opposed to changing it. She’s a DeMaio regardless of what’s on her birth certificate,” I told him, hearing the gruffness in my voice, the question: but are you staying or are you going?
Jonah eyed me seriously… cautiously, and I kind of liked it. “You’d consider it?”
“Yeah. You are her dad,” I answered. “All I wanted was for her to know she’s loved. That she belongs. I didn’t want her to feel any different just in case we were all she ever knew. And if you wouldn’t have shown up, I never would have told anyone you were her dad, at least until she asked.” I swallowed around the lump in my throat and the ball of anger that was there too. “Like I said, nobody knew about you, not even my grandpa or Peter. Not Luna. Well, no one but my roommate back in Paris, but she wouldn’t say anything to anyone. We’ve barely even talked since then.”
He watched me. The problem was, I wasn’t sure what his silence meant. What I did realize though was that it didn’t matter what it meant; what mattered was what was going to happen from here on out.
“I don’t know why you’re here,” I told him. “You said you didn’t know about Mo, and I don’t know why else you would have come, but I need you to make a decision at some point, sooner or later. If you’re right and you did up and disappear because of whatever reasons”—you’re still an asshole, I thought but didn’t say—“then I’m sure this is a shock to you. You can’t make a decision about whether you want to be a dad or not in just a couple hours, and I don’t expect you to.“
Even though he should since this was involving a child’s life. His child’s life. Anyone who wasn’t a deadbeat would already know what they were going to do, but maybe I was being unfair. Hadn’t I had to do some serious thinking in the weeks after I’d taken those tests? Yeah, I had, and I wasn’t enough of a hypocrite to claim otherwise.
I kept going. “But she needs you to make a choice. If you want to be a part of her life, then do it. I know we don’t live down the street from each other, and this is going to be complicated, but I’m not worried about that. I just need to know if you even want to make the effort in the first place.” Or if you’re a piece of shit and don’t.
I made sure to pin him down with a look, but it was totally unnecessary. He was 1000 percent focused on me. Everything about him was. Jonah was thinking big time.
So I didn’t stop.
“If you don’t think you can make her a priority in your life, every day until you die, then we’re going to need you to go. She’s little now, but she isn’t going to stay little, so you have to decide because it’s going to be a lifetime commitment. I don’t want her to ever feel like she’s not important. She’s going to have enough people who try to make her feel that way when she’s older. But I’m not going to let a father figure do that too.”
I held my breath and met his eyes, giving him what my old coach had called my Michael Myers face. Because that’s what I would turn into if he fucked with my chunky monkey. She wasn’t ours yet. He didn’t have the protection of being family to me or Grandpa until he made a choice, and we would both do some sketchy shit without question if we had to. “If you break her heart, I will make you regret ever thinking about playing rugby. So I want you to understand that before you make a decision because there aren’t any takebacks or refunds.
“I will never, ever ask you for a cent if you don’t want to be a part of her life. I won’t ask anything of you. I don’t need anything from you. You’re free to go if you want to go, but you have to make that choice, and it’s a final one unless she decides she wants you around when she’s older,” I finished telling him, fisting my hands at my sides because I could feel them start to get tingly. “You have to go in ready for this, living in another hemisphere and all.” I raised my eyebrows at him. “When you