“I know.”
As soon as I heard the door, I stood and walked to the edge of the bed like a lion protecting his mate and cub.
My ribs strained against every breath, air cracking to reach the depths of my lungs, as my best friend walked into the hospital room where my wife had just given birth to his baby.
“Max.”
Without my worry over Daisy clouding my gaze, I saw him clearly. Thinner. Nervous. But the bags under his eyes were gone. Same with the bloated look he always got when he drank too much. I wanted to ask if he’d stopped drinking, but that was a question for a different time. A different friendship.
“Congratulations, Daisy,” Todd was the first to speak, tucking his arms over his chest as he came a little closer but not too close. Especially to me. “Max.” Our eyes met.
The man who’d fathered Lucy and the man who wanted to be her father.
I brimmed with tension, every moment I’d been in the presence of his father earlier, hitting me like a freight train. If they sent him, if they thought I was going to let him anywhere near Lucy?—
“If you’re here because of what I said to your father earlier?—”
“You talked to my dad?” Todd’s arms dropped, and if I wasn’t so skeptical of him and why he was here, I’d think he had no idea.
“Max?” Daisy’s surprised gasp came from behind me.
“I did,” I answered them both, but my gaze never left Todd’s as my voice lowered an octave. “But if you didn’t know, then why are you here?”
Every single question—assumption—hanging in the air between us.
Are you here to get Daisy back?
Are you here because you want to be a father to the baby you never wanted?
“I wanted to apologize to Daisy…and to explain.” He looked briefly at me, but then his attention turned to my wife.
I wanted to step in front of him. I wanted him to explain to me first, but then I felt small fingers curl around my wrist and then slide to my hand.
Let him,her hold seemed to say.
“I know you said you didn’t need my apology, Daisy, but I need to give it.” He swallowed. “It’s part of the program.”
I stilled. How many times had I tried to get him to get help? To go to an AA program? He never would. Always said he didn’t need it.
“I shouldn’t have…left you…you both the way I did, but I just wasn’t capable. Wasn’t ready to…explain.” Nerves shivered over him. He shifted his weight, his eyes losing some of their steadiness. He ran his hand along the back of his neck and thenblew out a breath. “I’m just…I guess I’ll just start at the root of it.” He grimaced. “I’m gay, Daisy.”
Daisy gasped, and I stiffened, Todd’s truth hitting me like alcohol on the back of my throat, burning as it soaked in deep.
He was gay.
It wasn’t that I’d never thought…never wondered…every once in a while…But I was his best friend, and we had plenty of gay friends, so I figured if he was, he’d tell me. Trust me.
“It wasn’t you,” he said, like he knew what I was thinking. “It was me. I was trying…not to be.” He let out a bitter laugh. “My parents…what they wanted?—”
“But your dad…” I croaked, and Todd’s head snapped to mine.
I felt Daisy squeeze my hand, confused.
“Todd McCormick isn’t my father,” Todd rumbled. “Not in the ways that matter…nor the ways that don’t.”
“Wait, what? Todd, what are you talking about?” Daisy gaped.
“The night of my dad’s party—the night we, ahh…” He trailed off, and seeing that we all understood where he was going with that, he cleared his throat and continued, “You disappeared, and when you were gone for a while, I went to look for you. I thought maybe you’d wandered off into one of the quieter rooms of the house. I heard low voices—noises coming from my dad’s study, but when I went inside, it wasn’t you. It was him. With their neighbor, Matthew. They were…together.”
