Another Chance With Love (Chance Series Book 2)
Page 4
I said goodbye as quickly as I could because I knew I wouldn’t be able to hold back the stream of curse words that were ready to erupt from my mouth. No matter how composed she was, I knew if I’d said what I needed to say, she’d be on a plane to Atlanta with the sole intention of whipping my ass. Which she’d only done once in my life, and that was when I shot at and barely missed my neighbor’s cat with a BB gun I’d just gotten for Christmas.
After hanging up, the rage still filled me. Everything that happened two years before, when my mom literally ended my relationship with the only man I’d ever loved and probably ever would love, combined with my stupidity at not listening to him and taking her side when I knew he was telling the truth. Martin had always told me the truth, it’s the very thing that made me fall in love with him in the first place.
When Martin called on Sunday afternoon, I was mortified as well as angry. He told me how well it had gone and how thankful he was that Matilda had gone to all that trouble to apologize. “It’s just the healing I needed,” he admitted.
I could tell by his voice something had shifted in him since we’d spoken last summer, when I showed up at his parent’s place trying to get him back. I’d been mourning his loss since then, and the anger with my mom only magnified from there.
“I’m getting married, Peter,” he said, and I thought my world was going to crumble from under me. “I had a hard time letting his family in, and that’s because I kept waiting for the next shoe to drop. But your mom coming out here, that helped, it made it better.”
My voice cracked a bit. “Is he good to you?”
I could hear in Martin’s voice how much he must care about the guy. “Yeah, he’s really good to me.”
“I’m glad, Martin. You deserve the best.”
“Peter, go easy on your mom. I spent the past two years hating her, but she really regrets what happened. With the tumor, it really wasn’t her fault. I’ve even looked up the kind she said she had, and her behavior wasn’t atypical at all.”
Somehow, he ended up telling me the private investigator’s name and how he’d set up some kind of ruse to get my mom into his office. Martin laughed about how it had worked, but all I could see was red.
Having the man’s name was all I needed. I wished Martin all the luck in the world. After hanging up, I wrapped up all my anger at my mother, myself, and the situation with Martin, and put all my energy into finding the investigator. And by God, even if I ended up in jail for the rest of my life, I was going to give that man what he had coming.
I arrived at his office at seven the next morning, which was an hour before they opened, and waited, and stewed in my own juices until some poor woman showed up to unlock the front door. Luckily, years of training by a single mother had taught me not to put a woman by herself in a situation where she was dealing with an angry man, so I waited until more people showed up before I went in.
The lady I’d seen come in first was at the front desk.
“Hi and welcome, how can I help you?” The woman’s perky morning attitude grated on me that much more.
“Where is Trevor Kovachich?” I asked.
The secretary looked at me with concern on her face.
“I’m sorry, sir. Mr. Kovachich works from home most days. I don’t think he’s coming in today.”
“Then you call that son of a bitch and tell him to get his meddling ass down here cause I’m not leaving until I can see him face to face.”
The woman didn’t even ask me to have a seat. Instead, she excused herself, which was probably best since I was spun tight enough to explode.
When she returned, another woman was in tow, who escorted me back toward an office with minimal furniture and decor. “This is Mr. Kovachich’s office,” she said. “I’ll call him and see if he can make it in.”
Then she left and was gone for several minutes. I wondered if I was about to be escorted off the premises by some brute or even the cops, but I didn’t give a damn. I was going to talk to this man if it killed me. So I could kill him!
The woman returned a few minutes later and said that Mr. Kovachich was on his way, but he wouldn’t be there for at least an hour, maybe more.
“I’ll wait right here until he arrives!” I said with as much venom as I could put into the words. It shocked me, but when I looked at the woman, it appeared she was trying to stifle a smile. Did she think it was funny?
That just stoked the fire in me once again. I sat for a full hour building steam before the man walked into his office. When I confronted him, he didn’t act like he knew what I was talking about, so I spelled it out, all while resisting the urge to take a punch at his well-developed chin.
Before I could react, however, a loud screech sounded from somewhere behind him. The man’s face paled, and he quickly ducked out of the room. When he returned, he was carrying an infant that was screaming like an Irish banshee.
The man frantically searched through a baby bag until he found a bottle. He quickly knocked the top off and stuck it into the baby’s mouth. At first, the infant appeared to refuse it. But after some soft talk and cajoling, the baby accepted the bottle and snuggled into the man.
The relief on the man’s face was instant. “That was his no-nonsense cry. You gotta get it under control when it first starts, or there are hours and hours… and hours of screaming. It would’ve been the end of any meeting if I hadn’t calmed him down. Sorry, you were saying?”
When I looked at the baby who was happily sucking the bottle, then back up at the man, I realized instantly he was the one I’d seen that day months ago when his girlfriend had dumped the baby on him.
Call it a miracle, or the magic associated with a happy baby, but my anger flowed right out of me at the memory. I suddenly didn’t know why I was there, and when the anger faded, exhaustion crept in to take its place.
