“Look,” Frankie said, dumping out his water bottle and using it to make tall sand spires in front of Blue. “This can be a fairy castle.”
Watching their heads bent together made it impossible to ignore the thought I had buried down so deeply ever since the first moment my newborn blinked at me.
She was Frankie’s
Why had I lied to myself that she was Cash’s?
I had been in such a hurry to forget Frankie that I hadn’t even considered the possibility. After all, it hadn’t been very likely. Only the tiniest possibility really. . .
“It’s not your fault,” Frankie said. “He had everyone fooled.”
Tears blurred my eyes, clumped on my lashes.
“Blue is your baby.”
There was silence for a moment.
“I know she is,” he said in a low tone.
“How long did you know about Blue? How come you didn’t demand a DNA test?”
I focused on my baby, the way her hair curled all over her head.
“I guessed. I didn’t really know. I didn’t want to distress you. It didn’t matter to me. I will love her whether she’s mine or Cash’s.”
“Sheisyours. Look at her.”
Tears were falling down my cheeks now.
“I can see it more every day. The curl in her hair, the color of her eyes, those dimples in her cheeks. The way she looks out at the world. But you don’t have to claim her if you don’t want to.”
“Of course I want to claim her! I just didn’t want to distress either of you if she was attached to Cash?—”
I laughed. “No. He was all about the photo ops. Not being there for her every day. He didn’t even change diapers or do any of the hard work, and most of the time he came home after she was already down for the night. Why did you drag this divorce out?”
“Because I love you,” Frankie said, his voice low and throbbing, and he bent closer, smelling like salt and sand and sun on skin. “I’ve never stopped loving you. You could have a dozen babies with a dozen different men, and I would still love you and them the same as my own.”
My skin prickled and my heart felt painfully full, like I couldn’t bear to hope.
Would it even work?
“What should we do now?” I said. “I can’t bear the thought of leaving Ramshackle Bay, but it’ll be so hard to watch the Perk Up & Read get demolished.”
“I will be beside you, no matter what you want to do.”
“You? Leave Ramshackle Bay? What you’ve always said is the world’s best surfing?”
“For you two, I’d do anything.”
I felt my heart make a desperate, twisting leap inside me.
Frankie hadn’t barreled in with a DNA test demanding to see Blue. He’d just waited, letting me figure out what I wanted to do at my own pace.
He’d put Blue’s needs above his own. He’d put my feelings above his own.
“Theremightbe a probationary period,” I said, and Frankie didn’t even wait one second before joyfully pulling me into hisarms and kissing me, both hands eagerly on my face while Blue burbled happily between us.
“I saidmight,” I warned, but he was gasping in joy and relief. “And you don’t get to move in right away. We’ll see how it goes.”
