Cowboy Daddy

by Hannah McBride

  “I feel pretty good. Not too much nausea anymore.”

  “Have you been having really weird food cravings? I heard that happens.” Sophia could already tell that Marcy was going to become an expert on pregnancy and childbirth overnight and would be as involved as she could be.

  “Not really. I was really wanting broccoli last night, though.”

  “That happens. I heard broccoli is a common craving. You know I’m getting you that book, that What to Expect When You’re Expecting.”

  “Sure,” Sophia shrugged. “Any help I can get. I’ve done a bit of research to create the perfect pregnancy diet. Blake and I still get coffee but I limit it to one a day. No soda. I’ve been doing well and staying active.”

  “Good, good. And emotionally?”

  Sophia couldn’t resist the smile cracking through her worry. “I’m really excited, honestly.” She looked at Marcy with a tender smile and Marcy melted. “I guess I shouldn’t be. But I have always wanted to be a mother.”

  “Why shouldn’t you be happy? You’re not alone, it sounds like. The guys said they would help, so you have nothing to worry about. You should be over the moon.”

  “Yeah, that’s not the issue. It’s my family. I shouldn’t be so happy. I know that I should be panicking. I mean, what am I going to do about my family?”

  Marcy gasped and her eyes widened with understanding.

  “They just won’t understand. My mother will be devastated. They will be so mad I got pregnancy out of wedlock and the fact I don’t know the father….well, they’ll flip out. They can’t know about the Franklins, though, they can’t.”

  “Then don’t tell them,” Marcy suggested with a casual shrug, as if that was the obvious solution. “Just say you don’t know who the dad is. They might get mad and think you’ve been a slut, but let them think that. You’re a grown woman and it doesn’t matter what they think of you. You really don’t have to tell them about this menage thing. Because I agree, they would probably disown you over that. They won’t disown you over you being a slut, but fucking both Franklin brothers? Yeah, no.”

  Suddenly Sophia gasped. “But Tony saw me with Blake!” The memory flooded back of him glaring at her with his piercing dark eyes as she pecked Blake good-bye at the elevator before greeting them at her door. All of them had seen her and viewed her with such searing judgement!

  “What? He did?” Marcy exclaimed. “How did he see that?”

  “Yeah. When he came over and taunted me the way I told you, you know that day he came over with my mother and Angela. Well, he saw Blake and me walking and then I pecked Blake bye to make him jealous. So now he’ll know exactly who I’ve been with.”

  “OK, so say it’s Blake’s.” Marcy still acted as if this was so simple. Obviously she couldn’t put herself in Sophia’s shoes, but Sophia just wished that she could understand more. Could anyone in the world understand? Had anyone ever been in her place in life? She felt so alone.

  “But that will hurt Adam,” Sophia argue. “He will hate having to pretend it’s his brother’s when really it’s…it’s all of ours. I can’t just choose one or the other, or it will hurt all of us.”

  Marcy sucked in her breath and swilled her wine. “Well, I can see that, I guess. But if they really care about you as much as they say, they will do what it takes to keep your family at peace. I mean, your family needs to be involved. You want your kid to know them, right?”

  “Oh, of course. My mother has grandkids already and it’s so sweet seeing her play with them. But I’m her only daughter. She really wanted me to have kids with Tony. It would break her heart never having a relationship with her grandchild. So she needs to know this little one. It will mean a lot to all of us. I can’t cut my family off just because of this.” Suddenly, Sophia burst into tears. “I don’t want to lose my family! But this is who I am! I can’t change and I won’t for them!”

  Marcy seemed a bit confused about what to do. She finally set down her wine and crouched over Sophia, patting her back awkwardly. “Are you going to be OK?” she asked, genuinely worried.

