“How is it your fault that I fucked up? I fucked up, Leah! I keep fucking up! And you paid for it! Just like Bryan paid for it! Just like Gram’s paying for it, and Jake, and Tommy and everyone I give a shit about in this world is paying for it!”
He was yelling now, and Leah stood there, her eyes pooling with tears. Because they weren’t talking about Scott anymore.
And all at once, she realized what had happened tonight was so much bigger than him.
On some level Danny had been a powder keg for the last year of his life. That phone call today was the strike of a match.
And Scott had tossed it in.
Danny cursed under his breath, dropping his head back and covering his face. “It’s not your fault,” he said from behind his hands. “You didn’t deserve what happened tonight. I shouldn’t have left you with him. I fucked up.”
“You were just doing what I asked,” she said, her voice trembling, and Danny’s hands fell from his face at the sound of it. “I put you in a position where you felt like you had to protect me. And that was so stupid of me, because I don’t want you to leave me for any longer than you have to—”
Her words cut off suddenly as she burst into tears, and she cupped her hand over her mouth.
Saying those words out loud had completely demolished her, because it wasn’t hypothetical anymore. It wasn’t something that might happen someday. That phone call made it real. The date was set. It was so close.
He was in front of her immediately, pulling her into his arms, and she covered her face with her hands as she sobbed into his chest.
“Please don’t cry,” he crooned softly, running his hand over the back of her hair. “I’m so sorry for yelling like that. I’m not mad at you. You know I’m not mad at you.”
Leah’s breath hitched as another sob fell from her lips, stifled by his shirt.
Danny pulled back and ducked down, bringing his eyes to her level as he removed her hands from her face and replaced them with his own. “Don’t cry, sweet girl,” he said, pressing his lips to her forehead. “I’m so sorry. For all of it. I just…I can’t stand the idea of anyone hurting you. It makes me crazy.”
His voice was dejected, cracked into a million pieces, and she hiccupped repeatedly, trying to calm down. Danny brushed his thumbs under her eyes, pressing his forehead to hers. “And I know that I’m the one hurting you now, and I don’t know how to fix it, and it’s killing me. Because I love you, Leah,” he said, brushing his lips over hers.
Everything stopped.
Her tears. Her breathing. Her heart.
Danny pulled back slightly, his hands still on her face as he met her eyes. “I love you,” he repeated softly.
Her heart came back alive in her chest, pumping wildly, every beat sending those magnificent words coursing through her body, repairing her from the inside out. And for that one moment, all the guilt and anxiety and fear and frustration vanished. The only thing that existed for her was the immeasurable connection she felt to him, fortified by his words—the intense satisfaction of knowing that the person she loved with her entire being loved her in return.
“I love you too,” she whispered, her breath hitching as the tears slipped over her lashes.
He closed his eyes and exhaled, and for a moment, his face relaxed, and everything was gone for him too.
Leah lifted her chin, closing the distance between their mouths, and Danny released her face, wrapping his arms tightly around her waist.
“So much,” she whispered in between kisses, and Leah felt his lips curve into a smile against hers.
She brought her arms up around his neck, and he tightened his hold on her, lifting her off the floor. Leah wrapped her legs around his hips, and he walked them back to her bedroom, their lips never breaking contact.
As soon as her back hit the bed, she arched up, pulling her sweater over her head, and when she tossed it across the room, she could see that Danny was already undoing the buckle of his belt. She sat up quickly, taking over the task so that he could remove his shirt, and once it was off, he slipped his fingers under the cups of her bra and pulled it up over her head, completely bypassing the clasp.
There was urgency in their movements, earnestness in their kisses, fueled by the phone call, the fight, their declarations. Within two minutes of entering the bedroom, their bodies were already joined, and they clung to each other, clutching and clawing and gasping and still needing more. It was like they couldn’t get close enough, and the desperation left them zealous and feral.
