Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 99434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 99434 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 497(@200wpm)___ 398(@250wpm)___ 331(@300wpm)
“I had an appointment on the calendar with a new client named Mackenzie. I had no idea Max was short for Mackenzie, so I didn’t think anything of it.” Layla’s voice was eerily calm. “The woman showed up and acted really strange. She had a little girl sleeping in the stroller. She said her partner stole six million dollars from her. Then her daughter woke up and—she was beautiful…. She had your exact same green eyes. Only I didn’t realize they were yours at first. When I complimented them, she said the little girl had her father’s eyes.”
“And she said it was my child?”
“You really had no idea?” She looked back and forth between my eyes.
“Of course not!” I stood and began to pace. “This is fucking nuts. I can’t have a child with her.”
“Why not?”
“Why would she have kept it from me?”
“Why would she steal from you and set you up when you both had more money than you knew what to do with already?”
I sat back down. With elbows on my knees, I held my head in my hands while I rubbed my temples. “I can’t answer that. Because none of it ever made sense to me.”
Layla was quiet for a moment. Her voice sounded so vulnerable and scared when she spoke. “You really didn’t know?”
It was at least the third time she’d asked me that question. Jesus Christ. I was so busy getting over the shock of what she’d told me, I hadn’t even begun to think about what this meant to the two of us if it were true. Looking up, I saw so much pain in her eyes. Suddenly everything I’d waited to have for more than two years felt like it was slipping through my fingers.
I got up and walked back around behind her desk, where she still sat in her chair. Crouching down again, I took her face in my hands. “I haven’t seen Max in more than a year. Last I’d heard, she’d moved to Florida. I didn’t even know she was in New York, and certainly not that she was coming to see you and playing some sort of sick game. I had no idea she had a child, and I wouldn’t put it past her for this entire thing to be made up, Layla. You have to believe me.” I moved my face closer so all we could see was into each other’s eyes. “I had absolutely no idea about any of this. No idea.”
She searched my face and nodded.
I let out a sigh of relief, even though I knew it was only temporary.
The sound of keys jingling forced my attention from Layla to the hall, just as a uniformed security guard stopped in the doorway. “Building closing in fifteen, Layla.”
She nodded. “Oh. Okay, Frank. Thanks.”
The guard looked at her face and me crouched down beside her. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah. Everything’s fine. We’ll clear out in a few minutes.”
He nodded. “Have a good night.”
When he walked away, I pushed hair from her cheek. “You look exhausted. Come home with me.”
She shook her head and started to sweep all the papers strewn over her desk into a pile with her hands. “I have Freckles at my house, remember? Plus, I’m exhausted. I really want to sleep in my own bed tonight.”
She was already slipping away from me mentally. I couldn’t let physical distance add to that. “Can I come home with you, then?”
I saw the hesitancy in her face.
“I’ll sleep on the couch if you need some space. Just don’t push me out the door and close it, Layla. Please.”
Reluctantly, she nodded.
That night, she let me sleep in her bed. I wrapped my arms around her and pulled her tight, holding on for my life. Because I knew. I knew. The shit was about to hit the fan tomorrow.
Chapter 24
* * *
Layla
The bed was empty next to me in the morning. Cold, too.
Daylight wasn’t yet shining through the blinds from outside, but I had no idea if it was the middle of the night or early in the morning. Reaching for my phone to check the time, I spotted the kitchen light on from underneath my closed bedroom door.
Five AM. I wasn’t a late riser, but it had taken me a long time to fall asleep, even after I’d rolled over and pretended to have conked out. So this morning, I was dragging. Part of me wanted to roll back over and forget everything, but I knew sleep wouldn’t come. I needed to get up and take a shower, think about everything that had transpired with the clear head of a new day. But I also needed to know if Gray was still here. I sensed he was, so I got out of bed and padded from the bedroom.
I found him with a coffee cup in his hand, staring at the screen of his laptop in the living room. The overhead light was off, but the glow of the screen illuminated his face. Gray was always handsome. It would be impossible to not see that through any emotions he wore; his chiseled bone structure didn’t allow the beauty to disappear like it did with some men, depending on their mood. But this morning he looked tired. His green eyes reflected the dark circles under them and looked strained from lack of sleep.