Total pages in book: 28
Estimated words: 25896 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 129(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 25896 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 129(@200wpm)___ 104(@250wpm)___ 86(@300wpm)
In that moment, she saw herself through his eyes as nothing more than a hookup.
“Okay, Trey. Give me a minute and I’ll be right back.” She smiled kindly at the little guy, picked his chart up off the bed, and left the bay.
“Maisie,” Rhys called her name, but she didn’t stop. She counted on him not following her out of the bay because hopefully he wouldn’t leave his son alone.
She set the chart on the counter and asked one of her coworkers to take over for her. “I’m not feeling well,” she said. “I think I’m coming down with something.”
“You should go home then,” her boss said. Maisie nodded and made her way to the locker room. She changed quickly, and all but ran to her car. Inside, she gripped her steering wheel and rested her head against her hands.
Maisie sat there until her phone rang. She looked at the screen and saw Rhys’s name. She ignored the call and turned her car on. The drive home felt like it took hours instead of minutes.
“Hey, I’m home,” she yelled to Dorian when she entered the apartment.
Dorian came around the corner, shocked to see her roommate. “What’s wrong?”
“He has a kid.”
“Who?”
“Rhys. Mr. Rich Guy, who lives in a fucking mansion, has a son. He’s three. And he has the same name as his dad.”
“No way.” Dorian came toward her, mouth open in shock.
“Way. He brought him in because he’s not feeling well and had me paged to take care of his kid. The son he forgot to tell me about. Like, why?”
“You were in his apartment, doesn’t he have pictures of him?”
Maisie shrugged and plopped onto the couch. “If he does, they weren’t up. He probably put them away before he brought me over so I wouldn’t see them.”
Dorian sat next to Maisie. “Are you upset because he has a kid?”
“Nope. I’m mad because he didn’t tell me. I get wanting to protect your child from whoever you’re fucking, but Jesus Christ, at least say ‘hey, I have a three-year-old’ instead of fucking hiding him. It’s not as if he didn’t have plenty of time to tell me about him.”
“Honestly, it does seem odd.”
“Like I get the first date, but he asked me out again, and we spent the weekend together. I’d like to think that at some point in between him sticking his dick in me, he could’ve said, ‘oh by the way, I have a son’ but clearly, it’s either not important to him or he saw me as a hook up.”
Maisie’s phone rang again. She ignored Rhys’s call and cleared the notifications. She didn’t even look at how many times he’d texted her. There was nothing he could say. As far as she was concerned, Rhys was red flag central.
Dorian had to go back to work and Maisie decided the best way to nurse her broken and pissed off heart was with a tub of ice cream and whatever show she could binge. She hated feeling sorry for herself, but this was unavoidable.
Rhys Wainwright the II was too good to be true, and she knew better than to think she could land someone like him.
ten
As soon as Maisie walked in, and he saw the look on her face, he knew he had majorly fucked up. Rhys had every intention of telling Maisie about Trey over the weekend, but was so swept up in being with her, he never found the right moment.
And now it was too late.
This definitely wasn’t the right way for her to find out. But when Trey’s daycare called and said he wasn’t feeling well, all he could think about was having him seen by someone he trusted.
Except he didn’t trust her enough to tell her about his son.
Another nurse came in and treated Trey. Rhys wanted to ask where Maisie had gone, but figured he had no right—he’d lost that as soon as she walked in and saw his mini-me sitting on the hospital bed.
They sent Trey home with strict instructions to rest. His flu test came back negative, and the nurse said it was likely just an upset stomach. No cause for worry.
Rhys was worried, though.
He really liked Maisie and had ruined everything.
“Hey, bud, we’re going to stop at the store real quick,” he said to Trey while looking at him through the rearview mirror. Trey nodded but kept his attention on Fenway, who laid her head on his leg.
Rhys kept the windows cracked open for Fenway and rushed into the store with Trey on his hip. He put his son into the cart and went right to the floral department.
“For grandma?” Trey asked when he saw the bouquet in Rhys’s hand.
“No, for Maisie.”
Trey blinked at his father in confusion. “She wistened to my heart.”
Rhys nodded. “She’s my friend. We’re going to go see her.”