Jace stiffened and stepped forward, his intent to respond to the venom in my father’s voice obvious. I held an arm out in front of him.
“No,” I said. “You raised me to be ashamed of who I was. It took years of therapy and meeting the right people to erase all the bullshit you put in my head.”
“Therapy’s a bunch of garbage. Obviously, or they would have done something about you being gay,” Dad grumbled, ignoring me and focusing on one word in my response as usual.
“I’m not gay. I’m bisexual.”
“If you’re fucking men, you sound pretty gay to me,” Dad growled and gulped his beer. He held it out to me. “You want some? Or you still doing that AA bullshit?”
“You mean the bullshit that keeps me from turning out like you? Alone? Drunk? Angry? Yeah, I’m still doing that bullshit, Dad.” I fought the urge to crinkle my nose in disgust. The more space I put between us over the years the less angry I became with him and the more I just felt disgusted by how he’d turned out. He’d lost his child and his wife, and while anyone might be broken by that, he’d spent years choosing to reject the only family he had left in favor of that bottle right there.
Dad turned his attention on Jace, his face distorting into a snarl. “So, you’re a fucking f—”
“Do not finish that sentence,” Jace said in the deepest, most authoritative voice I’d ever heard. Olivia gasped and looked on in horror as Jace drew himself up to his full height, looking rather menacing as he stepped toward my father. “I’m the man who’s going to spend the rest of my life taking care of your son because I love him. If you ever start to use that word in front of us again, I’ll knock your fucking teeth out.”
Wow, his protectiveness is a huge turn-on.
I threaded my fingers through Jace’s, and my father stepped toward us, his hand raised. Jace must have seen it coming because he stepped in front me and took the hit to the face that my father had obviously intended for me.
Olivia gasped again and a quick glance at her told me that she was far more horrified than I’d expected. Maybe she really hadn’t understood how terrible this interaction would be or maybe it was just too much after Jace’s encounter with Martin this morning.
Frankly, he’s using fewer slurs than I expected.
Jace turned to face me, blocking me from my father. “Are we done here?”
I ran a hand over Jace’s reddening cheek. “Almost, babe.” Jace took a deep breath and stepped to the side again, allowing me to face my father.
“One more thing, Dad. I want to make sure you meet my girlfriend, Olivia,” I said, putting my arm around her and pulling her toward me. I pressed my lips to the side of her head and let them linger there, hoping to offer her some comfort in the moment. “Jace and I are very happy with her.”
“What the fuck is this?” my father snarled, taking a sloppy swig of his beer. “Which one of you messed up my son even worse than he already was?”
“This is called a throuple—at least, that’s what we choose to call ourselves. We’re in a committed polyamorous relationship and we’re raising our daughter together,” I said.
Olivia scowled at him. “Your son isn’t even remotely messed up, which speaks to his character more than anything now that I see how he was raised.”
Dad’s eyes flared with anger.
“I’m glad I moved back to Boston,” I said. “I found a family. That’s not you, Dad. That’s never been you. I hope when you’re alone, taking your final breaths, that you look back on how you treated me, and you finally feel remorse. Because I won’t be thinking about you at all when I die and I sure as hell will never be like you with my children. We could have been stronger together after they died, Dad. It didn’t have to be like this. We didn’t have to lose each other when we lost them, but you made that choice for us when you decided to start drinking and hitting me to deal with your anger.”
Dad looked stricken, and for a brief moment I wondered if the man I knew before my mother died was in there, but even if he was, it was far too late for us. I turned to leave, and my partners followed me.
“You’re all bad enough but you’re going to fuck up kids too? When the fuck did you have a kid?” he yelled after us.
Olivia paled, and it wasn’t lost on me how much he’d just struck a chord with her. It was for Olivia that I even bothered to address him again.
I turned to face him for the last time. “There is nothing fucked up about us. My daughter will grow up with parents who love each other, love her, and never raise a hand to her. That’s a hell of a lot more than you can say for your parenting, isn’t it,Dad?” I spat the name he hadn’t deserved since the day my mother died.
He stared at me for a moment before Jace grabbed my wrist and tugged me toward him. I let myself turn toward him, and together, the three of us walked out the door. One day, Kaylee might decide to call me Dad, and if she did, I’d cherish it for the gift it was. It was a title I’d work every day to earn and remain worthy of.
Chapter Forty-Nine
Olivia
By the time Jaceand I left the office, I felt like I hadn’t slept in days. I hadn’t fully recovered from Martin’s blackmail before we’d faced Kayden’s father, and it turned out that no description that Kayden had given me of his abusive past could have adequately prepared me for the hatred that man had spewed toward hisson,of all people. There was nothing Kaylee could ever do that would make me treat her like that, and Kayden had endured that for most of his life. It broke my heart, and I was still on edge as Kaylee got ready for the father-daughter dance.
Kayden had come over after work and he was waiting in the living room as Kaylee put on her bright pink dress. I’d curled her long brown hair into loose ringlets, and she looked like a fairytale princess. My heart swelled as I zipped her up. She was still my baby girl, but it felt like the years had flown by since I’d held my baby in my arms. For the first time in years, I felt a desire to have another child and to share those moments with Kayden and Jace.
A knock at the front door made Kaylee lift her head and smile at me. “Is that Jace?” she asked excitedly.
