Chapter 11

ELEVEN

I t’s hard maintaining one’s dignity in pajama pants covered with pizza-scarfing unicorns. It’s even harder when you have six feet five inches of fury tailing you, looking like a supermodel. An extremely pissed-off supermodel.

Kate had wisely shuffled Sofia away from the door as soon as she glimpsed who was there, leaving me to step outside. Now that I had to have this conversation, I wasn’t doing it within the supersonic hearing of my four-year-old. Nor was I about to leave her alone with her unbeknownst daddy while I put on something that wasn’t covered in cartoon characters.

And so, I left the house in my fantasy wear, an old pink sweater, plus a ratty parka to guard against the wind while Xavier used the sidewalk as his own personal runway.

You have to pick your battles, is what I’m saying.

Xavier made it exactly two blocks before he picked his.

“Francesca, stop.”

I shook my head. “I need breakfast. Pioneer Works actually has a decent café in the back. They make a really good matcha latte.”

“I don’t give a fuck about matcha lattes, Ces. Who the hell was that? Did I imagine I was talking to my own baby picture back there?”

I sighed and finally stopped on the corner, ignoring the looks of a few passersby walking their dogs or likely on their way to Fairview Market at the end of the pier.

“Xavi, I will explain everything, I promise. But first, can I get some breakfast? And maybe take us somewhere so we aren’t discussing the fact that my daughter has your eyes in the middle of the street?”

Maybe it was the simple admission or the fact that I was acknowledging out loud what we both knew, but Xavier opened his mouth and nothing came out. Much like last night, when he was telling me about Lucy, he looked vulnerable. Scared, even.

Welcome to parenthood, buster. Terror had been my constant companion since that second line appeared on the pregnancy test five years ago. She was a persistent bitch too.

“Come on,” I said gently. “It’s cold. I’ll buy you a hot drink, and then we can talk.”

I was stalling, but it appeared to work. He followed me another few blocks to the café inside the local art gallery I had mentioned, then waited silently while I chitchatted with the baristas. I ordered us both matcha lattes and a couple of the locally made scones, then guided Xavier back out to Van Brunt and on toward the river’s edge.

We sipped our drinks and ate our pastries while we walked. Even Xavier couldn’t sniff at their buttery goodness. But the second we arrived at the tiny park on the Hudson, populated by only a few dog walkers braving the frigid December drizzle, he exploded.

“How could you fucking do this to me?”

I finished my latte and tossed it in a nearby trashcan, focusing on anything but him. “You’re going to need to be more specific than that.”

His glare was machete-sharp when I finally looked up.

“Now is not the time to play games. That little girl?—”

“Sofia,” I interrupted. “She has a name. It’s Sofia Elizabeth Zola, after her great-grandmother and then my favorite book character.”

“Sofia.”

He said the word slowly, like he was tasting each syllable. I tried and failed to ignore the tension gripping every inch of my body. God, we were only at her name, and I was already about to implode.

“It’s pretty,” he said.

Well, it was something.

Xavier swallowed thickly and pulled at his scarf. “So… Sofia . She’s…how old?”

“She just turned four.”

“And she was born…”

“December third.”

“Which means she was conceived…”

His eyes flickered as he was clearly counting back approximately nine months from December third. Hope crossed his face, and I wanted to slap him for it.

“According to my doctor, approximately May third,” I said sharply. “I’m sure you can remember what exactly we were doing on May third.”

His mouth opened, then closed, and his eyes dilated slightly. Yes, he remembered. So did I.

“She was almost two months early,” I added, if only not to imagine the way Xavier’s big body looked over mine naked. “Spent two weeks in the NICU before they sent us home. She was a fighter.”

I didn’t elaborate more, though I could have. You can’t really explain the trauma of birth to someone who hasn’t been there, and you really can’t explain the terror that comes when your new daughter weighs less than three pounds, can’t eat or even breathe on her own, and has to live in a plastic box for the first two weeks of her life. It was touch-and-go there for a few days.

Xavier stared at me while he processed everything, those blue bullets tunneling through me. I resisted the urge to avoid his gaze and toe my sneaker into the sand. This was my daughter. I wasn’t ashamed of her when I arrived at the hospital alone to a bunch of pitying looks from the nurses and doctors. I wasn’t going to be ashamed of her now. I’d take whatever was coming for my choices about raising her the best I could.

