Destiny

In the worst of the worst-case scenarios rushing my mind over the last week, that one was topping the list. And he’d flung that threat in my face without hesitating. I had no recourse. If Jordan meant it, if he followed through, I could lose Toby.

My entire body shivered, and my hands trembled while I splashed water on my face in the small half bathroom.

It reeked like gardenias. The scent of Tillie’s perfume overpowered the small room and stung my eyes almost as equally as that threat.

He could do it too. That’s what made it all so worse.

Jordan Marx, former Major League pitcher and who in the hell knew what he did now, but his family was a legend in this damn town. He could pull my ass in front of a judge tomorrow and win without a shred of evidence. All he needed was his name to declare it so and no judge in this county would deny him anything.

“Shit!” I slammed my hand to the counter, the sting of my palm on Formica ran up my arm.

This was why it’d been so much easier and safer to stay away. Why I desperately begged Tillie to move to Texas so we could all be together. It was wrong, and a declaration made of terror, but damn it, everything I’d said to Jordan was true, too.

I’d kept our son from having the same crappy life I’d had.

That, I wouldn’t apologize for.

A soft knock hit the door, and I swung toward it, almost expecting more ranting and threats. The ranting I deserved.

It was exactly what I expected when I first started telling him the truth. He had a hot temper and a quick trigger to unleash it.

Damn it! Why did Tillie have to die before I was ready for all of this?

“I didn’t mean that Destiny. I don’t want that.” Jordan’s deep voice was thick and rough. “I shouldn’t have said it, but I swear to you that’s the absolute last thing I’d ever do to you or Tobias.”

A sob ripped from my throat. Tobias.

It was the first time Jordan had said his son’s name and it was beautiful, even laced with anger and sorrow.

“Come on out. I want to talk. Just talk.”

We’d done enough talking and there was more to say, but my emotions were way too frazzled to handle anymore. Not with the funeral and spending most of the night packing up Tillie’s house. I couldn’t exactly stay hiding in the bathroom forever.

I opened the door, intent on stepping out when Jordan’s large frame blocked my way.

He’d been six foot six in high school, but he had to have grown in ten years. Broad shoulders and his height and muscled build consumed the doorway where he had one hand on the frame. His head was dropped, and I tilted my head back to meet his eyes.

Mistake.

Jordan had the most beautiful eyes of any man I’d ever seen in my life. Thick, long black lashes rimmed crystal clear blue eyes so light they were almost like glass. I sucked in a breath at the feel of him so close to me I could see his pulse beating at the base of his throat.

“Jordan—” I said, and shut my mouth.

His eyes held torment, either at what he said to me or the realization of what I hid from him. No way was I brave enough to ask.

“I wouldn’t do that. I wouldn’t take him from you. No matter how pissed I am, I swear it.”

God. He meant every damn word forced out through his gritted jaw, still so pissed off.

He’d been my protector since the day he first sat down next to me when I was bawling my eyes out after a pack of popular girls verbally attacked me in school. I’d gone outside, needing space to clear my head after punching one of them in the face, surprised as hell at myself for doing that in the first place, when he took my hand in his and muttered, “Do you need ice for that? Wicked right hook you have.”

After that, he made it clear no one was allowed to mess with me.

Two weeks later, we went on a first date where I subsequently received my first kiss.

Two years later, I took off on him and destroyed all the plans we’d made.

What could I say? I was a Matsen. We ran when shit got hard and we couldn’t deal.

“Mom?”

I jumped at Toby’s voice, almost slamming my head into Jordan’s chin.

“Oh shit,” I cursed and then cringed. I tried hard not to curse in front of my kid. “Toby?”

Jordan pushed off the doorframe and stepped back. “Holy shit,” he whispered, and his hand slammed into the wall on the other side of the hall.

God. This moment. It was not how I planned it. Toby’s eyes, same icy blue as Jordan’s, bounced back and forth between us and before I reached him, his chin was already shaking along with his hands and his entire body.

“Toby.” I curled my hands around him, blocking his view. “What’s up, kiddo?”

“I’m hungry.” His eyes were glued to Jordan behind me. Didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out both of them had gone frozen at the sight of each other.

Shit. Damn it!

