“Please,” he begs, “I just need to talk to her, Mrs. Tanner.” He looks ruffled, like he hasn’t slept.

“Kyle?” His head whips up at the sound of my voice. “What are you doing here?”

“We need to talk,” he says, taking a tentative step forward, cautious of my grandmother. She might look old, and sweet, but she won’t hesitate to pull out a shotgun and send Kyle running for the hills if she thinks it’s necessary.

“It’s ok, Gama, I’ve got this.” I smile weakly at her and I can see she doesn’t believe me.

Hannah walks past me, and whispers into my ear. “We’ll be in the kitchen, but yell if you need anything.” She follows my grandmother into the kitchen, leaving me alone with Kyle.

The silence is awkward, and Kyle shuffles from foot-to-foot. “Why didn’t you tell me?” he asks forcefully, unable to keep his cool. “That you fell pregnant after we…”

I think about making this easier for him, considering I did drop a bomb on him last night, but choose not to. He doesn’t deserve it.

“Because I didn’t want you to treat her the same way you treated me, Kyle. You would’ve denied that she was yours, the same way you denied that it was you in that video and let me take the fall.”

“But I deserved to know!” he snaps. “Don’t you think I had the right to know I fathered a child?”

“No,” I reply harshly. “You didn’t. You lost that right the minute you’re turned against me, knowing how humiliated and ashamed I was after that video came out. You turned your back on me when I asked you for help, and I will be damned if I’d let you do that to my child too.”

He sticks his fingers through his hair harshly, tugging it. “Hayley,” he hesitates for a beat. “I was young, and stupid, and you deserved so much better than how I treated you. I’m sorry for that, really, I am, but I’m not ready for this.”

My eyes fixate on Kyle’s face, and for the first time I feel something akin to hatred towards another human being. The irony that it’s towards the father of my child doesn’t escape me.

I fold my arms across my chest and lift my chin. “I haven’t asked you for anything Kyle, and I have no intention of starting now.”

Incredulity flashes across his face. “So, you’re not expecting me to stick around?”

His expression is hopeful and a small part of me crumbles inside, the part that thought there was a tiny chance he’d want to know Ari. But I know better. Kyle was never the type of person to think of anyone but himself and I’m naive to think otherwise. Can I blame him when I’ve kept Ari from him for so long? I don’t know, but even now that he knows about her, he still wants to run. Which is the reason I never told him in the first place.

I brace myself, already feeling the hurt of the words I’m about to say out loud. “No, I don’t. I never expected you to, but I thought maybe you’d changed, and that you were no longer the selfish jerk you always were.”

“Hayley - ”

My hand comes up and Kyle’s mouth shuts. “You don’t deserve to know her,” I say. “I’m not even sure I deserve her, but for some reason God chose me, Ari chose me, and until a man worthy enough comes along to be there for every moment in her life, I will love her enough for both of us. We don’t need you, Kyle. We never have.”

I open the door and wait for Kyle to leave. He stops in front of me. “For what it’s worth, I really am sorry, Hayley, and you’re twice the person I will ever be.”

I close the door, and slide down until I’m on the floor. A few tears escape, but I wipe them away quickly before I have to walk into the kitchen. The last twelve hours swirl around in my head, and press down on my chest. Squeezing my eyes closed, I take a deep, calming breath.

I’ve been let down by the people closest to me more times than I can count, but I won’t be one of those people on Ari’s list.

Chapter 20

~ Cameron ~

I stop my truck next to the curb outside Hayley’s grandmother’s house and cut the ignition. I sit there for a good ten minutes, thinking about what it is that I want to say to Hayley. I know I need to apologize because I treated her poorly after my father died, but I’m still reeling after what happened at the diner last night. I can’t even imagine how she must be feeling. I woke up this morning and made the decision to drive over here, whether she wanted to see me or not, so that we could talk. I have no idea where to go from here, or if we even have a place to go, but if I don’t at least try talk to her, I will never know what could be. The truth is, Hayley has consumed me, and thinking about her has helped me through the last few weeks, helping me cope and deal with not only my father’s death but with my guilt, too. I thought I was doing the right thing by pushing her away, because she makes me feel and after losing my father, feeling was the last thing I wanted to do. But I see now that pushing her away, hurting her, wasn’t the right thing at all. Which is why I’m here. To talk. To clear things up, and to hopefully try again if she’ll let me. She needs to know how I feel about her, and Ari too, for that matter.

