It was no wonder my teammates in Connecticut couldn’t wait to get rid of me.
When we reached the car, Arizona left me on the passenger side, declaring, “I’m driving.”I didn’t have the strength to fight her, so I collapsed onto the seat without argument.
Once I was buckled, a hand landed on my shoulder from the backseat, accompanied by Maisie’s quiet voice. “Are you okay, Dad?”
My lungs seized, and my heart threatened to burst. This was the first time she’d ever called me Dad instead of Levi, a major milestone in our relationship. My only wish was that my daughter hadn’t been forced to lose so much to make this beautiful moment possible.
Reaching up, I squeezed her fingers. “I’m fine, sweetheart. More worried about you.”
Her shaky inhale sounded as Arizona pulled out of the parking lot. “Words can hurt just as much as being punched, you know?”
I hadn’t before, but I did now.
And I silently vowed to do everything in my power to be the type of man Maisie could be proud of from this day forward.
I crashed out hard when we got back to the house, sleeping through dinner. When I woke, the last traces of sunlight cast the sky in a tapestry of pinks and purples.
Needing a moment of peace to reflect on not only today’s events but my actions in the past, I grabbed my running shoes and managed to slip out the back door without anyone noticing. Traveling down the path that led from my property to the beach, I took off running as soon as my feet hit the sand.
Emotions slammed into my chest one by one.
First came regret. Maybe if I hadn’t been such a blatant womanizer, Maisie’s birth mom wouldn’t have felt the need to hide her pregnancy from me.
Then shame. I’d been outright cruel to others, and there was simply no excuse for how badly I treated them.
And finally, grief. Grief over missing out on being a part of the brotherhood that my teammates in Connecticut had created. Grief over missing out on almost thirteen years with my daughter. Grief over missing out on love.
Drenched in sweat and feeling somewhat lighter, I turned around and began jogging back home.
When I got within sight of the house, I noticed a small figure sitting in the sand, staring out at the ocean.
As I drew closer, I slowed my steps, my chest heaving after my impromptu workout.
I dropped to the sand beside my daughter. “It’s late. Shouldn’t you be in bed by now?”
Not taking her eyes off the waves illuminated by the moon, Maisie shrugged. “No school tomorrow, remember?”
Right. How could I forget that, in my fit of rage, I’d pulled both kids out of school without a backup plan?
“First thing in the morning, I’ll set up some tours at local private schools,” I promised.
She sighed, her fingertips ghosting over her prosthetic leg. “There’s no hiding that I’m different. People are always going to pick on me.”
The calm from my run vanished, and my blood pressure spiked. “That’s unacceptable.”
“Maybe. But it’s true. We can’t change schools every time it happens, because there will be ignorant, hateful kids everywhere we go.”
I grabbed her hand. “I understand that, I do, but at a bare minimum, you deserve a learning environment where you can feel safe. A place where administrators handle bullying appropriately.”
“That’s fair,” she agreed.
Something had been nagging at the back of my brain since we’d left the school. “Did it bother you, what he said? Obviouslynot the reason, because that’s not true, but about your mom giving you up?”
Dark lashes fluttered to kiss Maisie’s cheeks. “Yeah, a little.”
Swallowing thickly, I said, “If you want, we could try to track her down. I know she wasn’t in the Find Your Family Tree database, but if I hired a private investigator, I bet they could find her.” I hated that I’d slept with so many women—half of whom I didn’t even bother to get their names—that I couldn’t give my daughter this information myself.
There was silence as she considered my offer.
