Page 27 of York

“He is. Come here.” I reached for her and lifted her up onto the counter. “Actually, I want to tell you something about York.”

“What?” she asked, biting into the chocolate-coated vanilla ice cream.

“Well, here’s the thing, munchkin. He’s not just my friend.” Her eyes were big, round, and the same color as his. Somehow, that made it easier to say the words. “He’s actually your Daddy.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

York

I dropped all the bags in Denali’s room, where she was sitting quietly on her bed, watching me with an odd look.

“You okay?” I asked when she didn’t rush over to grab all her toys and start organizing them.

“Mommy said you’re my daddy,” she said.

You could have knocked me over with a fucking feather.

When I’d come in, Runa had been straining pasta in the sink. “Hey, I need to talk to you.”

“Sure. Just let me put these bags down,” I said, wondering if she was going to tell me about what they were running from.

But I guess that wasn’t it.

She’d told Denali about who I really was.

“Yeah,” I said, walking over to her and crouching down. “How do you feel about that?”

She shrugged.

“I feel happy about it,” I told her. “I know we don’t know each other very well yet, but I’ve liked getting to spend time with you so far.”

“The zoo and games were fun.”

“Yeah. And we can keep doing fun stuff.”

“Yeah?”

“Yep. Now that you and your mom are here, I’d like to keep hanging out with you guys.”

She contemplated that for a moment.

“And you won’t hurt Mommy?”

Fuck.

That was the second time she asked about that.

What the fuck had happened to Runa?

“Listen, Denali, I would never, ever hurt your mom. Or you. I promise.”

“You pinky-promise?” she asked, sticking out a pudgy hand, her little finger out.

“Yeah, I pinky promise,” I said, wrapping my little finger around hers and shaking.

She was quiet for another second. “You got Mommy’s ice cream.”

“I remember you saying what kind she liked. I got you all your favorites, so I thought I should get her something special too.”