But Alex’s heart sank. They were starting and Elijah still wasn’t here. He was either going to come in midway through and make a scene or else he was going to miss it entirely, and neither possibility was any good. Jack was going to be heartbroken.

  Please, let him still make it at all. At least let him show up.

  By the time it was Jack’s turn to present, Alex was beginning to hope that Elijah had been in some sort of accident. She could think of no other excuse for his absence, no reason good enough for him to be missing this milestone. As Jack stepped to the front of the room and positioned his tree carefully on the floor in front of him, Alex was glad to see that he wasn’t making eye contact with her. Perhaps he hadn’t noticed his father’s absence. Maybe Elijah would be able to sneak in and pretend — to Jack, at least — that he had been here the whole time.

  Maybe.

  Jack cleared his throat. “This is my family tree,” he said. “It has all the people who are part of my family and all the important people who are part of my life. At the top are my great-grandparents — my dad’s grandparents. Then this is their son, Victor, who married Grandma Betty. Their kids were my dad, Uncle Rob, and Aunt Julia.” He waved a hand at the carefully arranged twigs under his aunt and uncle and their spouses. “Uncle Rob married Aunt Andrea and Aunt Julia married Uncle Marco, and they had all my cousins. I have seven cousins in all, but I don’t get to see them very often because they don’t live close by. We usually see each other at Christmas.”

  He moved over to the other side of the tree. Alex drew her breath, wondering if this part would be emotional for him.

  “My dad married my mom,” Jack said, gently touching Stephanie’s branch of the tree. “She died a long time ago, so I don’t remember her very well. But she’s still a really important part of our family, because without her, there would be no me.”

  The room was quiet. Even Jack’s fellow first-graders seemed to sense the seriousness of the moment.

  Jack cleared his throat and continued. “Now Alex lives with us,” he said, touching Alex’s branch of the tree. “Alex is my friend, and she helps take care of me. And she makes Dad happy. Dad said it was up to me who I put on my family tree, but I think Alex is a part of my family, because we care about each other. And that’s what makes people a family.”

  He stepped back and gave a little bow that made the adults in the room chuckle fondly. Everyone applauded, and Jack beamed and went back to his place in line.

  Alex was both deeply embarrassed and deeply touched. The way Jack had described their relationship had made it sound as if she really was a part of the family — as if she was involved with Elijah or something. She knew that was what everyone in the room would take away from what he had shared. They would all think she was dating Elijah.

  Then again, could she blame anyone for thinking that? It wasn’t so far from the truth. They weren’t formally dating, but they were certainly cohabitating, spending their days together, caring for a child together, and even sleeping with each other — though she still didn’t know whether that was an ongoing thing or a one-time incident, or even which she would choose if it was up to her.

  How could Jack have been expected to describe their situation without it coming across like a romantic entanglement? Alex wouldn’t have been able to describe it without making it sound like one. She wasn’t even sure it would have been valid to say that it wasn’t a romantic entanglement. Maybe it should sound like that.

  After all, it wasn’t like she didn’t have feelings for him.

  But right now, the biggest thing she felt was anger. She boiled in her chair throughout the rest of the presentation. Jack’s eyes had found her in the crowd now, and she saw his face fall slowly as he realized that his father wasn’t with her — that he hadn’t shown up.

  Where the hell is he?

  When the presentations were over, Alex pushed her anger aside and forced a smile onto her face. She went up to greet Jack. “You did so great!” she enthused. “I think everyone loved what you had to say. You used a nice big voice, just like we talked about, and you remembered to mention every branch on the tree. I’m so proud of you, Jack.”

  “Thanks,” he said, but he wasn’t smiling. “Is my dad here?”

  Alex hesitated. What to say to him? “He’s not,” she said. “But you know what? That’s okay. We’ll see him at home, and you can give the presentation again. I know he’s so excited to see it.”

  “Yeah,” Jack mumbled, his face falling.

  Alex’s heart broke. “Jack, you know he would have been here if he could,” she said. “He wanted to be here.”

  “I know,” Jack said, scuffing his foot on the ground. “Sometimes he just has to work. I get it.”

  You shouldn’t have to.

  She put a hand on Jack’s shoulder and gave him a quick squeeze, wishing there was more she could do to comfort him and knowing that the next time she spoke to Elijah, they were going to have it out about this.

  CHAPTER 18

  ELIJAH

  The light was on in the kitchen. Elijah stood outside the front door, reflecting on the fact that he felt nervous even to go inside. It wasn’t like him to be anxious about going into his own home. But it wasn’t like him to feel anxious about things at all. More often, Elijah would simply do what needed to be done without worrying about what the result might be. His way would be to walk into the kitchen and confront whatever was waiting for him there, and to deal with the fallout as it came.

  But he was nervous. He knew he had messed up by missing the presentation today, and he had no excuse. He was going to have to explain himself to Jack, and his son wasn’t going to be happy.

  He drew a deep breath and went inside.

