by Skye Jordan
Eden’s brain spiraled for answers. His sister? Could this be his sister and his nieces? But he said he had two nieces, not three. Though the little one could be a friend of the girls. Or the woman could be babysitting.
There were a dozen different explanations to fit this scenario. Logically, Eden knew that. But emotionally, her brain was having a heyday throwing doubt at her, because, honestly, how did Eden know Beckett wasn’t married?
How good could a quick Internet search be? And how many lovers had John passed off as female colleagues right in front of her face? For that matter, how many financial scams had John covered as legitimate business? How many lies had John twisted as truth?
How many attacks had John sworn never to repeat?
What made Eden think she would be any better at seeing lies now than she’d been able to see then?
The woman followed the girls as they ran down the corridor. Her gaze caught on Eden. And held. After a moment, she lifted her hand to wave. Eden felt as stiff and cold as metal, but she slipped her hand from her crossed arms to wave back.
The metal doors slammed open, and team members dribbled out in small groups. Eden strategically placed herself at the base of the stairs, prepared to bolt. Her mind was now in an intense battle between logic and fear. Surely Faith wouldn’t have stayed quiet at the pancake breakfast if Beckett were married. Would she? Then again, Eden knew less about Faith than she knew about Beckett. But Gabe, Gabe would never lead Eden astray. But Gabe was all about the game, not the guys. He probably wouldn’t even know if Beckett was married or not.
Still, it didn’t make sense for Beckett to have Eden meet him here if he’d known his wife and daughters would be there to greet him. Hell, maybe they were supposed to be out of town and were surprising him. Or maybe he did know they’d be here and this was his ploy to make his wife jealous.
Eden lifted a hand to her temple to stop the spin and whispered, “Or maybe it’s just his sister.”
She didn’t know anything anymore. All she could do was wait. Wait for this sand under her feet to completely shift and knock her on her ass or solidify into concrete.
Eden held her breath as another wave of men passed through the tunnel. And another. People said hello and joked and hugged and talked and made plans. Kids played and laughed. A couple of the guys who’d been at the YMCA said hello to Eden before jogging the steps to the parking lot. No weirdness there. That was a good sign, wasn’t it?
She hadn’t counted, but she swore most of the players had to be out of there. Where in the hell was Beckett?
“I should leave,” she whispered to herself, glancing at the stairs with a fist gripping her gut. “I should go.”
The doors opened again, and Eden had convinced herself that if it wasn’t Beckett, she was leaving.
When she swung her gaze back, Beckett came through the door with Tate a couple of steps behind him. His gaze immediately homed in on Eden, and a big smile lit his face.
“There you are,” the woman said.
Beckett’s gaze darted toward her, then the three girls, and his momentum stopped dead. His smile faded into shock.
Eden sipped a breath and held it.
“Man, you’re still the last one out of the locker room,” the woman said. “Girls, he’s finally here.”
The three girls turned. The two older ones returned to the woman’s side, but the little one, the little one threw her arms in the air, yelled, “Daddy!” and ran full speed at Beckett.
Eden stood frozen as Beckett dropped his bag and caught the little girl with a grunt and “Jesus, Lily…”
Daddy?
Daddy.
Eden turned and hurried up the stairs. She wasn’t thinking, just moving. Away, away, away. No, no, no. How did this happen? How did this happen?
“Eden!”
Beckett’s bellow hammered her heart into overdrive, and she flinched, pulling her shoulders up and fisting her hands. She had to force herself not to run, but rushed along the fence line of the parking lot. With no idea where the hell she was going, she kept her focus on putting distance between her and Beckett and his family before her mind started working.
“Eden.” A woman’s voice startled her, but Eden didn’t stop moving. She was behind Eden, her footsteps quick. “Eden, wait.”
A hand touched her arm. Eden spun and backed away. “I’m sorry.” The words came out breathless. “I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t—”
“I’m not his wife,” she said, her expression as compassionate as her soft voice. “I’m his sister. Sarah.”
