“You have every right to be.”
“So you’re deciding my emotions for me too?”
“No, I?—”
He exhales sharply, so I fall silent. “I cannot have this conversation while your sister’s wedding party is twenty feet away, pretending everything is perfect.”
The band starts playing something fast and upbeat. People stand. Jason and Faith are laughing, unaware.
Damian grabs my wrist. Not roughly. Decisively. “We’re not doing this here.” He pulls me toward the hallway. He doesn’t look back to see if I’m keeping up. We pass the bar, the gift table, and the hallway where I detonated his life earlier. The bathroom corridor is dimmer. Quieter. The music dulls to a distant thrum.
“This is not how I wanted to do this,” I say, trying to keep my voice steady.
He stops abruptly. The force of it nearly makes me collide with him. “Wanted?” he repeats. The word is sharp in his mouth.
“I wanted to tell you properly.”
“When?”
“When it wouldn’t ruin your son’s wedding.”
“Do you think this isn’t ruining it?”
I open my mouth and close it again. He has a point.
He pushes open the restroom door. It’s empty. The warm lights flicker on overhead, too bright, too unforgiving. The mirror shows us both flushed, strained, overdressed for a space that smells faintly of disinfectant and expensive perfume.
He lets go of my wrist.
I rub the spot absently.
“Say it again,” he demands.
I hate how much pain I see in his eyes. So, I do what he tells me to do. “You’re their father.”
His reflection goes still. The words feel heavier in this room. His hands brace on the counter on either side of the sink. He lowers his head briefly. “How long did you know it was me?”
“Since I found out I was pregnant. There was no one else.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before now?”
The question cracks open something I’ve been holding in for months. “Because I was scared. Because you’re Jason’s father. Because Amber is Amber. Because you’re respected and powerful and stable, and I’m a woman with two newborns and amessy apartment and a reputation I set on fire at New Year’s to ruin my ex and my sister. Because I couldn’t stand the thought of hurting you or losing you.”
He looks up sharply. The music outside swells again. A cheer rises and fades. His jaw tightens. “You decided I couldn’t handle it.”
“I thought you might not want it. Or me.”
“You decided for me.”
“Yes,” I whisper.
His anger shifts. “You let me build something with you on incomplete information.”
“I know.”
“You let me deliver them. Name them.”
“I didn’t plan that?—”