“So she’s…she’s mine?” he asked finally.

He asked like he felt he had to. I supposed he did, but it still felt like a slap in the face.

“Of course she’s yours,” I snapped. “I wasn’t the one who was engaged to another woman while we were sleeping together. I was a virgin when we met, in case you forgot. Did you think I was lying about that?”

He blinked repeatedly, looking rather like a fierce, oversized owl. Clearly, he didn’t remember that minor detail. Or else he was still in shock from the previous disclosure.

Yes, Xavier, she’s your daughter.

Yes, that means you’re a father.

Yes, yes, yes.

“How could you keep my own—my own daughter—from me?” He started out shouting, but by the end, his deep voice cracked.

My hands folded into a tight fist over my heart. For some reason, all the heartache, the frustration, the isolation of becoming a lonely single mom at twenty-three—all of it throbbed anew.

So, while I felt for him, I was also angry all over again.

“It’s not like you’re that easy to reach,” I said lamely.

Xavier’s head snapped up like it was pulled on a string. “Oh, really? What, with my massive public profile, five email addresses, multiple assistants, social media accounts, and so on?”

“I think you’re forgetting that you weren’t using the same name, you asshole,” I retorted. “You may be Xavier Parker now, but back then, to me, you were Xavier Sato. Not that I would have cared any more than I do now, but on top of not telling me about being engaged, you also neglected to tell me who you actually were.”

“Sato was my mum’s name,” he sputtered. “I only took on Parker for the business. I told you that last night.”

“Yes, you told me. The point is, I didn’t know then, did I? So how could I have reached you, huh? I didn’t really have loads of energy to track you down as a new mom. You know, between recovering from birth, learning to breastfeed, trying to find a job, and taking care of an infant by myself .”

“Fuck that. You had my number. You don’t think it would have been so hard to drop a quick message? ‘Hey, Xavi, great shag last month. Those eight inches really did it for me. In other news, you’re gonna be a dad.’”

“You know what? Fuck you,” I snapped, surprising even myself. Four years of being a mother and then an elementary school teacher had rendered my language G-rated most of the time. If this was an indication of what Xavier brought out in me, my instincts were right from the beginning.

“Fuck me ?” he repeated, dumbfounded.

“That’s right! Fuck you . That heartlessness right there? That’s why I didn’t contact you. Because what child needs a father who thinks about women like that? Who shows up at their door the morning after they make out just to ruin their lives and threaten their family!” I grabbed at my hair hard enough that the elastic band holding it back snapped, tossing my sleep-tangled curls all over my face. God, I had barely even begun to process the things he had been yelling once I opened the door. “Fuck!”

“That’s horseshit, and you know it,” Xavier retorted right back. “I have a right to know about my own daughter, Francesca.”

“And I have a duty to protect my baby girl from anyone who could hurt her!” I threw back at him.

“What?” He looked absolutely flabbergasted. “Why in the fuck would you think I would hurt her? My own flesh and blood?”

“Because you hurt me !” I fairly shrieked, startling a flock of pigeons and a few people walking their dogs by the waterfront.

“Everything all right?”

We both turned to find a man and his boxer stopped nearby.

“Fuck off,” Xavier snarled.

“Calm down,” I said. Then, to the man, “I’m sorry. We’re fine, thank you.”

“You sure?” he asked, looking suspiciously at Xavier. Not exactly like he wanted to fight him or anything. But like he wasn’t above calling the police.

I couldn’t really blame him. Last night, Xavier had looked refined and distinguished in his three-piece suit. Today, in his street clothes, combined with his overall size and obvious anger, he looked more like a criminal than a respected businessman. Downright dangerous.

“I’m sure,” I said. “I’m just fine. Aren’t I?”

We both turned to Xavier, who had folded his arms across his broad chest and continued to stare daggers at the guy while he mouthed “fuck off” again at him.

I sighed. Not helping.

Our interloper looked like he didn’t believe me, but slowly backed away under the force of Xavier’s glare. When he turned back to me, his eyes were ice cold. But he also looked like he was about to crumble. Just like me.

“You broke my heart, Xavi,” I said, unable to keep my voice from cracking. I swiped at the tears leaking out, one by one. “I was in love with you, and I thought you loved me too. I would have done anything for you. I would have married you if you’d asked—yes, even after just a few weeks. But then you just…well, you know what you did.”

