Ego Maniac

by Vi Keeland

“We’re going!”

  “You’re not taking him on the road to follow a bunch of race car drivers around the country and home schooling him! Go, if you want to go, but Beck is staying here.”

  “What is he going to do here with you? You work sixty hours a week.”

  “I make it work. At least here he has his school, his routine, his home.”

  “You don’t make it work. You dump him on a babysitter. I’ve heard more about the new sitter this morning than you. And apparently she’s not even competent to watch him since his hand is burned.”

  Shit.

  The yelling quieted, and I knew Drew was trying to get himself under control. I pictured his jaw clenching and flexing as he breathed in fire and attempted to push out ice.

  When he finally spoke, his tone was more than angry; it teetered on lethal. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. I don’t ship my son off to a babysitter. He was with me or my girlfriend the entire time, and he was well cared for.”

  “Girlfriend?” Alexa spat. “You’re bringing my son around your fuck of the month now?”

  “Our son.” Drew growled. “And she isn’t a fuck of the month. Unlike you, I’ve never introduced Beck to anyone I was seeing casually. All the times he’s mentioned random men being around, I’ve kept my mouth shut and trusted you were being careful and respectful around him. And I expect the same in return for Emerie.”

  “Emerie? The woman I met in the lobby? You’re fucking the hired help?”

  “We’re sharing space. She’s a psychologist, not the hired help. And what the fuck would it matter to you if she swept the floor here? At least she has a job. You should try it. It might make you appreciate the thousand-dollar boots you’re wearing right now.”

  “I’m raising our son. It’s a full-time job.”

  “Funny how he’s our son when I’m footing the bill for that full-time job. But yours when you want to take him on a NASCAR tour of redneck country.”

  “I’m taking him,” she snapped

  “You’re not taking him.”

  “I don’t think it’s something you want to fight about. Beck should get to know his father and spend time with him.”

  I braced myself for the roar I knew was coming.

  “He is spending time with his father!”

  “I meant his biological father.”

  “That wasn’t my choice. You made sure of that. God knows I wouldn’t have fucking married you had I known you were a whore carrying another man’s child!”

  “Screw you!”

  “Get out, Alexa. Just get the fuck out.”

  Even though I knew it was coming, I jumped when she whipped open Drew’s office door, and it slammed against the wall. Alexa left a wake of stomps and crashes behind her.

  I waited in my office for a few minutes, unsure whether I should give Drew time to cool off or attempt to comfort him. Eventually, when I heard nothing but silence, I decided to check on him.

  Drew’s chair was pushed back from his desk, and he sat with his elbows on his knees and his head in his hands.

  “You okay?” I asked softly.

  He didn’t look up when he answered. His voice was hoarse. “Yeah.”

  I took a few hesitant steps into his office. “What can I do?”

  Drew shook his head a few times, then looked up. “Can you make me that little boy’s real father?” My heart clenched in my chest when I saw his defeated expression. His eyes were red and filled with unshed tears, and I felt the pain I could see on his face.

  I knelt before him. “You are his real father, Drew.”

  Even though he was listening to me, I wasn’t getting through. So I decided to share a story I’d never told anyone.

  “When I was nineteen, I decided I wanted to know who my birth mother was. I have no idea why; nothing had gone wrong. I was just curious, I think. Anyway, my adoption was open, so the information was there if I wanted it. Not wanting to hurt my parents’ feelings, I decided not to tell them and got the information on my own.”

  Drew was paying attention now, so I continued. “One Saturday, I told my parents I was going to a friend’s house and instead drove four hours across the state to the address where my birth mother lived. I sat outside her house and waited until she came out. Then I followed her to where she worked at a diner. After a couple more hours, I got up the nerve to actually go inside. I’d watched through the window, so I knew what section she was serving and requested a table near the window so she would be my waitress.”

  Even though Drew was the one hurting, he reached out and squeezed my shoulder for encouragement. “What happened?”

  “She came over to take my order, and I bumbled every word that came out of my mouth. But I managed to order toast and tea while I stared at her.” I paused, thinking back to that day. “She had red hair.”

  Drew stroked my cheek.

  “Anyway, while she was taking an order at the table next to me, my phone rang, and I saw it was my mother. I let it go to voicemail because I thought maybe she’d found out what I was doing somehow and was angry. But when I listened to her message, she’d just wanted to check in on me and see if everything was alright. She said I’d seemed a little down the day before. Needless to say, I felt guilty as hell. When the waitress—my birth mother—came to deliver my toast a few minutes later, I was crying. She looked right at me and never even asked if I was okay. Couldn’t wait to dump the toast on the table and disappear.”

