Grandpa slid a look toward the door my other dad had just walked out of before saying, in a strangled voice that said how much self-control he was using, “I made a couple of calls and got Big Mike to give me the number to the lawyer he used to get custody of his girls.”

It was no wonder I loved the shit out of this man.

“I started looking some up online today, but I couldn’t really find any information on what would happen since he’s not a U.S. citizen or even a resident, so that was a good idea,” I said, sensing the heaviness coming back into my stomach and chest. “I’ve tried not to worry about it too much because I know that I haven’t done anything wrong. I have proof I tried to reach out to him, and that there’s no way I would lose Mo if he tries to… be active in her life. Between all of us, I know that we’ve got this. And I know that I should be happy that, if he was going to come back, it’s now, before she gets older or starts asking questions I don’t know how to answer.”

I watched Grandpa’s eyes drift toward Mo again, who was busy chewing on her teething ring. I saw love soften his features for a moment and couldn’t miss the way the edge fell off his voice as he asked, like he didn’t want to but was forcing himself to, “You want him to be part of her life then?”

It wasn’t until right then that it hit me how my gramps might feel about some random man coming in and taking over the duties he had taken over effortlessly with Mo. The same duties he’d had with me… even though there were less. With me, it had only been him until Peter had shown up when I was three. Mo had three of us from the start.

But the point was, I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t want some guy coming in to usurp his duties as one of the men in Mo’s life. Then again, he’d been totally fine with the relationship I’d always had with Peter. So maybe I was just overthinking it.

“If he wants to be, yeah. As long as he’s dedicated to being in it,” I answered, watching him closely to see if anything spelled out him being worried or if he was just angry in our honor for being dumped. “I know I had a couple of dreams here and there that I had a mom that came looking for me, Grandpa, and at one point, I would have been excited for that to happen. So I’m not going to take that away from her. But I’m not going to let him disappear later on if he thinks it’s too hard to be around, or if he isn’t planning on giving it his best, either. He needs to know I’ll hunt him down if he doesn’t commit to her.”

Grandpa leaned back in his seat, seeming to think over what I’d just said.

Jonah Collins lived in a different country. A different continent. But I wasn’t going to make that a deal breaker. When you wanted something to work, you made it work.

This wasn’t about me anymore.

This was about the baby chewing away at a toy in a way that made my nipples have PTSD from when I had breastfed her before she’d decided she was done with my boobs.

If he wasn’t lying, then he’d just found out he had a daughter, and that wasn’t like… he’d found a twenty-dollar bill in his pocket. It was the biggest kind of news possible. It was a fucking daughter. The best one ever, I thought. Or at least she was tied with Luna’s too.

I heard Peter before I saw him pushing open the door into the kitchen holding his hand out. He looked tense. That was never a good thing.

“It’s him. He wants to speak to you.”

Chapter 7

“It’s me. Lenny. I really need to talk to you, so stop being a prick. I’m going back to Houston soon, and we need to talk. We don’t have to see each other. Just a call. Text. Whatever. I don’t give a shit. Please.”

I wasn’t even a little surprised that when the doorbell rang, everyone was in the living room, watching television. Or at least pretending to.

But it wasn’t like I would have expected any different. And it wasn’t like I wanted them to be any different than the way they were: nosey and loyal. If anything, the only thing I was surprised by was that Grandpa hadn’t called Luna to invite her in on the action.

It almost let me down.

I’d have to text her tomorrow to give her an update.

Rolling onto my feet from where I’d been lying on the floor with Mo as she shook the toys in her hands from side to side pretty violently, I headed toward the front door and unlocked it, swinging it wide, not even bothering to look through the peephole.

I stared at the Fucker. The Still an Asshole who was in the same clothes he’d been in earlier: a long-sleeved shirt that was almost a size too big and dark jeans. The only thing different were his eyes. They looked suspiciously puffy and tired instead of stricken and surprised. Mostly hidden in his big hand was a small stuffed bear he seemed to be holding onto tightly.

Whatever.

I still didn’t even bother with a “hi.” I settled for waving him and that enormous body in. “Come on, we can talk in the kitchen.” Which was just far enough away and had a nice swinging door, where the rest of the house couldn’t easily eavesdrop. Not that I honestly thought that would stop my gramps.

He didn’t say a word as I closed the door behind us and waved him again to follow me down the long hallway. I didn’t glance over my shoulder to see if he looked into the living room, where my two favorite men and my favorite girl were still hanging out, like the nosey asses they were. And if he slowed down to look at the baby playing with her toys on the floor, I had no idea either.

It wasn’t like it mattered.

He was here, trying to talk to me, and that’s what we needed to do.

Only seventeen months late.

I waited until the swinging door shut before I gestured toward the stools around the island. Then I went for it. “You said you had questions. Ask.”

I could have said that a little nicer, but… I didn’t feel like it. Not when this uncomfortable feeling settled in my chest as I confirmed that his eyes were puffy. I still couldn’t stand him.

The Prick straightened in the stool he’d taken, his chest expanding with a deep breath before he set the stuffed animal down on the counter, laced those long, solid fingers together and set them on the island in front of him. The damn bear had on a tiny T-shirt that said HOUSTON on it, and I had to force myself to stop looking at it. Those eyes, which were beautiful regardless of how hard I’d punch him in the kidneys if our lives weren’t so entwined, met mine and he asked, very, very calmly, very, very quietly in that way I had liked when I had first met him, “Who did you reach out to? To tell me.”

We had already covered this, I thought. But okay. Here we went again.

“I reached out to your brothers and your sisters to get in contact with you. None of them responded to me, even though I sent them each a couple of the pictures I had with you.” I kept going. “I can pull up phone records if you want. I got a new phone six months ago, but I can still turn on my old one if you want to see the messages I sent. I didn’t delete them. I tried contacting you. Maybe not as hard as I could have, but I did try. I reached out to Arnie and Akira, and they promised to pass my message along to you but....” I tipped my head to the side.

Jonah visibly winced, and I sure as hell didn’t imagine the way he swallowed hard before saying, “Akira played for Japan this past season, and Arnie went back to Dunedin. They boxed my things and left them at the team’s office. I haven’t seen either of them since.”