Chapter Sixteen
Olivia
My phone buzzed again, and despite knowing it would be Jace, who was still begging me to talk about Kayden and Kaylee, I picked it up and read it.
Jace: Can we please talk over the weekend, Liv? He’s coming into the office again in a few days. Please let me work through this with you.
I threw my phone down on my mother’s dining room table and cried out in frustration.
She set the bows and candles for the centerpieces we were making down on the table and eyed me suspiciously.
I glanced over at Kaylee who was locked into one of the Paw Patrol movies with Carl, neither of them paying us any attention despite my outburst.
“Livvy, what’s going on?” Mom asked. “You’ve been scowling at your phone all afternoon.”
“I’m arguing with Jace.”
“Oh no,” she sighed like this was the worst news she’d heard in weeks.
Want me to tell you that we’re also not really dating? That should help.
“Are you upset with him?” she asked.
“No,” I said, annoyed that I couldn’t just be mad at him.
He’d given me a few days to process the situation with Kayden and then he’d slowly started pushing me to talk to him about telling Kayden about our daughter.
I knew he wanted to help because he was worried about me.
But he was worried about Kayden’s feelings too, and in a way that made my stomach flip with jealously.
Still, I didn’t want to talk about it. I knew what I had to do. I knew the right thing to do was to tell Kayden but that didn’t mean I liked the idea any better than I had four days ago.
As soon as I talked to Jace, he would convince me to do the right thing, and I preferred living in denial for a few more days. For the last few days, I’d focused on work talk when we were in the office and avoided seeing him outside of work so I could live in denial a little longer.
“Kaylee’s father is back in town.” I sighed. “I’m trying to figure out what to do about it.”
“What?” Mom asked, leaning closer and taking my hand. “How do you know that? I thought you didn’t know anything about him.”
“Well, I know what he looks like,” I groaned. “His name is Kayden, and it turns out he’s an architect working for Acker Real Estate right now. I ran into him on my first day at the office.”
“Oh, sweetie.” Mom cupped my hand in both of hers. “Maybe this is a good thing. Maybe it’s time for him to know. It could be good for you and Kaylee.”
“You sound like Jace,” I said, rolling my eyes.
“Well, Jace is a pretty sensible man,” she said, giving me a knowing look.
I glared at her.
“Livvy, Jace is probably right about this. Even your father had a right to know he had a child. What someone does with that information is up to them, but if he’s not a danger to you or Kaylee, he has a right to know she exists.”
“I know he does,” I said. “I’m just not even remotely ready to face this.”
“You don’t have to face it alone. Jace will be by your side the whole time, right?”
My stomach sank. I’d never hated my lie more than in this moment. Even still, the answer was yes. Jace would be there for me however I asked him to be.
“Go talk to Jace,” Mom urged. “Kaylee can stay here for a while. It’s a Friday night; you should be together anyway.”
“And if I agree to this and Kayden blows us off?”
Mom shrugged sadly. “He might do that. He also might be the dad she deserves.”
My voice strained as I fought back tears. “I want Jace to be that person for her,” I said, sighing. “I want him so much more than I’ve let him believe, Mom.”
“If I were you, I’d take this one step at a time. Figure out what to do with Kayden. Then you need to be honest with Jace. If the way he looks at you is any indication, I’m pretty sure he’ll be whatever you want him to be—to you and Kaylee.”
I was going to have to tell Jace how I felt.
I’d avoided it for far too long. But before I could do that, I needed to deal with the Kayden situation.
I was pretty sure there was no world in which Jace would forgive me for not telling Kayden.
Which, on one hand, baffled me, since he barely knew Kayden, and on the other hand, made perfect sense.
Jace was honest and he cared about doing the right thing.
This was the right thing to do and if I pushed my fear aside, it was the only way to handle this situation in a way that was true to my values.
I’d have to figure out a way to tell this man I barely knew about the daughter he didn’t know he had.
I texted Jace back.
Me: I’m ready to talk. Can I come over?
His response was instantaneous.
Jace: Yes! I’m home.
Jace swung the door of his condo open as soon as I knocked.
He took one look at me and opened his arms, inviting me in for a hug, and I clung to his chest like it was the safest place in the world.
It would never cease to amaze me how easily he offered exactly what I needed.
He silently held me in his arms until I found the courage to let go and face him.