The unrelenting movement of Danny’s hips gradually pushed her across the bed so that by the time it was over, her head was hanging off the other side, and his hand was on the opposite wall, bracing them.
The intensity of it left them both gasping and shaking, and they held each other, kissing and whispering until their hearts finally slowed and their breathing evened out.
Eventually, Danny moved them to a more comfortable position, and Leah lay with her head on his chest and her leg thrown over his thigh as he gently pulled her hair through his fingers.
“I have a favor to ask you,” he said softly.
“Anything.”
Danny inhaled deeply. “I have to go to Brooklyn next week to meet with my lawyer, and I’m bringing Gram. He needs to interview her, but the thing is, he’s gotta go over some shit with me too, and I don’t want her in the room for that. She doesn’t need to know the specifics of things,” he said, running a hand over his eyes.
“Why does he want to talk to her?”
“He’s already spoken to her a few times, but they’re finalizing everything now. He’s trying to establish the relationship I had with Bryan. If the judge recognizes that this was about family, and not some college bar brawl, he might be more understanding.”
“So he wants to talk to her about your childhood?”
“Yeah. Our childhood, right up through when it happened.”
“Oh,” she said softly.
“The thing is, I’m not sure how long this meeting with me is gonna take now that…” He exhaled. “Now that the wheels are in motion. And I don’t want to leave her alone in the lobby while I’m in there. She gets really emotional every time we have to do this, and I just—”
“I’ll take care of her,” Leah promised softly. “We’ll go get a cup of tea somewhere. Have some girl time.”
“It’s on a weekday, though.”
“So I’ll take the day off.”
Danny brought his lips to the crown of her head. “Thank you,” he said before kissing her there. “And I just want you to know that…I won’t do that again,” he added softly.
“Do what again?” she asked, trailing her fingertips over his waist, and she felt his stomach muscles twitch in response.
“I won’t lose it like that again. Tonight was…” He shook his head. “It’s out of my system.”
Leah lifted her head, resting her chin on his chest as she looked at him. “No, it’s not,” she said softly. “And you can’t expect it to be.”
Danny blinked up at the ceiling.
“I know what you meant before,” she said, laying her head back down on his chest as she played with his fingers. “That you don’t want to live the next two months under a cloud of dread. And I agree. We should try to enjoy as much of it as we can. But there will be days when we can’t ignore it. And that’s okay, Danny. It’s okay to need a time-out.” She pressed her lips to his chest. “Tonight was just one of those nights.”
Danny slid his hands under her arms and pulled her up the front of his body so that she was lying on top of him. He reached up, scooping her hair back into a ponytail and holding it there with one hand as he brought the other to her face.
“You are incredible,” he said tenderly, running his thumb over her lips, and she kissed the pad of it. “You are beautiful, and smart, and thoughtful, and perfect, and I don’t deserve you.”
“Well, that’s too bad, because you’re stuck with me,” she said, and he s
miled up at her, using his hand in her hair to pull her mouth down to his.
The sound of her phone beeping with a text message interrupted the silence, and Leah lifted her head, breaking their kiss.
“That’s probably Sarah checking up on us,” she said, leaning over the side of the bed and swiping her phone from the nightstand. She lay back down on him, and he kept his hands on her waist as she opened the text.
And then she gasped loudly, shooting straight up in bed, and Danny bolted upright beside her.
“What is it? What happened?”
“Alexis is in labor!” she squealed, dropping the phone and clapping her hands quickly like a child.
Danny exhaled in a rush, running his hand down his face. “Jesus, you just scared the shit out of me.”
“Sorry,” she said, throwing herself forward and knocking him back onto the bed. She held her weight in her arms as she grinned down at him, and he laughed lightly, looking up at her.
“I’m gonna be an aunt!” she squeaked.
“You’re gonna be an aunt,” he repeated, tucking her hair behind her ear.
She sighed, lying down on his chest, and his hand came to her hair again, lazily running his fingers through it.
