Locked and Loaded (Bullet, #6) (22 page)

It was
different
, and he could feel that.

He was still consumed by happy thoughts when the three of them sat down to breakfast.  Jen was buttering Zoe’s pancakes and said, “Hey, Zane, could you grab her sippy cup?  I think she stuck it in the microwave.”

Zane started to laugh until he realized she meant the toy microwave built into the playset.  He walked over and opened the plastic microwave door above the play stove and, sure enough, the sippy cup with orange juice was in there.  “Looks like she hasn’t even touched it, Jen.  Should I get her some milk instead?”

“No, she likes juice.  She was just a little distracted.”

“Okay.”  He set her sippy cup on the high chair tray as Jen was pouring a few drops of syrup on Zoe’s cut-up pancakes.  Zane didn’t want to start without Jen, but he did grab a piece of bacon and popped the end into his mouth, biting some off and chewing.  Zoe looked at him and he winked and smiled.  The little girl smiled back and grabbed her green sippy cup with both hands, bringing it to her mouth.  She tipped the cup up and her head back.  When she set the cup back down, she pursed her mouth shut and squished her eyes closed.  Oh—too tart.  So cute.  But, as Zane continued enjoying her expression, he realized that the way Zoe’s mouth was pursed reminded him of someone else.

And then he could see that person in all her features.

He saw his own mother, plain as day, and he froze.  The only thing in motion then was the air he breathed in and out making his chest rise and fall.  Even his thoughts were on pause as he tried to process what he’d seen.  But it made no damn sense.

* * *

“W
hat, Zane?  You act like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“It feels like I have.”

Before she could even ask what he meant, Zane had stood up and left the room, obviously on a mission of some kind.  “What’s up with
that
?” she asked Zoe, grabbing a slice of bacon and tearing it into bite-sized pieces for the little girl.

Then she sat down and made her own breakfast, grabbing two pancakes off the stack on the big plate in the center of the table along with a slice of bacon.  She was pouring maple syrup on her stack when Zane came back in the room with a big black book.

Oh.  It was a photo album.

“Whatcha got there?”

Zane had a frown on his face and said, “You tell me.”  That seemed...
strange
, but she walked over to his chair and stood behind him so she could see what he was doing.  He was flipping through the pages furiously, and Jennifer wanted to tease him, telling him that was why everyone’s photos were online nowadays—but she got the feeling that he was agitated.

He paused on one page and then touched a picture with his finger, a small color photo that had faded over the years.  It was a baby picture of a woman with dark hair and blue eyes, and even though Jennifer had never met her in person, she could tell that this was a baby picture of Zane’s mother.

Holy.  Shit.

She could feel the blood draining from her face, but before she could even say anything, Zane spoke.  “Isn’t that kind of strange, Jen?  That your daughter has such an uncanny resemblance to my mother?  Almost like they’re related, huh?”

“Zane—”

“I was watching Zoe sipping her juice and she puckered her lips.”  He smiled at the child when she noticed he said her name and looked up from her pancake, but as soon as his eyes returned to Jennifer, the happy look was gone.  “It reminded me of my mom, the way, when her lips puckered, they looked like a heart.  Zoe’s looked like that too.  But I didn’t even have a chance to wonder why, ‘cause I realized my mom looked exactly like Zoe...only with black hair.  What are the chances?”

All words had escaped from Jennifer’s grasp.  “Uh...”

“Explain that to me, Jen. 
Explain it.
  What the hell are the odds that your daughter would look almost exactly like my mother at the same age?”

“Zane, please sit down.”

“I don’t wanna sit down.”

Jennifer sucked down a deep breath.  This was going to be hard, but it would be even harder if they started fighting again.  “Please, Zane.  I don’t want to talk to you if you’re hulking over me.”

He bit down, clenching his jaw, and then sat in the chair.  “All right.”

This wasn’t getting any easier, and she almost wanted to just tell him to
fuck off
and leave.  She understood why the asshole vibes were coming off him, but she had had her reasons, and he wasn’t fully justified in being an asshole right now.  “Zane...you’ve already figured out the truth, so I’m not even going to deny it, okay?  Yes, Zoe’s your daughter.”