“My mom shouldn’t have hired you to do that,” I finally said.
The man stared at me for a moment. “Do you have a car?” he finally asked, shocking me.
I raised an eyebrow in confusion. “Yeah, why?”
“Cause I’m going to let you take me out to breakfast since you dragged me and this little ball of anger out so early this morning, and I’ll tell you all about your mom and how everything shook out.”
I stared at him, thinking maybe he was a little off, but I was curious about the details. Not only that, I was also curious about what had happened to this man since I’d seen him on that day after New Year’s when he first learned he was a dad.
After several tries, we got the baby carrier secured in my little convertible’s back seat.
When he said he didn’t care where we ate, I, maybe a little vengefully, took us to the diner where I’d seen his girlfriend leave the baby with him.
When he noticed where we were, he blanched a little. But to his credit, he didn’t complain.
We got out and walked inside. The server who’d served him that day squealed from behind the counter. “Oh My God!” she said. “I wondered if we were going to see you again.” She ran over and started playing with the baby while the guy looked on with a smile on his face. “Can I hold him?”
“Of course,” the guy replied, and he removed the baby from the carrier and handed him to her.
At first, I waited for the little one to scream as he had before, but maybe because of his full belly, he didn’t seem to mind. “He needs to be burped, though,” he said to her. “So be careful you don’t end up with spit-up all over you.”
“Don’t you worry, I’ve got experience with such things. Can I take him back and show him off to the other staff?”
The guy just laughed. “I’m sure they all want to meet him, huh?”
The lady appeared shy. “You’ve been the talk of this place since that day.”
“I’m sure,” he said but in good spirits. “His name’s Luka. I didn’t know at the time, but that’s his name.”
The woman replied. “Hi there Luka, you look so much like your dadd
y. I bet you’re stealing hearts everywhere you go.”
I turned toward the guy who cocked an eyebrow at the comment but didn’t say anything.
“You two go on over there and sit down. I’m afraid it’s going to be a moment before you get any service cause we need time to make-over this little piece of cuteness, but one of us will get to you eventually.”
“Take your time.” the guy said, still grinning.
We sat down at the table the woman pointed out and pretended to look at the menu. Each of us tried figuring out how to proceed with our awkward conversation. The drive over had been filled with the guy trying to keep the baby quiet. My BMW was clearly not designed for a baby, so it was difficult for him to turn and keep the bottle in the little one’s mouth. That meant we hadn’t really had a conversation until now.
The entire staff was behind the counter, each one crooning over the little one. The guy across from me got up, grabbed a coffee pot from the ledge behind us that the server left there when we came in, and poured himself a cup of coffee. “You want some?” he asked.
I nodded, still unsure what to say.
As he poured my coffee, he chuckled. “We might as well enjoy this cause I’m doubting anyone will get service as long as Luka is here.”
“Why did you take my mom to Florida?” I finally asked.
“Because she hired me,” he said in a matter-of-fact tone.
“But that was the worst thing you could’ve done. It was unethical.”
The man put the coffee pot back on the ledge and sat down. This time looking me in the face.
“I’m not sure how much of this you know, but I’ll start at the beginning. When your mom came to me, she was hell-bent on having me follow you to figure out why you were ignoring her.” His good humor continued as he chuckled a bit at the understatement. “Knowing that was not a good thing to do, I discouraged her.”
“I can thank you for that, at least.”
The guy laughed out loud this time. “Oh, trust me, I know that a mom hiring a private investigator to track her son would not be the best way to make amends. Hell, I just came out to mine at Christmas.”
“Shit,” I replied. “Then you found out you had a baby?”
The guy looked at me, warily. “I’m going to let that comment sit for a moment until I’ve finished my story, then you can tell me how you knew that.”
I nodded, knowing I’d given away more information than I’d meant to.
“Anyway,” the guy continued. “When I found out what she’d said to your ex, I asked her why she hadn’t tried to make amends with him. That’s what I think put all the ideas in her head.”
I could feel the anger picking up, and I tried to wrestle it back down until I could at least get the rest of the story.
“Long story short, your mother couldn’t find Martin in Austin and hired my company to find where he’d gone. She said something about how your grandfather used to say that you had to clean up your own mess, or something along those lines. After we found him, she decided to go to Fort Lauderdale to make amends.” The guy locked eyes with me, daring me to contradict him as he continued. “I didn’t know anything about your ex or anything else for that matter, so when she told me she was bound to talk to the guy, I convinced her to hire me as her escort. At the very least, I could keep her safe while she went about it.”
When he finished his story, I leaned back, exhaustion hitting me again. “I wish she hadn’t gone,” I said with a sigh.
“I’m sure you do, but I was there, and the whole experience was a beautiful thing to watch. Martin, your ex, was angry when he first saw her, but as she apologized, something happened between them. Healing on both sides. It might not have been what you’d have wished, but it worked out well in the end.”
“That’s what Martin said,” I admitted, rational thought only now sinking in for the first time since I’d talked to my mother on Friday.
