TATE
Everything began to spin. When I finally lifted my eyes to Blair’s again, the look on her face told me everything I needed to know.
Rather than scream like I wanted to, I instead vowed not to do or sayanythingto scare this little boy right now. He didn’t deserve that. And I didn’t want his first impression of me to be a bad one.
Blair continued to stand there frozen.
“Who’s that, Mommy?”
Mommy.
What had been a 99.9-percent certainty now moved to 100 percent.
I knelt, my voice gentle. “I’m a friend of your mom’s.”
Blair cleared her throat. “Nicholas, sweetheart, go play with your toys for a bit, please.” She pointed. “In the living room.”
Nicholas.
He wouldn’t move. Instead, he clung to her leg as if he was trying to protect her. It pulled at my heartstrings,though at the moment it felt like my heart was hanging out of my chest.
“It’s okay. He doesn’t have to go anywhere,” I spoke softly so as not to scare him, staring at his face in awe.
My face. Or at least the one I’d had when I was his age.
When he let go of her and ran over to a corner in the living room, I stepped inside the house without permission. There was no more handling this situation delicately.
Tugging on my hair, I mouthed to her, “What the fuck?”
Her face reddened. “Tate...”
“He’s mine, right?” I asked, my voice choked with emotion.
“Yes,” she whispered.
I closed my eyes for a moment to grasp the enormity of that. To grasp the fact that my life would never be the same. Any plan for how to handle Taylor had gone straight out the window.
I finally opened my eyes. “How did this happen? We were safe.”
She shook her head. “I don’t know. It justdid.”
“I’m so fucking confused right now.” I pulled on my hair again and paced.
She followed me. “I’ve both dreamed about and dreaded this day. Before I knew who you were, I dreamed of finding you and telling you. But then at the wedding, everything changed. That dream became more like a nightmare. And I hadn’t figured out what to do yet. But please know I was going to tell you. I wouldneverkeep this from you.”
I turned to her. “This is why you said you needed more time.”
Blair nodded. “Before I found you at the wedding, I’d resigned myself to the fact that you’d never know him. I wasn’t happy about that, but I’d accepted it.” She paused. “This? You being Taylor’s father? I don’t have a plan for this scenario, Tate.”
I still had so many questions. But those could wait. There was only one thing that mattered right now. I walked over to where Nicholas was playing, sat on the couch, and watched him. I soaked in every inch of him as Blair stood in a corner of the room and looked on.
His eyes were like saucers as he focused on adding a block to his structure without the rest toppling over.
Eventually I had to force myself away because there was still so much I needed to ask Blair, and I realized it was probably better to do that while his attention was on the toys.
I walked past Blair and into the kitchen. She followed.
“I need to know everything,” I told her, leaning against the counter. “From the very beginning. Tell me what happened after you got back from our trip, how you found out you were pregnant.”