His face was like stone.  She couldn’t read him.  He wasn’t ready to explode like he used to.  Instead, he was quiet and still—and, somehow, that made him scarier than if he’d been ranting and raving and even throwing shit around the room.  “When?”

“When did I know or when did it happen?”

Zane drew in a deep breath but maintained eye contact.  “When was she born?”

“January thirty-first.  Of last year, of course.”

Zane nodded.  “Okay, so...were you
ever
gonna tell me?”

“I wanted to.”

The look in his eyes changed—from anger to hurt—and that was when Jennifer started feeling awful for having kept it from him for so long.  The truth was she could have used a partner.  But that was in the past now.  She had to try to explain her rationale and hope he would understand.  She took a deep breath.  “Remember the last time we were together?  Um...you know...”

“In a sexual way?”

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.  It was the night we decided to make Kung Pao Chicken.”

She had to give him points for that.  He’d actually remembered.  That told her they as a couple might mean more to him than she had originally thought, because—when he was under the grips of drugs and alcohol—she had a hard time believing anything Zane Carson ever said.  She looked over at Zoe and nodded before returning her eyes to Zane.  “Yes.  And, if you’ll recall, right after that is when it all went to hell.”

“When we started fighting again.”

He loved to blame it on the arguing.  He always seemed to forget what it all stemmed from.  “When
you
started screwing around again.  Don’t you get it, Zane?  Don’t you see?  It wasn’t that I didn’t want Zoe to know her dad.  I wanted
you
to know you were a dad, too—but how could I?  You were drugging and whoring and half the time didn’t even remember where you were.  I didn’t want Zoe to think you were the kind of man she should look for.  No way.  And really, Zane? 
Are
you the kind of man you’d want your daughter to date?”

He blinked and Jennifer couldn’t even tell what he was thinking.  “Wait a second.  We can hash that shit out in a minute.  How could you get pregnant?  I always wear a condom.”

Jennifer started laughing, even though what Zane had said wasn’t funny in the least.  “You always wear a condom
when you’re sober
, Zane.  When you’re hammered out of your mind, there’s no telling what you will and won’t do.  It’s always a crap shoot.  And you’re hammered more often than you’re not.”

The hurt expression returned to his eyes.  “Not lately.  You know that, don’t you?”

Jennifer nodded.  “Yes, I do.  But I also know that we’ve been there before.  It’s going to take a long time for me to know I can trust you, Zane.”

She saw him clench his jaw again.  Oh, this was
not
good.  “The feeling’s mutual, Jen.  Believe me.  The feeling’s fucking mutual.”

––––––––

Z
ANE HAD BEEN seething for days and, much as part of him wanted to see Jen and Zoe, he couldn’t do it.  He needed to calm down before he was around them again.

He understood why Jennifer had kept it secret from him—which made it even stupider for him to
not
spend time with Zoe—after all, she was his daughter and he wanted to be a part of her life.  But Jesus...it wasn’t like the kid even knew who he was.

And so, in spite of the fact that he understood Jennifer’s hesitation about telling him, he was pissed off and disappointed, and the more he thought about it, the angrier he got.  He’d missed the child’s first word and first steps, for Christ’s sake.  He had no idea how many other firsts he’d missed with the child—and he could never get those back.

He sat in Dr. Harvey’s office the next week trying to articulate all the emotions bubbling up inside him that simply couldn’t be contained anymore.  The man had started by asking Zane how the last few days had been (something he did at the beginning of every visit), and Zane hadn’t stopped spewing since.

“So, yeah—I get why she did it.  I understand.  But she never even gave me a chance to step up.  Maybe if she’d told me, I would have straightened out my shit sooner.”

“Had you given her any reason to believe that you would have?”

Zane tried to think of a time when he’d dried out and
stayed
dried out for any length of time—and there was nothing in recent history.  “I usually cleaned up before we got back together.”

“And how long did those episodes last?”

When Zane was honest with himself, he knew they hadn’t lasted long at all.  For
him
, the addict, those dry times had seemed to last
forever
, but—in reality—he knew they were short-lived.  “Not long.”