Relief swept through Eden. Her knees buckled, and she grabbed the chain-link fence to keep from falling and focused on the black pavement. “Oh, thank God.”
“And two of those girls are mine,” she said. “My daughters Rachel and Amy.”
Which meant…
In her mind, she saw that sweet little angel running to Beckett. Saw Beckett, in his slacks, dress shirt, and tie, hair still damp from the shower, drop his bag and catch the girl like he’d done it a million times.
A hard knot balled beneath her ribs. Eden lifted her head and looked at Sarah. “He has…a daughter.”
Sarah nodded. “Lily. She’s amazing. I’m so sorry we blindsided you like this. I didn’t know you were coming tonight, and I didn’t tell Beckett we were going to be here either. It was one of those last-minute things… God, I feel so bad…”
Lily.
Even her name broke Eden’s heart.
“It’s not your fault.” Eden released the fence. “I have to go.”
She turned.
“Eden, wait.” Sarah came around and stepped in front of her. “Don’t go. I’ll take the girls home. I promised them ice cream after anyway. You and Beckett can still—”
“No.” The word came out as a pained whisper. “No, we can’t.”
17
Beckett crossed his arms on his knees and rested his forehead there. Cold from the concrete steps in front of Eden’s door had seeped through his pants and frozen his ass half an hour ago. But he was going to fucking sleep here if that was the only way to get her to open the door.
After forty-five minutes of trying to talk to her, he was now reminding her he was still there every five. If he’d known this was how he was going to spend his night, he would have stopped to pick up a blanket and some water.
He lifted his head. “I’m still here.”
Beckett didn’t even wait for a response, just put his head back down.
Footsteps shuffled on the sidewalk behind him. The hair on his neck prickled. Ah, fuck. Beckett lifted his head and glanced over his shoulder. Two men stood three feet away. It was almost eight p.m. now and the streetlight shone at their backs, so Beckett couldn’t see much of them.
“What’s up?” he asked congenially, as if he sat on stoops in the hood in his suit all the time.
“Who are you, man? And why you been sitting here?”
“Friend of Eden’s.” He sighed and shifted to put his back against the iron railing. “And I’ve been asking myself that for a while.”
“Friends let you in. We don’t like you hanging here. This is our territory. Take your fancy ride and get.”
“Sorry, I’m not going anywhere.” To ease the sting of confrontation, he said, “Don’t worry, I’ll keep it down. Don’t want the cops coming to bust up my party.”
“You’re stalking,” the shorter guy said. “You can go to jail for that.”
“I’m waiting,” Beckett told him. “Big difference.”
“Fuck this, man.” The taller guy stepped over Beckett’s legs, jogged down the stairs, and pounded on the door. “Yo, Eden. You want me and Arturo to get rid of this guy for you?”
“Yes,” came from behind the door. The first word he’d heard in over an hour.
Tall guy stopped at the bottom of the stairs, hands on hips. “You heard her.”
“Tell me something,” Beckett said. “When you and your girl are having a fight, do you listen to
everything she says?”
“Nah.”
“And don’t you both say things you don’t mean?”
“Sho.”
Beckett lifted his hands with a shrug.
The tall guy turned back to the door. “Eden, are you sure you don’t want to come out and talk to this dude? He’s been out here a long time, and it’s like twenty-nine degrees.”
“Yes,” she said. “I’m sure.”
“Twenty-five, feels like nine,” Beckett corrected, “and I didn’t bring my snow-camping gear.”
“Would you all leave me the h-hell alone,” she yelled. “Some of us h-have to work tomorrow.”
The catch in her voice told Beckett she’d been crying, and that cut at his heart.
“Ouch,” tall guy said.
“Whoo-wee,” short guy added. “What did you do to piss her off? She’s always in a good mood.”
“I’m special like that.” Beckett pulled at his hair, which was sticking up in all directions. Then called to the door, “And it’s only eight o’clock.”
