“The day I found out I was pregnant.” She’s not looking at me, her gaze fixed on the stone wall. “I was doing a home visit to a family. Single mother and three kids under seven.” Her voice is flat. “Standard procedure. I’d been there twice before, building rapport, trying to get the mother to accept help.”
She shifts, wrapping her arms tighter around herself.
“The father didn’t want me there. Said I was trying to break up his family. I explained I was there to help, that services were available if they needed support. He—” Her voice cracks. “He pulled out a gun.”
My blood turns to ice. “Jesus Christ.”
“He didn’t mean to shoot. He was just... trying to scare me. But it went off and—” Her hand moves to her side without thinking,fingers pressing against her ribs through the sweater. “The bullet grazed me. I barely even bled.”
My breathing has changed. I can’t seem to get enough air into my lungs. The image of Desiree facing down a gun, of her bleeding, of her alone and terrified—
“They took me to the hospital. Cleaned the wound, bandaged me up.” She finally turns to look at me, and the pain in her eyes guts me. “And that’s when the nurse told me I was pregnant.”
“Desiree—” Her name comes out broken.
“I called you because I was terrified, and I thought—” Her voice cracks. “I don’t know what I thought. That maybe you’d make it less scary. We’d been talking every day at that point. I thought we were…”
She trails off, but I know what she can’t say. That we were together. That I was hers.
The silence stretches between us, heavy with the weight of what I did. What I said to her when she was already broken.
“Instead, I made it worse,” I say quietly.
“Yeah.” The word comes out small. “You did.”
Holy hell. She’d been shot at. Hours before she called me, someone had pointed a gun at her and pulled the trigger. She could have died. Our daughter almost never existed because some asshole nearly killed her mother.
And when Desiree called me, traumatized and pregnant and terrified, I called her a whore.
“I don’t—” I have to stop, swallow hard. “I don’t know what to say. I’m sorry doesn’t even begin to cover—”
“I know you’re sorry.” She wipes at her eyes. “But it doesn’t change what happened.”
“Is that why you left social work?” The pieces click into place. “Why you changed careers?”
She nods. “I couldn’t go back. Couldn’t walk into another home not knowing if there’d be a weapon. I tried—spent threemonths on leave thinking maybe I could do it. But every time I even thought about going back...” She shakes her head. “The fear never left.”
I did this to her. Not just the cruel words on the phone, but everything that came after. She faced trauma alone, carried our child alone, and rebuilt her entire life alone.
“I don’t know how you ever let me near Bella,” I say roughly. “How you trusted me with her after everything.”
“Because she deserved a father.” Desiree straightens, wiping the last traces of tears from her face. “And I knew—despite everything—you’d love her. That you’d be good to her even if you weren’t good to me.”
The distinction cuts deep. Good to Bella. Not good, period.
“I want to be good to both of you,” I say. “If you’ll let me try.”
She looks at me for a long moment, and I can see her weighing it. Measuring my words against my history. Against the man who failed her when she needed him most.
“We live in different states, Enrick. How does this even work? You’re in Winter Bay. My life and Bella’s are in Atlanta.”
“I don’t have all the answers yet, but I know I’m willing to be uncomfortable and inconvenienced if it means having you in my life.” I reach for her hand, relieved when she doesn’t pull away. “But I know we can’t solve our problems if you leave on Christmas morning.” I squeeze her hand. “Stay through Christmas. Bella’s with me until January, anyway. You don’t have to rush back to an empty apartment.”
“Christmas,” she repeats softly, like she’s testing the word.
“It’s Bella’s first Christmas where we’re both in the same place. Where we both get to enjoy her presence. “She’s happy you’re here and wants us to help her put out cookies for Santa.”
Desiree’s eyes shimmer. “I haven’t spent Christmas with family except Bella. My parents don’t celebrate...” She trails off.
