Logan sat on the couch attempting to work on some reports that his father had sent him for the transfer of his responsibilities in London, but he couldn't focus. His thoughts kept returning to the therapy session and the current status of his relationship with Rory. It had almost been two weeks since he moved into this house and he felt like he was walking on eggshells with her. So many old wounds had been opened and while they hurt, he could feel some of them healing as he started to understand more about her childhood and her mothers' influence. She had let him read her chapters of her book and while fiction he could see a lot of it was true and saw how her lack of grandparents and father had created this fear of abandonment and he realized that she was just as broken as he was. Throughout their years together he had never put much thought into the way she grew up and he was realizing everything he had done wrong. While Rory had welcomed him and his friends into her life, joining in on their exploits and world he never tried to get to know her outside of them. His interactions with Paris and Lane were nonexistent and while Lane could slightly be explained since they lived in different towns, he never made an effort to go with her an learn about how she grew up. His only visit to her hometown had been right before the proposal debacle and that was still limited and short. He was worried about his own future and while he slightly worried about her choices Colin was right when he told him that he made the decisions and plans and just expected Rory to follow along.
He closed his eyes and he tried to figure out what he could do now to try and move forward. From his conversations with Rory he knew that she had not been back to Stars Hollow since telling her mother she was pregnant and he knew that the estrangement still took a toll on her but she wasn't ready or willing to take the steps to heal that and he understood her feelings; Lorelai had caused this and should be the one to take the steps to fix it. But he also knew Rory was missing the small town that had shaped her. Coming to a decision he pulled out his phone and sent a message to Finn. After a few minutes he got a response and Logan smiled hoping that Rory would welcome what he planned.
A few hours later he had talked to Livy and they had set up a small candlelight dinner and Finn had dropped off the food.
Rory walked into the dining room and noticed the candles and a small smile came to her face when she saw what Logan had done. The past weeks left her feeling unsure and confused, while she wanted to move forward her fears still held her back. Progress had been made and she understood a lot more about herself that she ever had before and she knew that she needed to open herself up to him but the lifelong fears of abandonment kept holding her back.
"I hope your hungry," Logan told her with a small smirk as she walked over to the table. He pulled out the chair for her and she gladly sat down and looked at the dome covered trays in front of her.
"It smells amazing and familiar," Rory replied as she looked at him and he sat down as well.
He gave her a small tentative smile and pulled off the lid revealing a burger, and chili cheese fries from Luke's and tears sprang to her eyes.
"I'm sorry," Logan immediately responded when he saw the tears. "I know you hadn't been back to Stars Hollow with everything. I just thought…"
"Thank you," she said with a watery smile. "I did miss his food and I'm not ready to go to town, I don't want to run into her."
He returned the smile and they both dug into the food. Rory told him about working on the book and Logan told her about what he was working on to get everything settled in London. She knew he was worried about the sudden transfer, while in his youth he had avoided every responsibility to the family business he now embraced it and wanted to succeed and make his mark.
"If you need to go back…" Rory started, and he shook his head no.
"I'm needed here," he firmly stated.
Rory sighed and reached for his hand. "I know your job means a lot to you and you have responsibilities outside of me."
"You and the baby are the most important things to me right now," Logan replied as he squeezed her hand. "Dad is helping with everything in London and the team we have there can handle everything. I am not leaving you."
"I just don't want you to give up everything for this," she sighed as she gestured to her something. "All this is new to you and…"
"Its new," he stated as he looked at her, "but this isn't something I will ever walk away from. I've walked away from you enough over the years, I haven't fought for what I wanted or told you what I needed." He took a deep breath to steady himself. "You, the baby, are the only things that matter right now. I'm done running and not fighting for us."
Tears started to pour from her eyes as she looked at him and he moved to pull her into his lap. She buried her head into his shoulder, and he felt the dampness of her tears through his shirt. When she finally got the tears under control, she took a few deep breaths. "I done running to," she murmured. "I want this… I want you but I'm still so afraid."
"Ace, I'm afraid to," he stated as he placed a kiss into her hair. "Something about you had always scared me, it's why I didn't pursue you all those years ago. I told you, your special and that has not changed through the years. You're the only one I want a family with, the only one I want to spend my forever with."
She looked up and met his eyes and he pushed the hair from her face before wiping away her tears. "You're the only one I want a family with," she admitted with a small smile. "Just please be patient with me, hormones…"
He bent a placed a soft kiss on her lips and she immediately parted her lips and the kiss become more heated and soon they were lost in each other. Deepening the kiss, he tangled his fingers in her hair and felt himself stir and she let out a soft moan. When they finally broke apart for air he rested his forehead against hers. "You've waited for me for years, you've been patient with me and I will wait as long as you need. I just need to know that you want me, that for you us being together, being a family is the endgame."
She heard the pleading and desperation in his voice, "you and me," she sighed as she pulled back and looked into his eyes. "We are the endgame."
He felt his heart swell at her words, they still needed a lot of work. They needed to rebuild the trust and create a new foundation that would support their future, but her words were enough for him for now. Knowing that she wanted them as an endgame just like he did… he would put in every effort and fight every battle knowing she needed him, wanted him, just like he wanted and needed her.
After awhile longer she slowly moved back to her seat and they continued to eat. When they finished, he stood and disappeared into the kitchen and returned with a giant slice of chocolate cake and a cherry pie.
"This is amazing," she told him with a large smile. "This is the best grand gesture ever."
"This," he told her with a mischievous smirk, "it not grand, it's just a gesture."
She gave a hearty laugh and the sound made him smile. "I don't need grand gestures."
