“I’ll be right back,” I murmur, setting down my coffee.
Sebastian notices the shift in my voice. “Everything okay?”
I nod, though my throat feels tight. “There’s someone outside the bakery. I just want to see if he needs something.”
Sebastian sets his mug down. “I’ll come with you.”
The wind cuts sharper outside now. The snow’s picked up again, flakes dancing in the air. My boots crunch softly as I cross the street, Sebastian just behind me.
The man turns as we approach. His eyes are pale blue, like mine. His jaw is tight. There’s a tremble in his hands.
My steps slow.
He takes a breath. “Willa?”
My name sounds strange coming from him. Like it’s wrapped in history I was never given.
I stop a few feet away. “Yes?”
His voice cracks. “I’m your father.”
The world narrows to that one sentence. The wind. The snow. Sebastian’s steady presence behind me. None of it matters. Not compared to the storm that’s just started inside me.
I stare at the man I’ve never seen, the one I’ve imagined and hated and wondered about for most of my life.
And I say nothing.
Not yet.
Not because I don’t have words.
But because I have too many.
Chapter 11
Sebastian
Herfather.
The man who abandoned her. Never wrote. Never called. The same man her grandmother trusted so little, she left the bakehouse to Willa instead of him.
Anger flashes white-hot behind my ribs.
I step in, just close enough that my hand hovers near the small of her back. If he says the wrong thing, I’ll be ready.
“Willa, sweetheart,” he says, voice too smooth. He opens his arms like he expects her to fall into them. “It’s been too long.”
She doesn’t move. Doesn’t flinch. “What are you doing here?”
His arms drop. The smile slips for a breath before snapping back into place like some cheap mask. “I heard my little girl inherited a business. Thought maybe we could talk. Discuss a few opportunities.”
“Opportunities,” she repeats, her tone flat. “You came of Christmas Day for that?”
He nods. “You’re young. Running a place like that isn’t easy. Why not sell it to someone who can really make something of it? Think about what the money could do for you. You could go back to school. Move somewhere warm. Live a little.”
His eyes flick to me, then back to her. “Instead of wasting your life in a dead-end town with some washed-up veteran.”
My fists clench. I step forward, but Willa plants her palm on my chest.