They lay there quietly for a while, and Leah listened to the rhythmic beating of Danny’s heart, letting it lull her into a state of serenity. Eventually the rise and fall of his chest evened out and became regular, and Leah assumed he had fallen asleep until his voice broke the silence.
“Do you ever think about having kids?”
Leah nuzzled his chest, relishing the gentle vibrations that rumbled through it as he spoke. “I do,” she said.
It was quiet for a beat before he said, “I remember being young, like twelve years old, and thinking about what a good dad I would be. I think it was because my dad was such a worthless bastard. Like, in a way, I wanted to prove to myself that I could do what he couldn’t.”
Leah lifted her head, resting her chin on his chest. “You’ll be an amazing dad,” she said gently.
He glanced down at her and smiled sadly. “I hope so. It’s just…I’m twenty-nine years old. And I’m about to lose some time. Maybe a lot. And I know men can have children whenever, but…women can’t.”
Suddenly, Leah remembered the night he met her family—the way he had looked at Christopher as he rubbed Alexis’s belly.
Leah lowered her head, pressing her lips against his chest as she spoke. “Even if it were five years,” she whispered hoarsely, “you’d be thirty-four. I’d be thirty-three. Women can still have children safely at thirty-three.”
The second the words left her mouth, she froze. Leah felt his chest stop moving, and she closed her eyes, turning away from him as she rested her cheek on his chest.
She couldn’t believe she had just said that.
They had only just said “I love you” for the first time, and already she was deducing that she would be the mother of his children.
“I didn’t mean…I wasn’t assuming…I was just trying to show you…” She fumbled over her words, eventually letting them trail off.
They both lay there, saying nothing, and although his hand still rested on her head, his fingers had stopped playing with her hair.
After what seemed like an interminable silence, Danny spoke, the low timbre of his voice penetrating the stillness.
“Leah?”
“Hmm?”
He trailed his hand over the side of her face, taking her chin in his hand and lifting it as he turned her toward him.
“I want them to be just like you.”
She stared at him, a slow smile spreading over her lips, and he lifted his head, bringing their mouths together.
And she wrapped her arms around him as they kissed, figuratively and literally embracing her future.
Leah and Danny sat on the couch outside his lawyer’s office.
Danny was resting his elbows on his knees, looking down at his hands as he wrung them together, and Leah sat next to him with her hand on the small of his back, rubbing her thumb back and forth. They didn’t speak, and she knew he probably preferred it that way. Each time she looked at his profile, she could see that his brow was pulled together, or his jaw was clenched. He looked so vulnerable, and she wished there was something she could do to make what he was feeling go away.
As much as the three of them tried to keep the conversation light on the ride to Brooklyn, there was an obvious undertone of anxiety. The last time Leah had seen Catherine, her smiles had been warm, inviting, genuine. This time they were strained and contrived.
Throughout the ride Danny contributed to the conversation, his voice sounding easy and fluid, but his body betrayed him. He sat up straight, his shoulders rigid and his hands tight on the wheel. Leah knew he could sense Catherine’s apprehension and grief, and it was slowly eating away at him.
When they arrived at the office, Danny’s lawyer—a man named Eric Warden—took Catherine inside immediately. As soon as the door closed behind them, Danny’s carefully cultivated façade melted away, and all of the stress and guilt Leah knew he’d been feeling all morning came rushing to the surface. And so they sat on the sofa in silence. She knew no words were capable of taking those feelings away, but she hoped her presence at least dulled them a little.
Catherine was in Eric’s office for a little under an hour. When she came out, she held several crumpled tissues in her hand. Her eyes were glassy and bloodshot, and she looked completely drained.
Leah watched an intense pain flicker behind Danny’s eyes before the façade was back in place, and he smiled, walking over to give her a hug.
When he let her go, Eric stepped back into his office and turned to Danny. “Ready?” he asked, and Danny nodded before he looked at Leah.
