“Do you want me to read it to you before I hit Send?” he asked.
“If you don’t mind.” After he’d read it aloud, she shrugged. “That’s all there is to say right now, I guess.”
“We should probably give them a few minutes to read it and get the initial burst of talking about it out of their systems.”
“I know he’s not even two, but I hope they’ll remember Oliver is listening.”
“They will.” He hit Send.
After the whooshing airplane sound told them his familywas now in the loop, a tense silence settled between him and Siobhan again.
Quiet wasn’t good. Since the moment he realized he might have a son, his head had been like a snow globe. Every time somebody spoke, the snow globe was shaken and his thoughts were the flurry of flakes. But in the silence, the snowflakes got a chance to settle and Brian could make sense of his thoughts. One in particular was picking up steam, like a snowball rolling downhill.
Maybe Kelly had lied to her sister, but if Siobhan hadn’t hated Brian since day one and had supported their marriage, maybe Kelly wouldn’t have left him for some other guy. Maybe they would still be married, raising their son together.
He didn’t say it out loud. Right now, his only objective was getting to know the child he knew in his gut was his son. To do that, he needed to keep Siobhan at the campground, and that would be challenging enough without rehashing the years of animosity between them.
“I didn’t know,” she whispered, and since she was looking at her hands, Brian wasn’t sure if she was talking to him or to herself.
“If you’d known, you probably wouldn’t have shown up at a gathering of my entire family with him.”
She couldn’t have known how strong the resemblance really was, of course, because she had no way of knowing what Brian and his brothers had looked like at that age. But if Siobhan believed there was even a hint of a possibility Brian was Oliver’s father, he didn’t think she would have even come herself, never mind brought the boy with her.
“You’re right about it not being fair to put Oliver back in his car seat for hours,” she said. “But I’m probablygoing to leave tomorrow. There’s no way this isn’t awkward.”
“Give my family a chance,” he said. “For Steph’s sake, at least.”
Siobhan looked him in the eye, her gaze unflinching. “I adore Steph. We’ve been friends for years. But there is literally nobody on this planet more important to me than Oliver. If I think it’s a bad idea for us to be here, using Steph’s wedding to emotionally blackmail me into staying won’t work. As soon as one of my boundaries is crossed, we’re gone.”
“I’m sorry. I love Steph, so that was a genuine ask, but I can see how it looks like I’m using her to manipulate you. And maybe I am on some level, I guess. I’ll try not to anymore.”
“Thank you.”
There didn’t seem to be anything else to say, so Brian stood. “I’ll go out and make sure they’re settled down.”
“I’m going to use the restroom first—maybe splash some water on my face—and then I’ll be out.”
As he walked across the grass, he knew the moment he was spotted because everybody snapped intoact naturalmode. They weren’t very good at it, and he chuckled before his gaze landed on the little boy who looked like a replica of his own baby pictures and the sound died in his throat.
His son.
Brian wasn’t sure how he was supposed to keep his family’s expectations in check when he couldn’t even control his own, but he wanted Siobhan and Oliver to stay. He had to try.
Chapter Five
Walking back across the grass to where her son was being watched by the Kowalski family was one of the hardest things Siobhan had ever done.
Regardless of what she’d said to Brian, the urge to take Oliver and run was strong. Sure, he’d be upset about being back in his car seat for another three or four hours, depending on the flow of traffic, but he’d get over it. What he might not get over was his mother falling asleep at the wheel, and she was tired. When the emotions currently coursing through her body like an electrical current faded, she’d probably be utterly exhausted.
Then there was the fact that, even though he hadn’t understood exactly what they’d be doing, Oliver had been so excited to go on this trip.
At that moment, she heard his laughter and spotted him on the playground. Stella was running after a tennis ball, which she brought back to Nora. The little girl threw it again, and again Oliver laughed.
Siobhan stopped walking, taking in her son’s joy in the game and letting it refill her emotional well. While she was shaken to her core, he was too young to know anything was going on. The only way his happiness could be disrupted would be him sensing his mommy wasn’t okay and feeding off of her chaotic energy.
There were so many of them, all sitting around the unlit campfire. As Steph’s aunts, uncles and cousins had finished setting up their campsites for the week, they’d wandered over with chairs. Joining them would be daunting even if shehadn’tshown up with a surprise child, but all she could do was maintain a pleasantly neutral expression—which wouldn’t be easy—and sit quietly. There were enough family members talking to and around each other, trying to catch up since the last time they’d been together, that it should be easy to blend into the background.
She had to admit they did their best not to stare at Oliver. He ran around with Nora—who was great with him—and Stella, and every so often somebody would have them sit in the shade and drink some water. When he brought her a rock he found in the grass, she admired the smooth gray stone, and then she laughed with the others when he went from person to person, showing off the rock.
