Page 43 of Ruin

It’s easy to remember all the reasons I fell in love with this guy and forget all the reasons we’re not together now.

I watch him with Gigi. She’s on the swing, and he’s pushing her.

She’s giggling and saying, “Higher, Zweus! Higher!”

“Not too high, Gigi,” the concerned parent in me calls over.

Zeus nods at me, telling me that he’s got it. Not in a crappy way. More of a trust-me way.

And I’m going to have to trust him with my—our daughter. It’s just hard. I’ve been parenting Gigi alone for the last four years. It’s going to be hard, letting him have a say. But I have to. And this is the start of it.

“Slide now, Zweus!” Gigi jumps off the swing before it stops moving, giving me anxiety. She runs over to the slide, which is closer to the parents.

I can see the way they’re looking at him, especially one of the dads, like he recognizes Zeus.

And, if they haven’t figured out who he is, then they will from Gigi calling out Zeus’s name.

It’s not your average name.

I watch as they talk among themselves. The dad is sliding looks in Zeus’s direction as he follows Gigi around, moving from the slide to the merry-go-round.

Bringing us here was probably poor judgment on my part. I forgot how well known he is now. But then where can we go and not risk him being recognized?

This is going to be the hard part. Keeping who Zeus is to Gigi under wraps until it’s time for us to tell her. But I have a feeling that telling Gigi that Zeus is her dad will have to come an awful lot sooner than I prefer.

I get up from the bench and walk over to them at the merry-go-round.

When I reach Zeus, who is laughing at something Gigi just said as she whizzes around while he spins her, I step close to him and say, “You’ve been made.” I jerk my head in the direction of the parents.

“Yeah. I figured.” He exhales.

“You want to leave?”

He shakes his head, meeting my eyes. “No. I want to stay here until Gigi’s ready to leave.”

“Oh, well, in that case, we’ll be here all day. Right, Gigi girl?” I say.

She grins. “I loves the park!” she squeals as she spins past us. “Keep spinning, Zweus! Faster!”

“Not too fast, or you’ll throw up. Remember last time?”

“I puked,” she says to Zeus, a grim expression on her face. “I had ice cweam and had Granny Elle spin me fast.”

“Blue bubblegum ice cream,” I tell him. “It wasn’t a pretty sight.”

He laughs deep, a rumble in his chest. “Glad I missed it,” he says. Then, a flash of pain crosses his brow at his own words.

I want to say something to make him feel better, but I don’t know what.

And then we’re interrupted by a voice behind us.

“Hey, man.”

Zeus and I turn to the voice, finding the dad who was eyeballing Zeus.

“Sorry to bother you…but are you Zeus Kincaid?”

Zeus smiles. It’s forced. But you’d have to know him as well as I do to know that.