  Jack wasn’t there. Instead, it was just Alex, sitting at the kitchen table with a bowl of pretzels in front of her. Several pretzels had been snapped into tiny pieces on a paper towel in front of her — she wasn’t eating them. She was venting her anger on them. And Elijah had an unpleasant understanding of just how much trouble he was in here.

  Alex looked up. “Where have you been all day?”

  “I’ve been at work,” he said. “Where’s Jack?”

  “Jack is in bed, Elijah. It’s nine-thirty on a school night. It’s way past his bedtime. You didn’t think he would still be awake, did you?”

  “I guess I lost track of time,” Elijah admitted.

  She snorted. “Did you think it was still before ten a.m.? Because that’s when you were supposed to meet us at his school. Or did you forget?”

  “I didn’t forget.” He was annoyed. He knew he’d been in the wrong, but wasn’t she even going to hear him out?

  “Okay, so, what, you just decided not to come?”

  “There was an emergency,” he said. “While I was meeting with my ranch foreman, a horse broke his leg. I had to stay and help.”

  “Really? You had to? What if that had happened while you weren’t already there? Are you telling me your foreman couldn’t have handled it?”

  “Alex, you don’t understand how serious something like that is. We were able to save the horse, but it was touch and go. Accidents like that are how horses are killed. I couldn’t just walk away. Not if there was something I could do to help.”

  Alex shook her head. “I can’t believe you’d say that. You’re talking about a horse.”

  “I’m a rancher, Alex. Horses are kind of important.”

  “Are they more important than your son?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous.”

  “I’m not the one being ridiculous,” she told him, rising to her feet. She picked up the paper towel of broken pretzels, carried it over to the trash can, and shoved it inside. He watched her, wondering where this was heading, irritated at how presumptuous she was being. She couldn’t seriously expect that nothing would ever come up for him at work, could she?

  “Look,” he said, trying to keep himself calm. “You’ve made your point about how I need to spend more time with Jack. And I think I’ve heard you out about that. You said yourself that you’ve seen me making a change. That doesn’t mean I can forget about my other responsibilities. I still have things I have to take care of, and when something like this happens, I can’t just run off because my son has a school thing that his nanny is perfectly capable of taking care of.”

  “You saw how hard he worked on this!” Alex said. “You saw how many hours he put into it, and how proud he was of it. And today was the presentation, it was family day, and you didn’t even bother to show up for it.”

  “He had you there,” Elijah said, exasperated. “And it’s not like I haven’t seen his family tree. He knows I’m proud of him.”

  “Elijah. It was family day. You are the only family member he has, and you didn’t go. I’m the nanny. I know he put me on his family tree, and that’s really nice and sweet, but I am not a replacement for a parent! You can’t not show up to these things just because I’m going to be there.”

  “Well, I can’t make it every single time,” Elijah said. “And frankly, this isn’t up to you, Alex. I know you care about him. I get that, and I appreciate it. But you’re right — you’re not his parent, and you can’t call me out like this for parenting him badly. Sometimes I’m going to make choices that won’t be what you would have done, and you have to figure out a way to make your peace with that.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake,” she snapped. “It isn’t about me. It isn’t about what I can live with. Do you think it bothers me that you weren’t there? I don’t give a damn. This is about him. If you’d seen the look on his face when he realized you had missed it, you wouldn’t be so cavalier about it.”

  “He’s a child. It’s only natural that he would get upset when things don’t go his way,” Elijah said.

  But he felt a stab of uneasiness in the pit of his stomach. He knew the expression Alex was talking about, and it always hurt to see his son disappointed. The idea that Jack might be hurt like that because of him, even if there had been a perfectly valid reason for his absence today, was hard to cope with. He never wanted to be the person making Jack sad.

  “This isn’t about things not going his way,” Alex snapped. “You talk like he’s a little boy who didn’t get the toy he wanted at the store or something. This is a lot bigger than that. He got up in front of his whole class today and talked about his family. About the people who mean the most to him. Every other child in that room had at least one parent there. And meanwhile, your son was explaining to his new classmates that he doesn’t have a mother, and anyone who had their eyes open would have noticed that he didn’t have a father present either. It was heartbreaking, Elijah. He was devastated.”

  “Well, he can show it to me at home,” Elijah said uncomfortably. He was finding himself forced to reckon with the fact that Alex had a point. He should have been there. He knew he should have been there. He had known how important it was to Jack. It was just that he had convinced himself in the moment that he didn’t really have to follow through, that Jack was just a child, that work was more important and that he would be able to explain himself later.

  “I’ll talk to Jack,” he told Alex. “I’ll tell him what happened.”

  “He’s just a little kid, Elijah.”

  “I know who he is, thanks,” Elijah said, feeling nettled. “You don’t have to keep throwing this in my face. I’m doing my best here.”

  “If you were doing your best, you would have been there for him when he needed you. You’re his father. And you know, he’s just starting out right now, but this isn’t going to last forever. You have him for a finite amount of time, and then it’s over. When he’s in high school, do you think he’s going to want his father showing up to watch his school presentations?”

  “I think you’re being dramatic.”