  I sighed. “I took one more look at the woman who had given birth to me and realized my mother was the woman who’d left me the voicemail. I was biologically connected to that waitress, and she didn’t feel anything different for me than a complete stranger. Because that’s what I was…a complete stranger. I threw a twenty on the table and never looked back.”

  I caught Drew’s eyes. “Being a parent is a choice, not a right. I really didn’t understand why my parents celebrated Gotcha Day until then. You’re Beck’s dad, no different than Martin Rose is mine. Anyone can become a father, but it takes a real dad to love and raise a child as his own.”

  “Come here.” Drew lifted me from the floor onto his lap. He pushed a lock of hair behind my ear. His previously angry and sad eyes had warmed. “Where’d you come from?”

  “I broke in and showed you my ass, remember?”

  He laughed, and I felt a little of the tension dissipate when he wrapped me in his arms and kissed the top of my head. “Thank you. I needed that.”

  I was thrilled to have soothed him. Because Drew had been with Beck all week, this was actually the first afternoon we’d had alone in as long.

  “I don’t have an appointment for another two hours, if there’s anything else you need.”

  Drew was standing with me cradled in his arms practically before I finished the sentence. I yelped at the sudden motion. Expecting him to have me spread-eagled right there on his desk, I was surprised when he began marching toward the office door.

  “No desk sex?” I asked.

  “The desk is for fucking. I want to make love to you.”

  Drew

  I could get used to this.

  I’d just gotten out of the shower and walked into the kitchen. Emerie was standing at the stove wearing one of my dress shirts, which hung to her knees, and making something that smelled almost as good as she did. Music was playing, and I hung back in the doorway and watched as she swayed from side, singing some song I didn’t recognize.

  As if sensing me, after a minute she turned and smiled. “Breakfast is almost done.”

  I nodded but stayed put another minute, enjoying watching her. Five days ago, after Alexa had stomped in and started in on me about wanting to take Beck on a road trip, I’d assumed my week would be shit—as was typical after one of our arguments. But Emerie had a way of calming me, making me focus on the positive. It might also have helped that she’d been in my bed every night to help me alleviate any stress, and that I’d woken this morning to her head beneath the covers and
her tongue licking me like I was a lollipop.

  She smiled and winked with a blush. “Go sit. My turn to feed you.”

  Yeah. There’s a distinct possibility I could get used to this.

  “What time is your first appointment?” I asked. We’d finished breakfast, then I’d fucked her on the kitchen counter before cleaning up the dishes while she got ready. Now she was brushing some shit onto her eyelashes as she leaned in to the mirror.

  “Ten. But I need to run to my apartment first. You?”

  “No appointments until this afternoon, but I have to draft a motion and get it over to family court by then. What do you need from your apartment?”

  “Clothes. Unless you think I can get away with a belt and heels with this?” She gestured to my dress shirt, which hung open, and she had nothing on underneath it. Loving the easy access, I cupped one tit in my hand before reaching down and kissing her perky nipple.

  “Why don’t you keep some clothes here for the nights you stay over, so you don’t have to run home commando in your clothes from the day before?” Even though the statement came without much thought, it didn’t freak me out after I’d put it out there. Odd.

  Emerie looked up at me. “Are you offering me a drawer?”

  I shrugged. “Take half the closet, if you want. I don’t like the idea of you running around the city with your skirt and no underwear on in the mornings—even though I don’t really get why you can’t just turn them inside out and wear ’em again.”

  She crinkled up her nose. “That’s a guy thing.”

  After she finished putting on the makeup she kept in her purse, she got dressed and went back to her apartment. I called Alexa and left a message that I’d be by to pick Beck up for the weekend about five tonight.

  Grateful that her voicemail had answered instead of her, I went downstairs to get some work done, still in my good mood—only to be greeted by a process server waiting at my door. I was a divorce lawyer; it wasn’t unusual to be served first thing in the morning. It was unusual for the service to be from an Atlanta court.

  I’d just finished reading the same paragraph in the motion for the fifth time.

  Changes have occurred since the last custody judgment that necessitate a modification in the child visitation order. The changes were unknown at the time of the final decree and justify a revision to the custody arrangement.

  It was the next part that had me sitting in my chair, rather than heading to Alexa’s apartment, because I feared what I was capable of after reading the rest.

  Annexed hereto, paternity has been established for Levi Archer Bodine and not the defendant granted visitation in the final decree of custody.

  The petitioner requests a modification from equal shared custody to allow the defendant visitation every other weekend for a period of eight hours. The increased visitation of the petitioner is to allow time for the introduction of the biological father to the minor subject child.

  Further, the defendant’s shared custody should be reduced based upon recent incidents of child neglect. Namely, the defendant has engaged in conduct which put the subject child at risk by exposing the child to known criminals. As a direct result of that conduct, the subject child has been injured.