  Really, Marcy meant well. But she had no more answers than Sophia did. Sophia was the one who had to do this and all of it. She had make the decision about how to handle the family issue. All she knew was that she couldn’t lose them and they would disown her if they learned about her…deviant lifestyle. Not that it felt deviant to her. But everyone else would certainly think that. Her mother certainly could never know or she would lose her mind! Forget her normal drama, this would be the end of everything!

  Sophia finally composed herself. “Sorry,” she said, ashamed and avoiding Marcy’s eyes. Marcy had never seen her lose control of her emotions like that, not even after she had caught Tony cheating.

  “It’s fine, girl. You have one hell of a situation here and you know you can cry on my shoulder any time.” Marcy settled back into her seat, still looking concerned. “I just wish there was more I could do to help you. I really don’t have any answers.”

  Sophia nodded. “I have to figure this all out on my own.”

  “Maybe you should call Dr. Phil,” Marcy joked. “I bet you would get right onto the show. He would love to puzzle this one out.”

  Sophia managed a wan smile. “Right. Though I bet he couldn’t even fix this mess.”

  “Do you even have an idea what to do?”

  “I was just thinking I would claim it was some stranger’s baby. Let them judge me for that. Maybe I will say it Adam’s, or something. I don’t know. They have already seen me with Blake.”

  “But didn’t you just say that might hurt one of them?”

  “I know!” Sophia cried out in despair. “I want to stay with Adam and Blake and they want to stay with me. But if the three of us stay together, sooner or later the truth will come out. I just don’t know what to do.”

  Marcy looked as optimistic as she could muster. “We'll figure it out.” As she sipped her wine, she fixed her eyes on the wall, clearly unwilling to look at Sophia. She knew as well as Sophia did that there was no way this was going to end easily or well.

  Sophia could not sleep that night. Her meeting with Marcy had only made her feel more confused. If only some sort of answer might present itself. She prayed to God but felt guilty doing it. Would God even help her, when she had violated His word so thoroughly? Did he even still love her, considering her sexual exploits of late? She felt very far from her faith considering what she had been up to lately. The fact she was pregnant made her feel even worse and further from God.

  “Please bless this baby,” was the final thing she said in her prayer. This was no longer just about her. It was now about another little person, a person she did not even know the name of yet. She was certain it was a son and she planned to name it something cute, like maybe Arden.

  She decided to distract herself by calling the Franklins and talking about baby names. Though they lived almost next door, she wanted to just stay in her place alone. But it was fun to plan for the baby with them. They planned to help her transform the room adjacent to hers into a nursery. They hoped to continue their current living arrangements for now, and maybe consider a nice house in the suburbs later on.

  Chapter 11

  Tony’s secretary buzzed him, declaring that “Mike” was here to see him. He settled back in his seat and straightened his cuffs. “Send him in.” This was a meeting he had been long waiting for.

  Mike shuffled in and gingerly set a manila packet of photos on his desk. He was an unassuming guy, a bit tubby with a huge bald island with an archipelago of graying hair. He peered at Tony nervously over the tops of his round glasses. “Well. There you go.”

  “So what’s she been up to?” Tony asked grimly as he put on his reading glasses. He was steeling himself for the worst. He knew that a woman as beautiful as his ex-wife was probably not single. Plus, he recalled her kissing Blake Franklin by the elevator. Was she with him? Would he view a bunch of sickening photos of those two all over each other?
Maybe she was dating around, with a whole slew of men in and out of her life. The thought of any other man putting his hands on who he still considered rightfully his made his stomach burn.

  Mike hesitated. Tony looked up at him, expectantly. “Well?”

  Mike cleared his throat. “I’ll just let the photos speak for themselves. Now may I have the balance of my fee?” His voice shook as he asked for his money. He really was a good PI, so unassuming, but he had no balls. Tony could read a person from a mile away and he knew from the beginning that he could trust Mike because Mike was a bit afraid of him. As far as Mike knew, this powerful corporate attorney was connected, with hitmen on speed dial.