They all stared at her door for an extended moment, and when it didn’t open, tall guy crossed his arms and asked Beckett, “What you do for a livin’ to buy that fancy Porsche?”
“I play hockey.”
“Hockey?” He shifted and angled his head to get a better look. “How come I don’t recognize you?”
“Probably because we wear helmets, move real fast, and are usually covered in cuts and bruises.” He held out his hand. “Beckett Croft.”
The expression on tall guy’s face went from skeptical to no shit in a split second. He laughed and took Beckett’s hand. He did some kind of secret hood handshake and slapped Beckett on the shoulder, laughing. “Look at this, Arturo. Beckett Croft is in our hood. You had a great game tonight, bro.”
And the conversation progressed from there. But only for about two minutes.
Eden’s door flew open. “Stop. Just fucking stop already.”
Her hair was up in a ponytail, and she was in sweatpants and a sweatshirt. And she’d definitely been crying. Her face was red, her eyes puffy.
Beckett’s heart plummeted to his stomach. He should let her go. She didn’t have room for this kind of turmoil in her life. Neither of them did.
“Robby and Arturo, thank you for checking on me, but get the hell out of here.” And she turned back inside, leaving the door open.
Robby sucked air through his teeth. “Good luck with that, bro.”
Beckett sighed and stared at the door while the other guys retreated.
“Twenty-five, feels like nine,” she called from inside. “Come in or stay out, but close the damn door.”
Kennedy was back. The tough chick who’d put him in his place that first night. Beckett sighed, stepped into the basement, and closed the door behind him.
She was sitting at her desk with her back to him, elbows planted on the desktop, hands clasped near her mouth. “You lied.” She shook her head. “I can’t do lies.”
Now she only sounded half-tough. And half-shaky. “Baby, I didn’t lie.”
She cut a look over her shoulder.
“I swear I was going to tell you about her tonight at dinner.” He slid off his blazer and laid it on the bed, then moved to the corner and sat. With his forearms braced on his knees, he clasped his hands. “What’s really going on, Eden? This reaction is pretty extreme. I understand the initial fear that I might have been married, but once that was cleared up…”
“You first. Why wasn’t she the first thing you told me about? Why wasn’t she the only thing you talked about?”
The way she said it conveyed the message that Eden believed Lily should be the center of his world. He was glad to know they shared that value, but there was a big puzzle piece missing in the picture that made up Eden Kennedy.
“I’ve filed for full custody of Lily, and the hearing is coming up soon. Her mother hasn’t contested it so far, and I don’t want anything to change that, so I’m keeping Lily very under the radar until the hearing is over and custody is finalized.”
“Were you married?”
“No. Her mother was a woman I had a casual night with on the road when I was nobody, still making next to nothing. I was a stepping-stone on her way up the professional athlete chain to bigger, flashier stars. And I was fine with that.”
“Why isn’t she fighting you for custody?”
Beckett shook his head and looked at his hands. “Kim wants what a lot of women who chase after professional athletes want—money, fame, a lifestyle. Lily wasn’t planned, and a kid gets in the way of a lot of things. For Kim, Lily got in the way of finding a sugar daddy. She’s got herself a very rich football player right now. Taking Lily back would jeopardize all that.”
Eden’s expression compressed into agony, and she rubbed her eyes. “God, I hate people sometimes.”
Beckett got that. In her job, he could only imagine what she saw on a daily basis. “That’s not even the worst of it.”
“What does that mean?”
“I didn’t know Lily existed until she was almost two and a half, and Kim showed up on my doorstep looking for child support. When she thought I was nobody, there was no point in tracking me down. But after news got out that I’d signed a nice contract, she was all over me. I told her I wanted a paternity test, but one look at Lily, and I knew. She looked a lot like my nieces as babies. I told Kim I’d give her child support without lawyers if she gave me visitation. She was all too happy to hand Lily over to someone else. I learned later she did that a lot. For extended periods of time.