His spine stiffened, and I gave him a little shake. As his eyes slid to me, tears were already pooling in them. “Why is he here?”

“He came to talk honey. And he knows, kiddo.”

Crap on a cracker. I squeezed my eyes closed and inhaled a strengthening breath. Tillie’s house was old, and the walls weren’t thick, even to the outside. He could have heard us shouting. Hopefully, he had kept his Beats on until he came inside and heard nothing.

I stood in front of him and blocked his view, tried to get his attention but his gaze kept sliding over my shoulder.

“Toby. We talked about this last night. But Jordan…he came over to talk today, and I told him. He wants to meet you. Do you want that?”

Angry, icy slits slid back to me and he shrugged his shoulders beneath my hands. “Whatever.”

Oh good. We were back to typical tween behavior. I couldn’t fault him. His tears were controlled though, and I gave him a moment and then I stepped to the side, pulling us both into the mouth of the hallway where we’d have more space.

Jordan stayed where he was, one hand bracing him on the wall like he’d fall without the support. His other hand was at his chest rubbing his sternum. He was staring at a mirror image of himself when he’d been ten, and now he knew everything.

The magnitude of everything I’d done, every choice I made hit me and it was then, that moment, I realized the forceful truth of what Jordan had said to me.

When I found out I was pregnant, Jordan had deserved the trust I had in him to do right by not only me but his kid, too. I’d ripped that away from him.

I was such a selfish bitch.

“Jordan.”

“Yeah.” He gave me a chin lift, eyes never leaving Toby. Then slowly, they lifted, and he sliced through my heart with that look of pain. He stepped toward us. In my hold, Toby stiffened. “You’re one damn good-looking kid, Tobias.”

“He prefers Toby,” I said, and another slash of pain went straight across Jordan’s face. I kept on, stupidly talking. “And I try not to curse in front of him.”

“But you still do sometimes,” Toby said, and I looked down to see his head dipped all the way, looking up at me. “Actually, a lot.”

“Yeah. Sorry.” I gave him a little shake and tried to grin. Pretty sure I looked manic. “Toby, this is Jordan. Your dad.”

Jordan had kept moving and he was in front of us. He was so damn tall; he crouched down in front of Toby, so they were almost at eye level. “It’s really nice to meet you, Toby.”

Jordan held out his hand. The hands of time slid to slow motion as I waited. Finally Toby lifted his hand and placed it in Jordan’s.

“Hey,” his little, not yet manly voice said, shaking like a leaf.

Tears fell down my cheeks, mirrored by the same thing happening on Jordan’s face. He didn’t even try to hide the emotion he was battling.

And it was all my stupid, selfish, idiotic fault.

I rubbed my finger across my eyes to get a grip on my tears but then Toby stepped out of my hold and closer to Jordan. “I don’t know what to call you.”

Goddamn it. I’d need more time to prepare him for this.

Jordan appeared to take it in stride even with his own tears still rolling down his cheeks. “How about, for now, you call me Jordan. Sound okay?”

Toby pulled his hand out of Jordan’s and shrugged. “Whatever.”

He turned and skirted around me, gone before I could stop him. My heart ached at his posture with his head down and shoulders slumped. He trudged up the stairs, wiping his cheeks and not looking back at us.

“As far as first meetings go, that probably could have gone better,” Jordan said, stepping next to me, eyes on where Toby had disappeared up the stairway.

“Probably.”

“Think he heard what I said to you?”

“Maybe.” I shrugged, and a weird chill slid down my arms. I rubbed them with my hands crossed in front of me and turned to Jordan. “I’ll talk to him. He’s been through a lot and this might have been too much for him, you know?”

“No, I don’t know,” he said and walked past me back to the living room. “I don’t know shit about him and that pisses me off. I’ll try to hold it in check, though, for him.”

I rested my shoulder against the doorway to the living room and said nothing. I had no argument to give anymore.

He paced through the living room, occasionally shoving his hands to his hips and then through his thick, black hair.

I’d be blind not to notice how incredibly sexy he still was. With his back to me, his muscles were still visible through his dress shirt. I kicked the visual reminders of what that body could do out of my brain and shifted my gaze to the front door. I’d blown my chance with Jordan eons ago. There was no point in noticing him anymore. It’d be a miracle if he didn’t spend the rest of our lives hating me more than he did in that moment.

