Cap grunts and takes another slug from his flask.
“Who’s the father?” Nash demands.
“Who?” I echo.
“Yes, who? Your fiancé?”
“Um.” I justify what I say next by the fact that, yes, in some ways, Jonathan has been a father-like figure to Bennie. He’s been in her life for two years. Sometimes he picks her up from school. “In a sense.”
Another jerk of his chin and his brows pull so tight it looks painful.
“In a sense? What the hell does that mean? He either is or he isn’t.”
This is the perfect time to tell him the news of his surprise child. I could make it funny with a Maury Povich-style “Youarethe father!” But none of this is funny, and the words refuse to be said. They’re trapped on my tongue while guilt worms its way through my chest. I have to tell him or my mom won’t get the surgery, but I can’t tell him because if he gets mad, he might not help me get the gold so she can have the surgery.
And as wrong as I know I am for not telling him, at the end of the day, he’s still the one who left. He missed out on the last eight years because he made a choice, and that choice was another city. Then another and another. That’s all the reminder I need to match the fight in his voice. “It doesn’t concern you.”
“Doesn’t concern me?” He scoffs. “You’re still my wife, Rue. She could be mine for all I know.”
Cap grunts; I choke. Because: Fuck.
“She’s five,” I repeat, hoping I believe it as much as him.
“Still not an answer.”
“We haven’t seen each other in eight years!” My shout draws attention from a nearby family. “Our marriage is just a piece of paper. And you’re seeing someone. Why do you care?”
“Why do I care?” He’s flabbergasted, stepping toward me. “Are you fucking kidding me with that question?”
“Does it look like I’m kidding?”
He sniffs. “Just to be clear that I have this right?—”
“Oh, here we go.” I roll my eyes.
“You marry me?—”
My voice fills with as much pissed-off as his. “Andthatwas my first mistake.”
“Then you tell me you don’t want to be married to me because I’m too irresponsible.”
My heart rate ticks up along with my desire to slap him. “Your shirt proves that point.”
We exchange heated looks but he doesn’t back down. “Then you tell me to leave—so I do.”
“Finally!” I smile the biggest smile of my life. “My favorite part of the story.”
“And you never send divorce papers.”
“That was my mother!” I throw my hands in the air. “I can’t control that woman.”
“While I write you postcard after postcard, begging you to come get me. So I can be with you. For years.”
“I didn’t—what?”
He cannot have been writingcome and get mein the literal sense. Come and get me is a taunt. A thing kids say when they’re playing a game.
“And you’re telling me that you had a kid, and it doesn’t concern me?”
