A/N: Look at all the reviews! You folks are lovely - thank you! :) Now, let's deal with the Logan situation...

(For disclaimer, etc. - see chapter 1)

Chapter 4 - 4th July 2018

She had invited him, she ought to have known there was a chance he would show up, and yet finding Logan at her door had Rory feeling completely bowled over. Somehow he had always been very good at that. Good to know some things never changed.

"Hi," she said, finding no more words naturally came to mind.

"Hey, Ace," he replied, with a smile and all the easy charm he had ever possessed.

The difference was in the eyes. They always gave him away if a person knew what to look for. Right now they were showing fear and apprehension rarely seen in a Huntzbergers face, but then these were extenuating circumstances.

"I guess you better come in," she said, moving away from the door and ushering him inside.

"I'm guessing you...?" he began, but the rest of the question died on his tongue.

The room had fallen silent when the assembled party saw who had arrived. Lorelai and Luke were there, it was their house so that part wasn't a shock to Logan. Lane and Zach he recognised from years ago and their kids accompanied them. He would not necessarily have been shocked to see Paris, or Sookie, or a whole mess of other people he recalled from Rory's past, and yet the man stood in the centre of the scene, holding what had to be the child Logan had fathered and yet to meet, he was a surprise, and not a pleasant one.

Rory looked from Logan to Jess and back again. This was bad. Very bad, actually. Shaking her head, she swung into action, pushing past Logan into the living room and retrieving her son from Jess.

"Can't believe he showed up," she heard him mutter as Jacob left his arms.

"Right there with ya," Lorelai agreed, zipping her mouth closed when Rory shot her a look.

Logan was still standing in the hallway, staring in at the scene he didn't belong to, in awe of the tiny person Rory carried towards him now.

"C'mon," she urged Logan to follow her.

The two of them, plus baby making three, went into Rory's bedroom and pushed the door closed behind them. It didn't look like he remembered, but then it had been more than ten years since he saw it last. Logan noted the crib in the corner, how most areas were covered in baby-related items, from clothes to toys and everything in-between. Rory was a mother, and her baby was his own. The reality of it hadn't hit Logan quite as hard as this before.

"Oh, Rory," he said, sitting down fast on the trunk at the end of her bed, face in his hands. "I can't... This is crazy."

"No, this is parenthood," she said succinctly. "You'd know that if you'd been a part of our lives this past year."

"Ace..." he began, but the look on her face when he peered up at her put paid to any of that in a second.

"No, Logan. We're not going to fight about this and you're not going to give me any excuses. That's not how this is going to work," she said definitely. "I told you from the start, I was going to have my baby and raise him my own way," she reminded him. "You have a right to visit, to receive updates on Jacob's progress, whatever you want, but he is my son first, and you don't get to screw around with his life."

The words were on the tip of Logan's tongue - 'He's my son too' - but he swallowed them down hard. That was biology, plain and simple. Being a father was much bigger than that. Logan knew better than most. Mitchum wasn't the absentee type, but he might as well have been. Whenever he was around, it was usually pushing his son in one direction or the other, never letting him be quite what he wanted. Logan thought he had learnt to live with that, learnt to embrace it. Now he wondered if that was really true.

He looked up at Rory, more so the baby she held in the arms. He had her eyes, her hair colour, a perfect little man with way more Gilmore in him than Huntzberger. That had to be a comfort to them all. Ought to make things easier for Logan too, but it didn't.

"So, this is him."

"Yeah," Rory nodded, trying to encourage her son to look at his father, though he didn't seem keen to get his face out of her shoulder. "Logan, this is Jacob. Jacob, this is... Daddy," she said, with just a hint of awkwardness.

Logan got up and moved closer, reached out to the baby who immediately looked wary. Jacob eyed him curiously from a fair distance, then shook his head and hugged onto Rory even tighter.

"He's not great with strangers," she said, expression almost guilty.

They both knew she had stung him with those words but also that they were never intended to wound. It was just true. To Jacob, Daddy was a stranger. Logan was just a random man who showed up at the front door on his birthday and took him away from his family, those he knew and loved. Logan wasn't sure he would be too impressed if he was Jacob either.

"I shouldn't have come here," he said, shaking his head.

Logan went for the door and Rory almost laughed, though there wasn't a shred of humour in her body right now.

"Great," she said shortly. "So now you're just going to run away. Again."

"It's not that simple, Rory!" he yelled, having already pulled open the door.

He didn't immediately see, as Rory did, that Jess was out in the kitchen. Clearly he had come to see what was going on, maybe heard some yelling starting up and was worried. Rory knew Jess was probably itching to go after her from the second she walked away with Jacob in her arms and Logan on her heels. Just as soon as he had an excuse, he would be by her side, just like always. She loved that about him, it was one of many things, but right now just the very sight of him was going to be inflammatory to Logan.

"Hey," said Jess, looking only at Rory.

"Hey," she replied in kind, finding him a smile. "Could you...?" she said, offering her son to him.

"Sure," he agreed easily, reaching for the little boy who went more than willingly into his arms. "C'mon, Jakey."

"His name is Jacob," Logan snapped, though he already knew it was pointless.