  “He wants you now,” Alex said. “He needs you to show up for him right now. You’re all he has. And…” She took a deep breath. “Elijah, I hate to put it like this, but he’s all you have too. You two are each other’s whole family, and if you don’t put each other first, there isn’t anyone else who will.”

  Fury surged in him. “Don’t speak to me that way.” How dare she? He understood what she was saying. She was trying to call out the fact that he’d lost Stephanie. She was telling him that he couldn’t afford to relax at all in his relationship with his son, because that was the only relationship he had left.

  He knew that. Some days it was hard to think about anything else. He certainly didn’t need her rubbing it in, reminding him of how alone he was. It was a cruel and hurtful thing for her to bring up.

  “You’re right,” he told her coldly. “You’re not a part of this family, Alex. Don’t act like you know everything about us, because you don’t. You just work here.”

  “I just work here?”

  “Isn’t that what you’ve been telling me? Your bond with Jack doesn’t count for anything. None of the bonds you’ve made since you came to stay with us matter. That’s what you’re saying, right? None of this has been real.”

  “That’s not what I’m saying at all,” she protested.

  “Well, either you’re an important figure in Jack’s life or you aren’t. And you’re right, Alex. You’re completely right. You’re just the nanny. Don’t try to talk to me as if you have the same care and responsibility for him as I do. He’s not your son.”

  Alex stared at him.

  “Is this really how you feel?” she asked him at length. “You really think I can’t care for Jack without being his parent?”

  No. Of course that’s not how I feel.

  But that little voice was shouted down by the anger he was feeling. He didn’t want to be logical right now. He just wanted to quiet her. He wanted to make her stop saying the things she was saying, because he didn’t want to have to deal with them.

  She sighed and shook her head. “If I’m just the nanny, I shouldn’t be here,” she said quietly. “If that’s really all I am to you, all I can be to him — I already care too much about him for that to be it, Elijah, and it’s not good for either one of us to form these attachments to each other if they’re not going to last and be respected. If you’re not going to treat me like an important person in his life, I don’t think I should stay in his life.”

  “Wait a minute,” Elijah said. “What are you saying right now? You’re not talking about quitting, are you?”

  “I think I have to,” she said quietly. “I don’t want to leave Jack, but if I’m not going to be allowed to have any kind of say in what’s best for him—”

  “That’s not fair. I’ve listened to you plenty of times. What you can’t do is wait until I get home from work and then give me hell for making a choice you wouldn’t have made. You’re acting like—” He stopped. He had been about to accuse her of acting like she was his wife, and that wasn’t going to make this any better. Things were bad enough as they stood. He changed tack. “You can’t walk away from Jack,” he said. “Don’t do that to him.”

  “But I have to,” she countered. “Before things get any worse, Elijah. I can’t let him become reliant on me. And I can’t let you become reliant on me either. If me being around is an excuse for you not to spend time with your son, I have to go.”

  They stood staring at each other for a few moments. Elijah couldn’t quite believe this was happening. After all his attempts to keep her here, he was going to lose her after all.

  And the most heartbreaking part was that Jack was going to lose her too — and Elijah knew that was entirely his fault.

  CHAPTER 19

  ALEX

  The night seemed interminable, and Alex didn’t sleep a wink. She wished she could just get in her car and drive away right now, get the whole thing over with, but she knew she couldn’t. She couldn’t do that to Jack, who had already lost his mother unexpectedly. She couldn’t just disappear on him. He had to have an explanation.

  But it wasn’t going to be easy. She knew Jack had come to care about her as much as she cared about him, and it would hurt him that she was leaving now. He wouldn’t understand why.

  God, how awful of Elijah to have put them all in this position!

  All night long, she went back and forth in her mind, wondering whether she was really doing the right thing. Did she have to go? Maybe she could take back the words she’d said last night.

  But as she watched the sun begin to rise out her bedroom window, she knew she wouldn’t take it back. She couldn’t stay here if Elijah was going to push back the way he had last night. There should have been no argument, no question about who was in the wrong. He should have been at that family day event. If he didn’t see how important it was to Jack to have him there, he wasn’t the man Alex had believed him to be.

  She was falling for him too hard and too fast to stay here if that was true. She could be honest with herself and admit that.

  Of course, that meant it was her own fault, not Elijah’s, that she was going to have to leave Jack behind. If only she’d kept her distance from his father, this wouldn’t have happened. She was wracked with guilt at the thought that he would lose someone he had considered important enough to put on his family tree.

  I’ve been so careless with him. If I was going to take care of Jack properly, I should have made sure that nothing Elijah could do would hurt me enough to make me leave.

  Her one consolation lay in the fact that this really would be better for both Jack and Elijah in the long run. Elijah really had taken to heart the idea that he needed to spend more time with his son. The problem was that he had a nanny to lean on, and he didn’t always prioritize Jack the way he should. With Alex gone, he would have to put Jack first. She just hoped he wouldn’t go back to his old ways, locking himself in the office all the time and allowing his son to run wild.

  She sighed, got up, and got dressed. There was no point in tormenting herself like this. She had made her decision, and the only thing to do now was to see it through.