“So do you understand perhaps
why
she made the decision to keep you out of the loop?”

“Yeah, but that doesn’t make it feel any better.”

“Of course, it doesn’t.  It hurts.  And, consequently, it makes you angry.  When she weighed what she perceived as good and bad outcomes, the bad must have outweighed the good.  That is, any benefits you might have brought to the table were overshadowed by the damage you might cause.”  Zane blinked as Dr. Harvey’s words sunk in.  “You would have been able to benefit her and the child financially, correct?”

That hit him hard—right between the fucking eyes.  Dr. Harvey’s words were like a machete, cutting through the bone and sinew of his chest before slicing through his heart.  Jesus Christ.  When he put it that way, it gave him a whole new perspective.  Yeah, he’d understood on the surface why Jen had done it, but when the doc explained it that way—that Jennifer must have known how much she was giving up by
not
telling him—she must have thought he was a fucking monster.

Which then begged the question as to why she always came back.  When Zane found his voice, he said, “Okay.  All right.  I get it.  But if I was so fucking bad, why didn’t she just stay away forever?”

Dr. Harvey looked over the rims of his glasses.  “Perhaps you’re not the only addict in this relationship.”

Zane let the breath out of his lungs.  He wasn’t ready to process the whole codependent relationship bullshit.  Just this revelation today was enough.  He shook his head and then said, “Okay, so do I even stand any kind of chance?  I mean...if she felt like she couldn’t tell me about my own goddamned child...?”

“Zane, the fact that she continues to let you into her life tells me you have a chance.  You just need to repair the damage.”

He nodded.  “I feel like we have been.”

“Good.  That’s a start.”  Dr. Harvey removed his glasses and set down his clipboard, leaning forward.  “I know we’ve already talked about it, but you might again consider couples therapy or a twelve-step sex addiction group.  The group will help
you
stay on the straight and narrow and also give you other people to talk to—you support each other, and it helps to know others have experienced like situations.  Oftentimes, they can give you advice that has worked for them.  Couples therapy would benefit both you and your girlfriend—you can work together to build a new life for yourselves.”

“I don’t know if she’d go for that.”

“Have you asked?”

He sighed.  “No...but I know just getting her to go out on a date with me is sometimes pushing it.”

Dr. Harvey smiled and sat back in his chair.  “Mm-hm.  And
where
were you again when you found out about your daughter?  Didn’t you say they spent the night at your house the night before?”  Zane looked up at his therapist and nodded.  “Hmm.  That sounds like progress to me.”

Yeah...so Zane had to quit being butt hurt and continue making progress.  And that would start now.  He too had to find forgiveness in his heart.

* * *

“S
o I get it, Jen.  I get it.  I just need to know—do you and me have a chance?”

Jennifer was already surprised and amazed.  In the past, when they’d had some kind of blow up—granted, they’d had much worse before—that was when they’d stop communicating for a long time.  Zane wouldn’t call and Jennifer certainly wouldn’t make the effort.  The first time—when they’d been in college—it had been mutual and they’d parted as friends, rediscovering a very deep love and passion later on when the reconnected.  Since then, though, they would end their involvement every time with some sort of blow up.  The first time, Jennifer figured was the last, but Zane kept coming back, and she kept taking him back, because she loved him and wanted him.

This time felt different.  Zane was truly making some real changes, things she could see, but the other night felt like a game changer.  Like maybe he was going to hold it against her, the fact that she’d chosen to keep their daughter from him.

“Yes, Zane.  Of course.  I...
want
us to work.  And I want you to be a part of your daughter’s life. I
love
you.”  Maybe he needed to know, to
hear
what he meant to her.

He was quiet for a little bit and it sucked, because they were on the phone and she couldn’t see him.  She should have just texted him back and told him she’d talk to him after work, but his message sounded desperate.  She couldn’t wait.

“I love you too, Jen...and I’m sorry for what’s happened.  I want to move past it all and start fresh.”

“I do too.”

“I’m...considering a twelve-step type program.  You know...for, uh, sexual addiction.”