“It’s not any of my business, but if you’ll excuse my prying, you might consider letting your mom off the hook regarding all this. At least a bit.”
I narrowed my eyes at him. “You’re just trying to save your skin now you don’t have a baby to protect you.”
He laughed. “Well, maybe, but if I’d been too scared of you, I probably wouldn’t have asked you to take us out to breakfast.”
Within seconds, the woman brought the baby back. “If you ever need a sitter, I could hook you up with about three of my servers.”
He winked at her. “Careful, I might take you all up on that. And just so you know, it might take all three of you to watch him since he seems to have inherited his mother’s stubborn disposition.”
The mention of Luka’s mother caused the woman’s face to cloud over. I could tell she wanted to ask more, but instead, she asked in a falsely chipper voice, “So, have you decided what you’re gonna have?”
“I’m having the Falcon’s special,” he replied.
“I’ll have the same,” I said.
After we’d got our eggs and other stuff on our order worked out, the woman disappeared.
“So, your turn. How did you know I found out I was a dad after coming out to my parents? Are you a private investigator as well?”
I felt my face turn red. I was going to have to confess that I’d set him up by bringing him here.
“You and your ex were here right after Christmas at the same time I was. I was with my friend, and we watched the whole ordeal go down. I didn’t recognize you until you brought the baby in with you.”
I could see the realization dawning on him. Why I’d chosen this place for breakfast, and he laughed out loud.
“So, you were getting me back by bringing me here?”
When he said it out loud, I felt like a total ass. “I’m afraid so.”
“Touché,” he replied. “Touché.”
Things got awkward between us then, and neither of us knew what to say. Luckily, the food arrived, and we had a moment to collect our thoughts.
“So, what’s it like to be the parent of an infant?” I asked.
He thought for a moment then shrugged. “It’s like you’ve probably been told. No sleep, no life, but probably because of the sleep deprivation, you’re absolutely gaga over the little shit, nonetheless.”
I chuckled. “I normally wouldn’t pry, but since you’ve been in the middle of my pitiful life, I feel like I have some leeway here. Have you and his mother made amends yet?”
The guy looked at me, and something akin to misery crossed his face.
“She was my best friend. This was all the result of a night of bad choices, and no, she won’t speak to me or return my texts or calls… she’s completely out of contact.”
“That sucks...hell, that’s almost as bad as my fucked-up life.”
He chuckled humorlessly. “No, this is worse. I have a little man who’ll one day demand I explain how I chased his mom off. I seriously doubt he’ll be as forgiving as Martin was with your mom.”
I nodded and stared down at my food. “So, it really did work out between them?”
The guy smiled at me. “Yeah, it really did. I was touched by it. My parents suck worse than most. If it wasn’t for my grandpa, I would’ve probably ended up in foster care. To see your mom go to that much effort to make amends really touched me. I think both of them healed some that day, but watching it healed a part of me as well.”
I pondered what he’d said, thinking for the first time about how it really had healed them both.
“I think what set me off was that my mom once again went behind my back on this. She caused me to lose him, then she went to talk to him without my consent.”
“Would you have gone with her?” he asked.
“Hell, no, I’d have done everything in my power to keep her away from him.”
The guy chuckled. “So you understand why she did it behind your back.”
“Understand, yes, like, no!”
He looked at me and smiled but didn’t respond.
Seconds after he left, the server showed back up to refill our coffees.
“Are you his boyfriend?” she asked.
I laughed. “Hardly. Besides, how did you know he was bisexual?”
“Oh, I heard him tell his baby’s mom that day. I just assumed he’d have a boyfriend as cute as he was. You aren’t that bad looking either. The two of you would make a cute couple.”
I snickered. I was ready to smear his face all over his office just a few hours ago and might have done so had a certain little person not gotten in the middle of it all.
“We’re on professional terms,” I replied. “He worked for my mother recently.”
“Oh,” she replied, then winked at me. “Worked for, as in past tense?” I just stared at her as she laughed. “Well, ain’t no law about dating someone who worked, as in past tense, for your mom. Just sayin’,” she said as she walked away.
I hadn’t really thought about what the guy looked like until now. Which is odd for me since I’m a typical gay guy in that regard and usually size up any potential men when I meet them. The man was shorter than me and definitely had a Mediterranean complexion, which usually did lots for me. I liked men with a little Latin flair.
When he came back out of the restroom, baby in hand, he sat back down to finish his food.
“Everything come out, okay?” I asked, tongue in cheek.
He groaned. “Not my favorite part of the job.” He leaned over his son and tickled his belly. “We’re working on potty training early, aren’t we sport?” he cooed. Then in all seriousness, he said, “I’ve convinced myself he’s going to be advanced for his age and potty train before he’s a year old.”
I laughed at the comment. “I’m not an expert on babies, but I’m willing to bet you’ll have to wait longer than that.”
He put his hand up in front of me. “Shh, I want to hear no negativity… if you will it, it’ll come. At least that’s what my aunt keeps telling me. So I’m willing early potty training.”