“I’m really scared,” I said, as tears spilled down my cheeks.
“I know,” he said soothingly as he rubbed my back. “Let’s sit down.”
He guided me to the couch and used a remote to shut the shades in his massive windows before sitting next to me, our legs pressed against each other.
“Tell me what you’re scared of,” he said, taking my hand in his.
I used my other hand to swipe at my tears. “I don’t want Kaylee to get hurt and I’m not ready to share her. Does that make me selfish?”
“Liv, you’ve been a single mom for three and a half years. It’s okay for you to be worried about that changing.”
“Jace, Kayden wasn’t nothing to me. I know it was only one night, but he was amazing. Honest. A little unsure of himself, but so sweet. I would have seen him again if he hadn’t been leaving the next day. I would have told him if I’d been in contact with him.”
Jace’s throat bobbed as he swallowed, and he took a deep breath. “That matches what I know about him as well. I don’t think he’d ever ask for anything you aren’t comfortable with in regard to Kaylee. Him knowing about her doesn’t have to mean sharing custody next week.”
“The thought of that makes me want to barf,” I said. “Even if I tell him, I don’t know what I want to do about them meeting yet. That feels huge.”
“I get it,” he said, squeezing my hand harder, and gazing at me like helping me through this was the most important thing in the world. “Let’s focus on one step at a time, Liv.”
Just like Mom said. Get through this, admit that I’m in love with you, and pray to God I’m not misreading the way you look into my eyes in moments like this.
“Are we going to talk about your dad?” Jace asked gently.
“What about him?”
“I think maybe you’re worried Kayden will come in and out of Kaylee’s life like your dad did to you and that’s part of why you’re scared to tell him. You want to spare Kaylee the same pain he caused you when you were young.”
I nodded, feeling my heart expand at the way Jace saw me. He understood me better than anyone and he didn’t even know how much that had meant to me all this time.
“I think you should be honest with him about your concerns.”
I blinked, confused for a moment. “Who? Kayden?”
“Yes,” Jace said. “I think if you tell him that’s what you’re worried about, then his reaction will ease your fear. I don’t think he’s going to abandon her once he knows about her. I don’t think Kayden is anything like your dad, Liv.”
I looked at him curiously. Jace seemed to know a lot about Kayden. He certainly cared a lot about this situation. I knew he’d be this supportive of me, but I couldn’t help but notice the way he also seemed to assess how each choice I made impacted Kayden as well as me and Kaylee.
He must have seen the confusion on my face because it was like he was responding to my thoughts. “Liv, I’m pushing this because I care about all three of you. I know you know telling him is the right thing to do. I know your heart. Keeping them from each other is not who you are.”
“What if he doesn’t want anything to do with us?”
“I don’t think that’s going to be the case. But if that’s how he responds, I’ll be right there for you and Kaylee, I promise. Always.”
He pulled me into another hug, and with my face buried in the crook of his neck, I let the question constricting my lungs free. “Why are his feelings so important to you?”
Jace pulled me closer and took a deep breath but didn’t say anything.
“You’re not going to tell me, are you?” I asked.
His voice was barely above a whisper when he responded, “I can’t, Liv.”
A few more tears fell from my eyes. I was so tired of keeping everything I felt for him bottled up inside. “Do you think we’ll ever have an honest conversation about this thing between us?” I asked.
Jace kissed my temple and squeezed me even tighter, like he was conveying his feelings through his touch. “One way or another, we’re going to have to, Liv. But this is more important than us right now because you and I are going to be okay no matter what. We have to be.”
I held on to him for a few minutes before pulling back and looking into his eyes. He looked a lot more tired than I’d realized all week. He was truly torn up about this.
“Jace? Will you hold me for a while and pretend that we aren’t too afraid to say what we really feel? Just for tonight?”
He closed his eyes slowly and nodded before opening them again, the shine of moisture unmistakable.
He leaned back onto the couch and put his arm around me as I curled into his side and convinced him to watch my guilty pleasure, Love in the Wild, a Survivor meets The Bachelor reality show that he always complained about.
He didn’t complain tonight though, just got up to pour two glasses of wine and then settled back in with his arm around me and my body pressed tight to his until it was time for me to pick up Kaylee.
When we said goodbye, I promised to talk to Kayden after their meeting on Monday afternoon.
I gave Jace one last hug, wondering when we’d be able to give into the desire to be more than friends.