  Tony handed over a wad of hundreds. He always paid generously and well. This was not his first time using Mike; Mike never left him disappointed. “Expect a bonus next week if you can get me more,” Tony said coolly.

  Mike nodded and hastily dodged out of the office. The secretary stared after him, clearly curious about what on Earth he was seeing Tony for.

  Tony opened the envelope slowly, not really relishing what he was about to see. Mike had made it seem worse than he had thought. It was not out of malice that he had Sophia followed. Sure, some of it had to do with jealousy. But some of it had to do with his unwillingness to let her go. This was his way of keeping tabs on her, of seeing if maybe she would come back to him. He had hoped that she was miserable without him so that she would rush back into his arms when he forgave her for leaving, and he had not expected for her to last this long on her own. He had thought that maybe she was being so stubborn because she thought he would never take her back and it was too late. Honestly, he would always take her back. He had known her his entire life and living without her felt like a hole occupied most of his heart. His life was so empty without her cheerful texts and knowing that she was safely at home, waiting for him, ready to give him anything he wanted. For months now he had waited for her to get over it and stop being silly and yet she kept surprising him, especially when she followed through with the divorce proceedings and went to live on her own in his penthouse.

  But since seeing her with Blake Franklin the other week and having her throw him, his mother, and his mother-in-law out of his penthouse, it seemed that she was way too happy living without him. That filled him with rage that burned at the back of his throat like a swallowed coal. She wasn’t just playing games anymore. She was actually living her own life. And that meant that there was a very real possibility that she would not come back. How can you lose your own soulmate, he thought?

  He laid the pictures out. His stomach was knotting up and hurting. Gingerly, he leaned over and peered at them.

  Of course. There she was with that dumb Blake Franklin guy. They were actually holding hands! What was she thinking, dating a nerdy white guy like that? He was a tech billionaire, and a scrawny excuse of a man compared to his brother. At least Adam dated models and went to outrageous parties. Tony had been to one of their parties and knew that they had a weird lifestyle and orbited around many different crowds, some of them including wild billionaire cokeheads and some of them including celebrities and some of them including weird MIT nerdy guys. But that didn’t diminish his respect for Adam, who never failed to shake his hand firmly and stare him in the eye. Blake, on the other hand, had none of his respect. Blake was the wallflower who liked to smoke pot, as if he wasn’t some important CEO. Blake was the one who had kissed his own wife right in front of him without even speaking to him like a man! Little sniveling brat….Tony’s heart rate shot up as he broiled over the photos of Sophia with her new little boyfriend. So disgusting. She so clearly didn’t belong with that guy!

  He squinted at the next photo in the series. This one seemed different from the others. Now she was kissing…wait, was that the other brother? They were making out as they tumbled out of the back of Adam’s black chauffeured car. It had to be Adam, because Blake didn’t have a car and rode his bike or jogged everywhere, trying to be green. Blake was one of those losers who rode the subway despite having millions just to keep a forest somewhere alive. Plus, Adam had brown hair, and wasn’t a fiery ginger like damn Blake.

  Tony shook his head and shut his eyes before looking again. Yep, that was definitely Adam Franklin! So she was with Blake the day before, and now she was with Adam? What the hell?

  His gut hurt. He could not believe that she was such a slut! Dating two brothers at once? What could possibly be happening here? That lying little slut was leading them both on and lying to them. They couldn’t possibly know about each other. After all, what man would be OK with sharing the same girl?

  And then he saw the next photo. Mike had managed to find an angle that went directly into the living room of the Franklin Bachelor Pad. The blurry image showed Sophia’s brown legs up in the air and a paler man over her. And then the next…it was two men! There were far too many arms and legs waving around against the glass window to be just one! She was being fucked by…two men.

  And the final image showed her getting off the elevator. It was night and she was wearing a long coat and a scarf. Both Franklin brothers were with her. One had his hand on the small of her back and she was cuddled against his shoulder. The other was leaning over to kiss her.