I climb from my truck and walk around the front just as the front door opens. It’s Kyle, and he looks happy about something. My stomach drops like an anvil. Are they getting back together? Not on my watch. Hayley and Ari are mine.

Kyle sees me, and the smug smile on his face falters.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. I don’t like this fucker one bit, and it has nothing to do with the fact that him and his bitch of a girlfriend gatecrashed my birthday dinner last night. However, it may have everything to do with the conversation I overheard when I walked back into the diner after Hayley left. Just thinking about what they put Hayley through makes me want to fuck him up seven ways from Sunday and not think twice about it.

“Taking care of business,” he replies, puffing out his chest a little. Really? “Why do you care? I thought you and Hayley were over?”

“You don’t know anything about me and Hayley, dickwad, so why don’t you get in your car and go back to whatever hole you crawled out of.” I sneer, making my disdain for this asshole known.

His hands lift up in mock defeat and he takes a step back. “Hey man, chill out. Hayley and the kid are both yours. I don’t want anything to do with them. I’m sure you can understand that at our age one pussy just isn’t enough.”

He shrugs nonchalantly, like he didn’t just throw away the best thing that could’ve been his. “Can’t deny that she was a great lay though. Too bad it came back to bite me in the ass with a kid.”

I step closer, feeling the familiar protectiveness over Hayley and Ari clash with white hot rage and warm my blood. My fist connects with his jaw and I hear the crack of bone. He falls to the ground with a thud. “What the fuck, man? What was that for?”

Bending down, I grab his shirt and yank him until our noses are pretty much touching. “Listen here, you waste of skin,” I growl. “Someone should have done that a long time ago. You have no idea how incredible those two girls are, and you sure as hell don’t even deserve to breathe the same fucking air as that precious little girl.” I let go of his shirt, giving him a shove. “So I suggest you leave and think twice about ever showing up here again, unless you want to piss sitting down for the rest of your life.”

Just then the front door swings open and Hayley appears. She sees what’s going on and runs down the porch steps.

“Cameron? What’s going on?”

Ignoring Hayley’s question, I stare at Kyle. “Are we clear?”

He spits some blood onto the grass. “Yeah, Cameron, we’re clear.”

He stands up and walks away without a backwards glance. What an asshole, I think to myself. Hayley and Ari are both better off without him anyway.

I turn to look at Hayley, expecting to find her scowling at me, or at least angry. But instead, she’s got a small smile on her face that she’s trying to fight, and I hope it’s because she’s missed me as much as I’ve missed her. Her eyes are a little red, like she’s been crying. It makes me want to find Kyle and punch him all over again.

“Do you make a habit of this?” she asks.

“A habit of what?”

“Showing up unannounced and punching people.”

I chuckle, looking at my hand that has started to throb. “No, but I’m starting to realize you make me do some pretty crazy things, buttercup.”

Her smile falls slightly before she looks down at her bare feet. It’s cold outside, and she’s in nothing but her pajama shorts, a tank top, and her robe. And she looks as hot as the day I met her, bending over the engine of her car.

She takes my injured hand. “Let’s get some ice on this, Mohammed Ali.”

I laugh at her little joke and feel the tension leave my body. I still need to talk to her, apologize, but at least she’s not pissed that I showed up out of nowhere. And she doesn’t seem to mind that I punched Kyle. Somehow, I think it’s because she knows I did it for her and Ari. I would do anything for them.

Hayley leads me into the kitchen and pulls out a chair. I take a seat while she grabs an ice pack from the freezer. Hannah walks into the kitchen and stops short. “Cam? What are you doing here?”

“Trying to be a hero,” Hayley murmurs, placing the ice pack on my swelling hand. I wince.

“What did you do this time, smartass?” Hannah quips.

“I punched Kyle,” I reply.

“Oh, well, then you are a hero. After what he just said to Hayley, he deserved more than just one punch.”