Page 2 of Forgiving Her First Love

Please let it only be one week.

“I’m fine,” he lied, spitting and straightening to look up at the boy of seven or eight. He wore a blue raincoat with dinosaur skeletons on it, rubber boots, and a red backpack.

“My mom gives me ginger ale when I’m sick. Do you want some?”

“You got some in your backpack?” Something in the kid’s big, earnest eyes tickled a memory in Logan’s chest.

“No.” He chuckled. “I can go to the store for you.”

“Thanks, but I’m not sick. I’m suffering the consequences of my actions.” A cold ginger ale sounded amazing, though.

“I thought you were having a hangover.”

“I do have a hangover. How do you know what a hangover is?”

“My grandpa has one. Mom is really mad.”

Oh shit. Now he was going to retch for an entirely different reason.

Those eyes. He knew those eyes way too well. And that helpful personality, the one that wanted to take care of him. His entire youth and a very hot angry week in his early twenties had been cushioned by big brown eyes exactly like those ones.

A piledriver had arrived to pound the knowledge into the back of his screaming skull, reminding him that yesterday was not the worst day of his life. That would be today, but he still asked with faint hope, “Who’s your grandpa, little man?”

“Arthur Marshall.”

“Thought so. I was drinking his scotch last night.” He regretted it even more now.

“Is that like butterscotch? Is it good?”

“Not really. Your mom is Sophie Hughes?”

“Mmm-hmm.” He nodded his head inside the hood of his raincoat.

“How old are you?” Logan was doing math that he’d done several times. The first time had been eight years ago, when his mother had told him Sophie was pregnant. He’d run the same figures four years later, when he’d seen her at his mother’s wedding. Sophie had been there with another man and a preschooler who had disappeared after an hour. She had ignored Logan the entire evening.

“I’m seven.”

“And who’s your dad?”

“Nolan Yantz. Do you want to know my name?”

“Brian?” Logan recollected vaguely.

“Everyone thinks that. No. It’s Biyen. Bye-En,” he pronounced slowly. “My dad picked it.” In the distance, the school bell rang. He looked up the hill. “I should go or I’ll be marked late.”

“Okay. Seeya later.” I’m going to stand here and lose a little bit more of the guts your mother hates.

Sophie wouldn’t have lied to him about something as important as whether he was the father of her kid. He had to believe that. She wouldn’t have lied to her mother or his. Not to her grandfather, either. Or her own kid.

Which meant she really had leapt from his bed into another man’s, despite a crush on him that had lasted a decade. A crush he had crushed beneath his Nike runners on his way to the ferry slip.

He had no right to be hurt or disgusted or even curious about her life or her son. He was the one who had left. He would do it again inside of a week.

Whatever had been between him and Sophie back in the day was very much over.

But his belly twisted with one more spasm. He had another spit before he rallied himself to walk inside and face her.

Chapter One