“By the time the paternity test came back, confirming Lily was my daughter, I was already head over heels in love with her. I filed for joint custody but had to fight Kim for it—not because she wanted Lily, but because she wanted my money. When Lily was almost four, Kim and I hit a rough patch with visitation. She kept making excuses why Lily couldn’t see me—playdates, birthday parties, vacation. I hadn’t seen her in a month when a stranger showed up at my door with Lily.”
Beckett would never forget that day. Never forget the sight of his daughter. Just the memory enraged him. “She was wearing torn, filthy clothes, had scrapes on her knees, hands, and face, knots all through her curls, a green runny nose and was coughing like a seal.”
“Shit,” Eden whispered and pressed her forehead to her hand.
“The woman who brought her turned out to be Kim’s aunt and told me Kim had dropped Lily off with her over three weeks before and vanished without a word since. When I took Lily to the doctor, she had bronchitis, pneumonia, double ear infections, pink eye, and was so dehydrated, she had to be hospitalized for two days. Once again, after the fact, I later found out Kim had gone on a Vegas bender with an Argentinian soccer player, which was why she kept telling me I couldn’t see Lily.”
He paused and studied his hands. “I told Kim that if she tried to take Lily back, I’d have her arrested for child endangerment and neglect.” His stomach knotted. “The thought of doing that to Lily’s mother still makes me sick, but I would have done anything to keep Lily away from her.”
A moment of silence passed. The room felt heavy with sadness and turmoil. “It’s ugly, heavy stuff, and we already have a fistful of challenges facing us. I don’t want to give up and let go. I’m crazy about you. But I don’t want to hurt you either.”
She took a deep breath, and air hiccupped into her lungs, the way Lily’s did when she cried hard. Thankfully, that hadn’t happened in a long time.
“This”—she gestured toward herself—“isn’t all your fault.” Her voice was soft but flat, like she’d gone numb. “I mean, most of this isn’t your fault.” She didn’t look at him. Her gaze lowered to her desktop and the textbook there, her fingers toying with a corner of the page. “My last boyfriend…was abusive.” She lifted a shoulder as if to discount the horrendous statement. “But that isn’t what’s held me back most. If it had just been the abuse, I’d have moved on by now.”
Her
breathing grew shallow, and a tear leaked from the corner of her eye. Beckett was at a total loss, with no idea how to manage his own sudden rage while being considerate of Eden’s distress. He felt as inept as he had the first time he’d taken Lily in his arms.
Beckett leaned forward and reached for her, but Eden lifted her hand in a stop gesture. “I need to get this out.”
“Okay.” He clasped his hands between his knees.
“I was…”—she cleared her throat—“pre—” Her voice cut out. She closed her eyes and tried again. “Pregnant. I was…pregnant.”
She paused to take a breath as if the words had been monumental to get out. They sent a cold trickle of dread down Beckett’s spine.
“We weren’t married, but he was a family friend, my dad’s work colleague. My parents liked him; we’d been dating over a year. I thought— Doesn’t matter. I was wrong. He wanted me to have an abortion. I refused. That was the first time he hit me.” She licked her lips. Took a breath. “I wrote it off to the stress, the shock. I thought him wanting the abortion was a phase and that he’d come around. But while I was waiting, he was drinking. When he drank, we argued. And when we argued—”
“He hit you,” Beckett finished, barely able to keep his fury in check.
Eden nodded and took a deep, shaky breath, then blew it out the way a sprinter would after a hard run. As if it had taken all her energy to get that much out. Her hand was shaking. And Beckett ached to take her in his arms, but his own hands were clenched so tight, his fingers had gone numb.
“I should have left him sooner.” Her eyes closed on a look so agony stricken, Beckett saw the next blow coming, and he couldn’t do anything about it. “But my parents adored him. And I’d finally found a window of approval in their eyes.” She shook her head. “I waited too long. I was packing my things when he came home early from a business trip. We got in the same old fight over the abortion. To get him off my back, I told him it was too late to have one. He was livid. I’ve never seen anyone so angry. He…backhanded me across the face, and I fell down a flight of stairs…”