“I need to get my shit together,” Jordan finally said, spinning and facing me. “I…this is too much. But I want to spend time with him, and after, when I can talk to you without wanting to throttle you, we’ll talk about what comes next. What your plans are.”

His eyes flicked to another stack of packed boxes and that square jaw went granite.

He heaved a breath and yanked his phone out of his pocket. “What’s your number? I’ll call you. And when I do, you better fucking answer.”

I rattled off my number, not hesitating a single moment. But I was thankful he was leaving. I had to see to Toby. I had to get my own head and heart settled. He tapped everything in and when he was sliding his phone into his pocket, his gaze caught on something else.

I followed him staring at something on the carpet and moved quicker. Picking up the picture, one of Jordan on the pitching mound his senior year of high school, looking sexy as hell and focused in the middle of a wind-up, I held it out to him.

“I had a box in my closet, everything I’d saved from…well…us.” His glare froze me to my spot. “I showed him everything last night. He took the rest to his room.”

He ripped the photo out of my hand and crumpled it, so much fire shooting from his icy eyes it was a miracle I wasn’t ash. “I really fucking wish I could hate you.”

He turned, hurried to the front door and he was gone, slamming the door behind him. Thank goodness I’d packed all the pictures on the walls or they would have crashed to the floor. I stood in the same spot, tears spilling down my cheeks, unable to move until he’d climbed into a giant SUV parked at the street, and tires squealed as he sped away.

* * *

“I know this isn’t what you want to hear,” Allison said through the phone. “But this is a good thing, isn’t it? If Toby’s dad is the good man you say he used to be then isn’t it good for them to meet?”

“It’s a mess is what it is.” I sipped my iced tea, curled onto one of the red Adirondack chairs on Tillie’s front porch. Lord only knew why she bought them. There was no way she could have hauled her small frame in and out of these chairs. “It’s not that I don’t see your point. It’s that I’m terrified. What if he does what he threatened?”

He’d taken the words back. He’d apologized. Said he’d never rip my son from me. That didn’t mean something wouldn’t shove him over the edge and change his mind.

Plus, his parting words still rattled in my brain.

“I don’t think you should sell Tillie’s house,” Allison said, jolting me in my chair. Iced tea sloshed over the rim of the glass.

“What?”

“Hear me out. You have three weeks until school starts, right?”

I did not like where she was going with this. “I don’t have the vacation time for this, Allison.”

“I’m not letting you take more vacation. Work from there. You can do almost all of your work remotely. Toby needs this, honey, and you’ve always done whatever Toby needs. A few days meeting his dad isn’t going to help anything. Give them time to get to know each other, get settled, come up with a plan. Then, we’ll talk.”

“I can’t—”

Damn it. She made good points I hadn’t even considered. “Toby has friends. And school registration coming up. We can’t stay here.”

“You can, you’re just scared, and I think it’s bullshit. Plus, if you do this, it’ll show Jordan you want to work something out. Then maybe he won’t follow through on that threat.”

“You’re too smart for your own good.”

She laughed through the phone and when she spoke again, her sweet voice made my eyes burn. “I’m glad you finally let this out. You’ve held on to this for too long by yourself. Now you can finally heal. You all can.”

After Jordan had left, I’d dragged Toby out of his room where we’d eaten our cold bacon and burnt eggs and toast with sullen expressions. He hadn’t said anything, mostly nodded when I tried to get him to talk or ignored me completely. After, he’d gone outside and dribbled and shot the ball for hours until he came inside and went to his room.

I’d checked on him and found him napping, which was enough to make me cry again. The kid hadn’t taken a nap since he was two. I’d put the poor guy through too much, too fast.

Instead of losing it, I’d gone downstairs and called Allison, needing someone to know everything. She let me blabber for almost an hour. Thank God for amazing friends.

“Call me Monday,” she said. “Talk to the realtor, get things settled. I’ll spend the rest of the weekend drawing up plans and rearranging work so you can do the stuff from there. We’ll figure it out and you can always call me. Always.”

My phone beeped with an incoming call and I looked at the screen.