The look Jess shot him only made that clearer as Jacob hugged the man who wasn't his father with all his might.

"Don't go there, Huntzberger," Jess advised. "Just don't."

With that parting shot, Jess walked away, presumably back to the party. Rory raised her hand to Jacob who was saying 'bye' and waving like a crazy person. It was something he recently learnt and enjoyed so much. Logan wouldn't know that. He knew nothing about their child. Nothing beyond his name and date of birth, Rory suspected, though she had provided other details. Until today, he probably couldn't have picked the boy out of a baby-sized line-up.

"He has no right-"

"He has every right," she cut him off the moment he began, spinning on her heel to face him with anger flashing in her eyes. "Jess is my step-father's nephew and a part of this family," she said definitely, voice low as much out of anger as a need to not have everybody hear this conversation.

"I'm your son's father," Logan shot back. "Doesn't that count for anything?"

Rory shook her head, anger fading back to sadness in a second.

"I don't know, Logan. Does it?" she asked him helplessly. "I offered you chance after chance to come meet Jacob. I told you I was pregnant. I let you know when Jacob was born. I sent photographs, emails, and it's not as if you didn't know where to find us."

"I know that", he said, turning away from her too blue eyes and expression of genuine confusion. "It's complicated, Rory. You know it is," he said, running a hand back through his hair.

Rory watched him pace around the room a while before finally coming to rest on a chair in the corner. He picked up a tiny stuffed bear and held it in both hands, staring at it as if he hoped it might give him all the answers he was looking for. Of course it didn't, it was never going to, but Logan was so much at a loss right now, he would wish for a miracle.

It would be easy to take pity on him. Rory almost wanted to give in, to throw her arms around him, hug him and tell him it would all be okay, but she couldn't. Staying mad at Logan wouldn't help her, but she wasn't about to let him off so easy. Parenthood was tough, she knew that already, and Jacob - who was fast becoming Jake thanks to just about everybody but her and her grandma - was only a year old yet. There was a lot still to go through, a lot of uphill battles, and Rory was essentially on her own in this. Sure, she had her mom and Luke, Lane and Zach, Sookie and Jackson, a whole ton of help, not to mention Jess who had been amazing from the start, but she was the only parent here. Everything came down to her in the end, because Logan wasn't around to play his part.

"I'm... I'm not trying to make you feel bad," she said eventually.

A hollow laugh escaped Logan's throat.

"Really? I'd hate to see you motivated, Ace."

Rory smiled at that, she couldn't help it. She moved to sit down on the trunk at the end of the bed, facing Logan. He looked more helpless than Jacob right now. It was equal parts pathetic and adorable somehow. Mostly, it was just familiarly painful.

"You thought this would be easy, didn't you?"

"No," he denied it hotly, before considering. "Maybe, a little," he admitted then, running his hands over his face. "I thought it'd be easy to stay away, to not... to not be involved. Geez, Rory, I'm not ready to be a father. I don't know if I'll ever be ready for that."

"Should've thought of that before the champagne and the bed and breakfast in Vermont," she said with a wry smile. "I guess we both should've thought more, before it was too late."

Logan nodded, knowing she was perfectly right. They both screwed up in their own ways, getting into that weird and unhealthy relationship they had going on for a while. Neither of them really wanted to commit to each other, and yet they kept on playing around. Seems Rory breaking things off had come just a little too late. The dates tallied just right. Jacob was almost definitely the product of that final time.

"So, you called him family. Luke's nephew," said Logan then, clearly not able to speak his name because Rory was almost certain he knew it well enough. "He's more than that, isn't he?"

"He's more than that." Rory nodded solemnly. "Jess is... He's really been there for me, and I don't just mean with the pregnancy and Jacob and everything, I mean, always," she tried to explain. "I... I did love you, Logan," she said then, reaching to take a hold of his hand. "A part of me is always going to love you, not least because you're the father of my son, but... but Jess is different. I think, if I'm honest with myself, deep down I always knew it was supposed to be me and him in the end."

"Yeah." Logan nodded, squeezing her hand now. "As much as I hate to say it, I'm pretty sure I knew that too."

He left within the hour and Rory wasn't sorry. Logan said he would appreciate updates and that he would send money, gifts, the usual kind of thing, but wasn't sure when he would be able to visit again. Rory didn't judge, didn't complain. She had given him the same choices that Lorelai had given Christopher so many years ago. Rory knew it was right for them and it was right for her and Logan as well. She would never pretend he wasn't Jacob's father and she would always ensure their son knew his Daddy was a decent sort of man, he just wasn't around much, he had another life he needed to live.

"You okay?" asked Jess as he found Rory by the front door, a single tear making it's way down her cheek.

"Yeah, I'm okay," she promised, wiping that tear away and finding a smile. "It was just weird, seeing him again like that, but I'm good."

Jess nodded that he understood, bouncing Jacob on his hip.

"Y'know what, Jakey? I think Mommy could use a hug right now," he said, offering the baby to his mother.

"Mama!" the little boy said happily, hugging her tight around her neck.

"Oh, I love you, baby," she said definitely. "Both of you," she added, looking at Jess.

Jess didn't say a word, just smiled and threw an arm around her shoulders, kissing her temple as they walked back into the party.