"I know," he told her as he took a bite of the pie. "You have never needed them, and you don't expect them which is why I always love surprising you."
Mitchum sat in his study and thought about what his private investigator had just told him. The day after he told Shira he wanted a divorce she had gone to Stars Hollow and met with Lorelai Gilmore-Danes and while he wasn't able to record the entire conversation he had recorded enough to know that Lorelai had something to do with keeping the baby away from Logan. Finding that out almost sent him storming into the small town to give the woman a piece of his mind but the PI convinced him to wait, told him there was something else going on, so wait is what Mitchum had done. He wanted to immediately tell Logan but had refrained as she tried to figure out what else the two women had done to keep the two apart.
The PI had found some information about the two of them but hadn't been able to find much that could show what they had been up to, but he wasn't about to give up. Shira was to much of an idiot to not leave some trail. Since he had filed for divorce the news spread like wildfire through the society set and there was speculation about the reasons. He had been able to limit press coverage and a statement was released that the divorce was due to irreconcilable differences. There were rumors and speculation of both of their unfaithfulness throughout the marriage but everyone knew that Shira wouldn't risk her lifestyle by complaining and with her new address and lack of appearance at events everyone knew that she wasn't the one to file and she had to have done something to warrant the type of response received. That morning he had received a phone call from an old colleague that worked at the New York Times years ago and he wanted to meet up. The call had left Mitchum confused to the reasons, but the man just said that they needed to meet and they scheduled a dinner for the following week when Mitchum could get back to New York.
The Odette situation seemed resolved for the time being, but he was still on guard waiting to see if she would try and retaliate. The news coverage had been exactly like he planned with the pictures of her being released there was the expected gossip and she became the target of jokes, especially when it was found out that she was sleeping with her yoga instructor, that knowledge just caused more rumors. Logans statement was released and it caused more jokes to be made of her leaving the handsome billionaire for a yoga instructor what could offer her nothing. The PI's trailing her followed her to Paris and reported that she was being slightly shunned from society, people didn't want the rumors around them. Despite the statement saying they had been separated for awhile rumors of her many affairs were spread throughout society. It seemed that Logan was unscathed as the only affair he had was with Rory but they had been seen together for the past five years so it was easy to believe it was a friendship and when it came out later they were expecting a child there should be limited fallout since her numerous affairs were all being discussed.
Mitchum knew he needed to sit with them to come up with a plan to introduce them as a couple and announce the child but with Rory's health issues he didn't want to stress her. As much as he wanted to visit her and try and make up for the past, he was reluctant to make a move especially since she was so recently in the hospital. He had been in contact with Logan and had gotten updates about how Rory and the baby were doing. Logan also told him they were going through therapy and wanted to try and make this work. Sighing he picked up his phone and sent a message asking if he could join the two of them for dinner one night, there was no time like the present to try and mend bridges.
Odette paced around her brothers Paris apartment and tried to figure out what she needed to do next. After that disastrous lunch she had gone straight to her fathers hotel and he swore that he would help her get even with the Huntzberger's but when he returned from meeting Mitchum his opinion had changed. Her father knew about how she had worked with Shira to keep Logan away from his child and he was unbelievably upset with her. When he told her of the Huntzberger's plan to release pictures of her with Enrique the yoga instructor he yelled at her father for him allowing that family to humiliate her but when he showed her the picture of her and Richard, a married English Duke, she knew she had to back down. According to her father there were more pictures of her and different men but Mitchum had spared him from having to see his daughter in that light. With her father no help she had tried her brother but after he found out what she had done… Revenge was what she wanted, revenge against Logan and that whore but with the media coverage of her relationship with the yoga instructor and the end of her engagement she was the family's black sheep. She had gone from a sought-after socialite to persona no grata. With her change in social standing she knew that she could not go after Logan or that woman and both her father and brother had told her if she attempted revenge she was on her own and would have no family support. She needed to get away, go somewhere where people didn't know her and maybe she could regroup and figure out her next steps. With those thoughts she left the apartment to see her father.
Lorelai paced around her office in the Dragonfly and pondered Shira's threats. So much had happened all those years ago and she had made decisions that she still thought were right. She didn't raise Rory to be a society wife, a trust fund brat but now here she was living in the Gilmore mansion and that probably meant the Emily and Chris had told her about her trusts and inheritance. There was no free money that she could pay the bitch off with, all of her cash was tied up in the annex and she was lucky that she received the money from the mother before everything had happened with Rory. What surprised her is that Emily hadn't reached out to her yet to tell her what she thought but what she realized now was that her mother had cut her out of her life. When the call came saying that she was no loner expected for Christmas, Lorelai had been too happy to question it but after that message, left on the home machine when Lorelai was at work but now she was starting to put together the pieces. Now, she needed to figure out her next step. She could contact her mother and try to reach out to Rory that way and try and get her daughter back in Stars Hollow but now that Logan was involved and back in Rory's life she knew that would be almost impossible to get her daughter and grandchild back where they belonged. Then she had to think about Shira and the possible ramifications of what she did when Rory graduated college. The mother and daughter relationship was damaged and the chance of it being fixed was extremely slim and if Shira told what she knew... if everything else came out… she knew that Rory would never forgive her. Then there was the town, none of the knew that Rory was pregnant and she had only told Luke they had an argument regarding Rory's book and when Jess showed up at Thanksgiving talking about how Rory was throwing away her life… now there was a possibility to try and drive a wedge between Rory and Logan, maybe she could use him again like she did all those years ago. With that thought she pulled out her phone to make a call, if this plan worked she would be able to get the money for Shira and get her daughter back.