She walked over to them, putting her hand on Catherine’s shoulder. “Catherine, do you want to go have a cup of tea? I noticed a diner down the street when we got here.”
Danny nodded. “That’s a good idea, Gram. It’ll be more comfortable than waiting out here. I’ll meet you guys over there when I’m done.”
She smiled unsteadily. “That sounds lovely, sweetheart.”
Leah turned to Danny, giving him a hug as she brought her lips to his ear. “She’ll be fine, I promise. Go do what you have to do.”
“Thank you,” he said before he pressed his lips to her forehead, and then he turned and walked into the office. Eric smiled and gave them a small nod before he shut the door.
“Ready?” Leah asked, and Catherine nodded weakly.
They walked the block and a half down to the diner in relative silence. The interview with Eric had taken a lot out of her, and the last thing Leah wanted was to make her feel obligated to keep up some mindless small talk. So, she was going to follow her lead; if Catherine preferred to sit in reflective silence rather than talk, then that’s what they would do.
Once they were seated, they each ordered a cup of tea and a muffin, and as the waitress left their table, Catherine removed her coat.
“Funny, isn’t it?” she asked in her soft, raspy voice. “You and I having tea together again?”
Leah smiled. “I bet you didn’t think you’d be seeing me before next Christmas.”
“Actually, I had a feeling I’d be seeing you again.” She smiled genuinely for the first time that day as she said, “Old Italian ladies all have a sixth sense. We know everything.”
Leah laughed as the waitress approached the table with their tea and muffins, and it was quiet for a minute as they both fixed their tea.
“You know,” Catherine said, dunking her tea bag in the steaming mug, “when you left my house that day, Daniel took me out to dinner, and every few minutes, he’d find a way to turn the conversation back to you. ‘So, who was that?’ ‘Why did you invite her inside?’ ‘How long did she stay?’ ‘What were you talking about?’ I think he was trying to be casual.” She looked down with a smirk as she removed the tea bag, shaking her head. “Men are so transparent
,” she chuckled softly, placing the used tea bag on the tiny saucer.
Catherine wrapped her frail hands around the warm mug. “I’ll admit that a little part of me wished I’d had some way to contact you. And then, wouldn’t you know it, we came home and found your note.” She smiled to herself. “And that’s when I knew I could relax, because there were higher powers on the job.”
She looked up at Leah with a tiny laugh. “The night he found your bracelet, he had this little glint in his eye. Like Christmas morning. Even better than finding it was finding his excuse to call.”
Leah’s stomach fluttered at the realization that he’d been interested in her, even back then.
“I do believe everything happens for a reason,” Catherine said, running her finger along the rim of her mug. “I’ve always believed that. I only had one child. My daughter. There were some complications during delivery, and I wasn’t able to have any more.”
“I’m sorry,” Leah said, and Catherine smiled sadly.
“Thank you. You know, I was okay with it, really. The only thing that made me sad was that I wasn’t able to provide my Louie with a son. He never said it, but I knew he wanted one.” She took a deep breath. “But God has a plan for everyone, and he works in mysterious ways. My daughter…she made some poor choices in her life. But those choices gave me Bryan.”
Catherine smiled, her eyes focused on her mug as if she were seeing something different than what was in front of her. “It wasn’t the way it should have gone, and it wasn’t the way I planned it, but it was wonderful all the same, raising that little boy.” She nodded slowly, and then her shoulders bounced with a quiet laugh. “And then along came Daniel. When I met him, he was six years old.”
She brought her delicate hand up to her chest, pressing it over her heart. “He was one of the kindest little things I’d ever met. He had a warmth in his heart, even back then.”
Leah looked down and smiled, imagining a six-year-old Danny—a sweet little boy with big blue eyes and messy black hair.
“What a pair they were,” Catherine said with a chuckle. “They certainly kept me on my toes. Such good boys. Thick as thieves. They would do anything for each other…” She trailed off, and her eyes welled with tears.
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