  Tony flung the photos away from himself and they scattered all over the office. He pulled a wastebasket close and threw up into it. As he wiped his mouth, his secretary called saying that his next meeting was coming up.

  “I’m sick. Tell them I have to cancel and go home.” He gathered up his things, collected the scattered photos, put the photos in his briefcase, and left without answering any of Valeria’s questions. Numerous times he had slept with Valeria and she had this idea she was his girlfriend and fussed over him like his mom. He pushed past his other colleagues, who all asked him what was wrong, and went home.

  Rarely did Tony Garcia ever lose his nerve. But seeing those photos had managed to crack the careful and airtight casing that he kept his emotions inside. They erupted inside of him in a volcanic tornado and he felt like he was losing his mind. He wasn’t even sure how he got home. He just had to be home for a while to gather his thoughts and find a plan.

  For every action, there is a consequence, he thought to himself as he made himself a Gin and Tonic in his kitchen. He gulped it down and made another, then went and sat gingerly on his couch. The anger was mostly gone and he was managing to package his emotions neatly again. He felt as he did before a trial, cold and ready to begin preparing every possible angle.

  He hated this apartment compared to the penthouse; Sophia had known just what to take from him in the divorce to hit him hard and get revenge for his fling with Brittany. And now that she was free of him, she was doing everything that she could to rub it in his face. She had gone to the farthest extreme possible to hurt him. This was all just a big show from her, a big fuck-you-Tony. The Catholic schoolgirl he knew would never do something this depraved. She barely even liked to try new stuff in bed; she was no pervert. There was no way she was doing this just for herself; there was some underlying purpose to it. She was trying to show him that she didn’t need him and she was done with him. She had probably even wanted him to find out, the way she kissed Blake in front of him, the way she was letting them both fuck up in front of an open window like that. She could be a vindictive little bitch at times. Like when she went through his phone and found out about Brittany just because he told her she couldn’t.

  There would be recourse for all of this. He would make sure of that. No one hurt him without being punished. Sophia would regret ever betraying him and leaving him to go be a freak with those two perverts.

  She didn’t miss him at all.

  And he was going to make her pay for that.

  ****

  Sophia headed out of the office, another day of work wrapped up. She was excited to go home and prepare an authentic Mexican dish for the Franklins. They were nervous about how hot they could handle Mexican chile peppers, so of course she said she was u
sing the hottest peppers, when really she planned to go easy on them. She was planning to take a taxi from the office to the grocery store to do some shopping on her way home.

  She walked out of her office and just as she rounded the corner to the elevators, there he was. The stony mass that was Tony Garcia. She froze, recognizing the anger he had for her in the flare of his nostrils and the coldness in his eyes. He appraised her coolly, looking her up and down in a way that was scathing and hurtful without any words having to be exchanged. Tony never was shy to let her know when he disapproved of her, as if she were just here to fit his model of how a wife should be and had no personality of her own. The longer she lived without him, the more she realized how horrible he had been and how unhappy she had been living with him.

  “Tony,” she said. She refused to let him intimidate her, which is exactly what he was trying to do. He wasn’t even as tall as he seemed; she knew that he wore lifted shoes to give him a height advantage for his various intimidation tactics.

  “Sophia.”

  “Why are you here?” she asked coldly. She hoisted her purse over her shoulder, pursing her lips and staring him down. She knew better than to break eye contact; doing so would make him think that he had won whatever twisted game he was playing.

  “We need to have a conversation,” he replied. The chill in his voice actually started to scare her. She looked around, and found that she was alone in the hall before the elevator bank.

  Tony grabbed her elbow. She jerked her arm away. She didn’t like how aggressive he was being, towering over her and touching her without her permission.

  “Come with me,” he hissed.

  She glanced around nervously before following to him a fairly private part of the hall, by the bathrooms. Some women walked by and glanced at them. She knew that if she screamed, she could probably get help if she needed it.