The ER's Newest Dad

That wasn’t what she was worried about.

He must have read her mind because his gaze narrowed and his face darkened. “We’ll still be here when you come out. I’m not like you.”

He didn’t have to say more. She knew what he meant. He meant that he wouldn’t leave with their son and hide him away from her.

Like she’d done to him.

But that wasn’t what she’d done and she wanted to argue that point, but although Justice was busily coloring a winged car, she knew he wasn’t missing a single word of the conversation. He never did. So she bit back all the things she wanted to say and smiled politely at the man who was invading her home and her life.

She’d play his game. For now.

“Fine. I’ll go take a shower and be back out in about twenty minutes.”

Less. Because even though she didn’t really believe Ross would run with Justice, she couldn’t quite get past how nervous it made her to leave her son alone with his father.

* * *

Heart slamming against his rib cage at all the morning’s events, Ross glanced down at the top of his son’s shiny blond head. Justice’s tongue stuck out the corner of his mouth as he concentrated intently on the picture he was working on.

“You’re very good at coloring,” Ross offered, suddenly nervous about the prospect of being alone with Justice until Brielle returned. When he’d knocked on the front door and Justice’s voice had asked who was there, he’d not been able to stop the words that had left his mouth.

Your daddy.

Without unlatching the safety chain, Justice had cracked the door, peered out at him.

“I thought you were Uncle Vann’s friend?”

“I am,” he’d answered. “Can I come in?”

“Mommy says I’m not supposed to let anyone into the house without her knowing.”

“I’m not just anyone.”

Justice’s little face had twisted with thought then without a word he’d shut the door.

Ross’s heart had pounded, fearful that his over-eager announcement had shocked the boy. But within seconds he’d heard the chain rattle, seen the door open.

“Since Mommy said you were Uncle Vann’s friend, that makes you not a stranger, right?” Justice had asked, still blocking the door with his tiny body, as if he’d been protecting his home and was still withholding house-entering privileges.

“Right.”

“Then I guess you better come in because I’m not supposed to stand with the door wide open. Lets bugs into the house. I think that’s cool, Mommy doesn’t.” Justice’s face squished up with another thought. “Are you really my daddy?”

Ross had wanted to wrap his arms around his son, to hug him close, to breathe in his scent, and never let go. Instead, he’d stepped into the house, closed the front door, and bent to one knee to put him almost at eye level with Justice.

“I am really your daddy.”

Justice seemed to digest that. “Where have you been for so long?”

A thousand answers ran through Ross’s mind and as much as part of him wanted to lay all the truth on his son, a more logical part of him knew that pointing fingers wouldn’t do Justice any good.

“I’ve been working in Boston, but I’m home now and want to be a part of your life.”

“Do you have to go back to Boston?”

Did he? He hadn’t really made the decision that he wasn’t going back to Boston, but in that moment Ross knew.

“No, Bean’s Creek is my home now, here with you and your mom.”