Second Chances: A Romance Writers of America Collection (Stark World 2.50)

Kipp's jaw dropped. "Wait? Are you serious?"

"Yeah. It's time I moved back." A lightness filled his chest at the thought--not just of seeing his daughter and Tori again--but at the idea of leaving New York. Coming home again.

"Dude. I can't believe it." Kipp teared up, slapping him roughly on the back. "You don't know what this means to me. Best freaking wedding present ever."

"It's not a gift." Nick caught a flash of a midnight updo at the opposite end of the room. "You're great at what you do," he said, and it wasn't a lie. Kipp might be a loveable teddy bear, but he was a teddy bear with a Midas touch who had turned his gaming hobby into a cutting-edge game design company. "I'm honored you want me to be part of expanding GottaPlay. And I need a change." The teal dress tugged at his attention. "But right now I see someone I need to talk to. Congrats on the wedding, buddy."

"Thanks, man." Kipp grinned. "I gotta tell Lolly."

He galloped off, bouncing with enthusiasm to tell his bride. Nick wasn't sure he'd ever been that excited to share his life with another person. Even before that awful first year of law school, when he'd constructed granite walls around himself to keep out the whispers and stares, he'd never let another person that close to him. Even Tori. She'd been an amazing girlfriend, but she'd been a part of his life, not his whole world. And he'd cut that part out when it felt like an anchor dragging him back to a past it felt like weakness to remember.

He owed the mother of his child the mother of all apologies.

Nick threaded through the crowd, stalking that curvy figure in the teal dress.

She was being hunted.

Tori was hyperaware of Nick, so she knew the very second he rose from his chair and began weaving toward her. She'd dropped off Lorelei at her mom's place and rushed to the restaurant only to find everything was going perfectly. Venue? Lovely. Food? Delicious. In another half hour the party would start breaking up, and she'd be able to escape.

She'd hoped to avoid talking to Nick tonight, but as he prowled in her wake, that hope died. At least she could control where they spoke. Her personal affairs would not be aired in the middle of a client's rehearsal dinner.

Victoria stepped off the private patio reserved for the rehearsal dinner and along the gravel path around the building. It was a pleasant night, but a chill breeze caught her as she rounded the corner of the building. She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself and wishing she hadn't left her blazer in her car. There was salt on the air, carried on the breeze from the beach to the hilltop restaurant. Victoria inhaled, taking comfort in the familiar scent, even as the crunch of footsteps on the gravel path behind her made every muscle in her body tense.

"Tori--"

She turned, cutting him off. "Are you going to try to take my daughter away?"

"What?" He stopped moving so fast his feet might have taken root. "How could you think that of me?"

"I don't know you anymore." She wrapped her arms tighter around her middle. "Lorelei doesn't know you at all."

He moved closer, shoes crunching the gravel. "Lorelei? You named our daughter after your favorite television character?"

She glared at him. "Forgive me if it seemed appropriate to name my baby after the Gilmore Girls. I was hormonal. You're lucky I didn't name her after the vodka we were drinking the night she was conceived."

"Lorelei is a beautiful name," he said, and it got harder to stay mad. "I want to know her, Tori. I'm moving back to California."

Her stomach plummeted. She'd been thinking he was only here for the weekend, believing if she could make it through to Monday, everything would be fine. Normal. Or as close to normal as a situation like this could be. But if he would be living here ...

She could handle her feelings for him when he was the absentee father, but if he was there, living down the street, helping out with the carpool ... she didn't know if she could do it.

And if he vanished on Lorelei like he had vanished on her ...

"I'm not going to forbid you getting to know your daughter, but she's my world, Nick. She doesn't know much about you, but if you come into her life you have to stick. You can't make her care about you and then abandon her like you did me. I will hunt you down and gut you if you ever make her feel unwanted, do you understand me? You don't get to hurt her. Ever." Tori knew all too well what it felt like to have a father who walked away. She never wanted that for Lore.

"I won't. You know me better than to think I would."

"I thought I did, but then you ran away to Manhattan and stopped taking my calls. I don't know what kind of person you are these days."

His jaw worked as he nodded. "I deserve that. I'm sorry. I was barely keeping it together, and I thought you would talk me into moving back here--"

"I wanted to be with you. I didn't care where."

"You made it pretty damn clear you weren't leaving Eden."

"Because you never asked me to go with you!"

"Because you kept talking about how you could never live in New York!"