It was Paul. I sighed into the phone. “I gotta go, sweetie. Paul’s calling.”

“Let that man go.”

Another beep made me think I misunderstood her. “What are you talking about? I already ended things with him.”

“You heard me. I love Paul. Good guy. Not for you. You held on to him because he makes Toby happy, but that’s not fair to anyone. This is your time for redemption. A clean slate. Let him go so he can find someone who loves all the great things about him. And do it so he knows there’s no reconciliation possible this time.”

“God, Allison. Kick me while I’m down.” My phone beeped again, this time dinging with a voicemail and I groaned. “I hate you.”

“You love me, and you love that I make sense. You might hate my tough love thing I have going on tonight, but you know it comes from love for you and your boy. I’m simply showing you the way to make this easier on you.”

Being around Jordan for weeks was the exact opposite of easy.

“I should call him back.”

“Love you. You’re stronger than you know, honey. And when you doubt that, call me. I can always come to you, too. Drake won’t mind.” Allison’s husband would give her anything she asked for. I’d never seen a man so smitten even years after he was married.

“Tell him I say hello. Talk soon. And thanks, Allison.”

“Always, honey.”

We hung up and I immediately went to my voicemail icon, stalling on returning his call. I pressed play and my eyes squeezed closed as Paul’s voice came through my speaker.

“Hey, Jane. Haven’t heard from you since yesterday and I know it’s tough for you.” He sighed and continued. “Wish you would have let me be there for you and Toby, but I understand. Give my love to Toby, too, okay? Call me if you need anything.”

I squeezed my eyes closed. His voice was tortured. Tinged with disappointment too and I knew that was because I’d insisted he didn’t come with me. Why would I want him here? God, if Paul had heard all those things at the funeral, he’d have lost his mind. Seeing Jordan wouldn’t have done any good either.

I’d call him later. After I heard from Jordan.

Until then, I had my head filled with too much drama to wade into more.

I stayed on the front porch and finished my tea and headed back inside to cook dinner.

We didn’t have much food, though I’d gotten us enough for a few days, so I went to work making chicken alfredo, a dish Toby loved, especially when I tossed in peas.

I was fixing up a salad, garlic bread in the broiler, when my phone rang again.

This time it was Jordan.

“Hey,” I said, answering it and shoving the phone into my shoulder to finish the salad.

“I want to come back and see him.”

God. His voice. His beautiful, rich and thick voice. It was slow as molasses, warm as the summer sun. Hearing it so full of pain gutted me, and I had no one to blame but myself.

The timer dinged on the microwave and I moved to the oven, saying, “I’m cooking dinner. Would you like to join us?”

“Toby okay with that?”

“He wants to spend time with you, but he’s scared you won’t like him.”

“Yeah,” he laughed, then a short burst that chilled me to my bones because it wasn’t a happy laugh. “Well that makes two of us. I’m on your street. See you soon.”

He disconnected, and I stared at the clock.

Shit! “Toby!”

I shouted as loud as I could and hoped he didn’t have headphones on. Footsteps pounded on the floor almost above my head and down the stairs. “What?”

“Kitchen, kiddo.”

He appeared moments later, eyes swollen, hair disheveled, shoulders slumped. “Jordan called. He wants to see you, so I invited him for dinner.”

The doorbell rang and both of our heads whipped in that direction. Toby’s eyes went wide and his jaw slack.

“That’s him, kiddo,” I said, my voice soft and on the edge of tears. “It’ll be okay.”

“He going to yell at you again?”

I still had no idea what he heard. I shook my head. “No. I promise he won’t. He wants to get to know you. That’s what tonight is, okay?”

“Whatever.” He shrugged and started heading toward the door. When I called his name, he stopped and glanced back at me. “What?”

“I love you, kiddo. I think you’re the best thing in the world. Jordan will too, I guarantee it.”

His chin did that wobble thing and his cheeks turned pink.

Then he rolled his eyes. “Whatever.”

Which meant when he disappeared from the kitchen, I was smiling. It was sad and shaky, but I was still smiling because Toby wanted this. I saw it in his eyes filled with hope and fear.

I thought I’d done what I had to do years ago to do right by my son, and now, it was time to finish that job by fixing all the mistakes I’d made.