I shook my head, wiping again at a few more insistent tears. I sounded insane. Stupid and naive. But of course, that’s what I had been, once. Didn’t he understand how fragile that kind of naivety really was? Hadn’t he ever felt so breakable?

Xavier exhaled forcefully through his teeth. “I—I know. But it’s not the same thing. This is—this is my daughter, Ces. Not some tawdry love affair. She’s more important than a broken heart.”

I couldn’t help but wince at the word “tawdry,” but he didn’t seem to notice.

“You know what I went through as a child, not knowing my dad.” He pressed his hands hard into his temples, then shoved them back through his hair. “How could you think it would ever be okay to let her believe her father abandoned her?”

“Because I’ve been on the other side of that,” I replied. “I was part of a family whose parents kept coming back again and again, but also kept hurting us every single time. How was I supposed to trust you when you hid an engagement and ended things so callously? Over a freaking email! Like I didn’t matter at all.”

For a moment, I was five years old again, standing at my parents’ bedside, trying to wake my mother up as a bad thunderstorm rocked the city. She had been passed out cold after another bender, too far under to even register her daughter’s needs. It had taken my fourteen-year-old brother to get me back into bed. Matthew had sat with me through the storm until I’d finally gone to sleep, supporting me just like he supported his niece now when I wasn’t around.

But I’d still wanted my mother. As any child would. As I always would, time and time again, until finally she left for good.

“You said it yourself,” I said quietly. “You don’t believe in love. But Sofia deserves to be loved. Every child deserves to be loved by their parents. And when they just get scraps, it hurts more, I think, than not having that parent at all.”

I squeezed my hands together, then shoved them deep into the pockets of my parka and stared at the ground. I didn’t really have anything more to say about the matter. I probably wouldn’t know for many years if I had been right or wrong to keep Sofia a secret. But I had done my best to protect her, which was a lot more than my parents had ever done for my siblings or me. And I couldn’t be sorry for that.

Xavier stared out at the water for a long time. At least two Staten Island ferries passed the Statue of Liberty, one in each direction, before he spoke again.

“I want to see her.” He looked back in the direction of the house. “I’d like to meet her. Properly, this time. I think we can both agree you at least owe me that.”

The slight glimmer of hope and vulnerability almost had me.

But I had also noticed that he hadn’t refuted anything I’d said about him. About my reservations, and the reasons behind them.

“I—I can’t do that. Not yet.”

His eyes flickered back at me, twin pools of icy heat, with something dangerous lurking below the surface. “Why not?”

I forced myself to tip my chin up and met his gaze. Stand your ground, Frankie. If not for yourself, for Sofia.

It always had to come down to Sofia.

“I am very careful about who Sofia meets and when,” I said. “Something like this? Introducing her to her father? It’s going to affect her a lot.” I shook my head. “I’m sorry, but I have to think about this. How, when. If.”

The muscles in Xavier’s jaw clenched on that last word. “If.”

Keep going, Frankie. Don’t move.

“Yes, if.” I inhaled, then breathed out. “I don’t know you anymore, Xavi, last night notwithstanding.”

“That’s absurd. You just said you loved me.”

“And you said it was nothing but a tawdry affair.” I shook my head. That one had really stung. “No, you’re going to have to wait. I need to see what’s best for Sofia. Get to know you better. See what your life is. Find out who you really are. Then, and only then, if I believe you won’t hurt her…then you can meet your daughter.”

He examined me for what seemed like hours. Now would have been a great time to make my exit, to sweep away on the last word like the heroines of my favorite books. It’s what Elizabeth Bennett would have done, for sure.

But the intensity of his gaze kept me rooted to the spot like I had been completely turned to stone. A statue to his Medusa’s glare.

Did that make him a snake?

After what seemed like an eternity, Xavier shoved his hands deep into the pockets of his jacket and took a few steps so we were less than six inches apart. Slowly, he bent down, and even in the winter wind, his salty-sweet scent of cologne, soap, and brine washed over me, causing a different kind of tension to ripple over my skin, a different kind of knot to twist in my stomach.

I closed my eyes. How could anyone bear this kind of torture? How could anyone fight it at all?

His breath was warm on my ear as he spoke.

“You’ll be hearing from my lawyer.”

The deliciously twisted knot turned to an anvil. When I finally opened my eyes, he was gone, swept away like a phantom, but leaving the ghost of his unspoken threats behind.