to hold her?” I ask again, perfectly aware that’s not why he stopped me.
Heavy heartbeats thump against my rib cage as I let my eyes wander to Tucker’s.
The confession as it leaves him is one I longed to hear back in Austin, but I feel absolutely nothing as he admits, “I came here for you, Billie. To make it right between us and to be a father to our child.”
Gaze locked ahead on my bedroom door, I stand stock-still. “And I already told you that I would never stand in the way of any healthy relationship you wanted to have with Blake.”
His fingers squeeze my elbow tighter. “Why are you ignoring what I said about us?”
Stepping forward, I break from his grasp, quickly entering my bedroom and setting a sleeping Blake in her bassinet.
Tucker’s in the doorway to my room when I stand back up, his eyes studying my unmade double bed. He’d be wrong to assume that I’ve had anyone else in there with me.
Pushing past him, I head straight for the coffee maker. “Do you want a drink?”
He just turns in the doorway, jaw clenched out of frustration. “I want to know why you won’t give us a second chance.”
My hand trembles as I reach up and snag a mug from a cupboard Emmett fixed, so much of me wishing I hadn’t asked him to leave.
“There is no us, Tucker. You cheated and destroyed our relationship.”
Footsteps sound from behind me as I flick on the machine and spin around to face him, palms cutting into the edge of the counter.
Standing only a few feet away, Tucker hunches his shoulders. “I thought you were a better mom than that, and so did my parents.”
Since the second Tucker showed up at my place, anger was yet to feature in the many emotions I felt.
Until now.
“Excuse me?” I question, voice incredulous.
He just shrugs like what he said wasn’t the epitome of gaslighting. “If Blake could talk, I’m pretty sure that she’d want her mommy to give her daddy another shot.” His eyes rove my home once more. “No kid would want to be brought up in a place like this.”
Hurt lances through me. Burning, maddening, searing hurt.
“Who the fuck do you think you are?”
He looks borderline satisfied to get a rise out of me. I can’t say I blame him; I’ve offered next to zero emotional response since he crossed the threshold.
“Billie,” he begins, “you’re a college dropout from a poor family, living in a place that looks like it should be condemned.”
“That’s not true,” I volley back, proud of my little apartment even if I can’t refute the rest.
He edges closer to me as the coffee machine finishes up its cycle. “It’s all true, Billie. But I want to make things right again.”
I scoff. “So, you’re here to rescue us, right? Like a white knight in shining armor.”
He grins, and I hate it. “Something like that, yeah. Plus, there’s a bunch of rumors circulating around the country club, and most of them aren’t favorable to my family.”
I cannot have heard that right. “I-I’m sorry?”
Tucker flushes a color I used to think was cute. “Let’s just say that it would be ideal for all of us if you came back to Austin with me. Whatever outstanding rent you have on this place my parents will settle, and the house we originally picked out is ready and waiting for us to move into.”
Pressing the heels of my hands into my eyes, I check that I haven’t entered an alternate universe. Nothing in real life can be this messed up.
Not even the Price family.
“I need to get this straight,” I sigh, hands still digging into my eye sockets. “You want me and Blake to up and leave our lives here in Brooklyn so we can fly back to Texas with you …” I drop my hands, vision now blurry as I look at him. “All so your parents can save face in their social circles?”
Tucker’s lack of response is answer enough.
“Get. Out.” I punctuate each word through my teeth.
Like I just pulled a gun and shot him through the chest, he rears back. “You’re kicking me out?”
I shake my head at him. “No, Tucker. I’m not kicking you out. We’re kicking you out. Blake and I.”
His jaw pops open, and I’m already halfway to the front door.
Yanking on the handle, I motion for him to leave.
Like he did with me earlier, I stop him with a hand to his arm, although he doesn’t bother to show me his eyes. “Given that your parents are the ones who call the shots in your life, would you take a personal message on my behalf?”
He remains silent, molars grinding.
“Tell them that if their son ever finds himself ready to step up and be a father to his beautiful daughter, I won’t be the one to get in his way.
However, that’s as far as my patience and generosity are willing to extend.
They might see me as a pathetic, poor little girl who got herself knocked up to ensnare their golden son, but they’re wrong.
They were wrong back when I was in Austin, and they’re wrong now that I’m standing on my own two feet here in Brooklyn. ”
He gives me his eyes, and I lock them with mine, certain that this will be the last time I see them, even if that breaks my heart for Blake.
“If Blake ever asks about her dad, I will always tell her the truth, Tucker. I guess it’s down to you as to what kind of parental legacy you choose to leave behind.”