  Wherefore, the petitioner has reason to be concerned about the safety of the minor subject child and requests an immediate modification of the custody decree.

  The annexed documentation in support of the petition included a copy of the purported criminal’s most recent arrest and an emergency room report. The criminal was Emerie, and of course, it was only a partial copy of the charges of indecent exposure. There was no mention that she’d been a teenager or that the charge was reduced last month. In addition to that crock of shit, there was a copy of the emergency room report bearing the diagnosis of accidental burn, along with an affidavit from a nurse that verified Beck was brought in with his father and the woman who had been watching him at the time of the injury: Emerie Rose.

  After the third time I reached voicemail, I couldn’t take it anymore and headed to Alexa’s in person. It wasn’t the smartest idea, considering the mood I was in, but I needed to have it out with her. I had only one thing to lord over this woman, but I had lots of it: money. I wasn’t above paying her to cut this shit out. Again. This little game was retaliation for telling her she couldn’t take Beck on a two-week tour following the NASCAR circuit. She needed to show me who was in control. I knew my ex-wife; she was cunning and all about making sure she had the upper hand. Our fight, and likely seeing Emerie, had left her feeling that I needed to be put in my place.

  The first knock on her apartment door went unanswered and only served to piss me off and make me knock louder. After two impatient minutes, I took out my key. When I’d kicked Alexa out and rented her this place, I’d kept a key for myself. There’d never been an occasion to use it, but I was done with her avoiding me.

  The lock was jammed, but after a minute of jiggling the key around, I felt some sense of relief hearing the loud clank as it slid open. Not wanting to get smacked in the head with a pan, I cracked the door open and yelled.

  “Alexa?”

  No answer.

  A second time. “Alexa?”

  The hallway was quiet, and there wasn’t a sound coming from inside the apartment. Deciding it was safe, I pushed the door open.

  And my heart stopped when I saw what was inside.

  Emerie

  Something was going on.

  Office doors had been slamming for the entire last half of my telephone counseling session. In the past ten minutes, yelling had started as well. One voice was a very pissed-off Drew, and the other was Roman, who’d recently arrived. He frequently did investigations for Drew, but whatever was happening seemed way more personal than just a case.

  After apologizing again to my patients—lying and telling them I was going to have a word with the construction crew about their language—I hung up and started toward my closed office door. I stopped upon hearing my name.

  “Emerie? What the hell has she got to do with this?”

  “Alexa basically told the court that I’m sleeping with an ex-con.”

  “An ex-con? What’d she do? Get a parking ticket?”

  “It’s a long story, but she was arrested for indecency last month.”

  “What?”

  “Happened when she was a teenager. It was an appearance ticket for skinny dipping that turned into a warrant because she hadn’t paid it. It’s a misdemeanor…nothing more serious than a parking ticket. But, of course, Alexa is making it out to be something more. The petition calls her an ex-con with a penchant for indecent exposure. And she also added in that it was the same ex-con who recently caused Beck to get burned.”

  “Fuck.”

  “Yeah. Fuck. That’s not the worst part. I could talk my way out of that in a New York court with the shit the judges hear here every day. But she filed the change of custody motion in Atlanta.”

  “How can she do that when you both live here?”

  “I just came from her apartment. She’s gone. Doorman said she left yesterday and gave a forwarding address. Her place is empty. She fucking moved!”

  Drew wasn’t a heavy drinker. He had the occasional glass of whiskey or a beer or two, but slamming them back wasn’t something I’d seen him do.

  Until tonight.

  Even though he’d assured me that none of it was my fault, I still felt guilty as the catalyst for making him look like an unfit parent.

  We sat in Drew’s apartment; both of us had cleared our afternoon schedules. I’d promised Roman that Drew would be at the airport for their flight tomorrow morning. The two of them were flying down to Atlanta to attempt to talk to Alexa, and I was really glad Drew wasn’t going alone. He couldn’t even say his ex-wife’s name without growling.

  Closing the door behind Roman, I locked the top lock, picked up Drew’s drink from the kitchen counter and dumped the rest down the drain. Then I went to the couch where he lay wi
th one arm covering his eyes. His legs were longer than the couch, and his feet dangled over the end. I unlaced his shoes and began to take them off.

  “You trying to get me naked?” Drew slurred. “Fuck the shoes. Take off my pants.”

  I smiled. Even loaded, the man was still himself. “It’s almost eleven o’clock. Your flight is in ten hours. I figure you need to get some sleep. The morning may not be too kind to your head.”

  His large shoes clomped to the floor as I slipped them off, followed by his socks.

  “I can’t lose my son.”

  My heart broke, hearing the anguish in his cracked voice.

  “You won’t. If you can’t buy her off, you’ll convince a judge that your son needs you and belongs with you.”

  “There’s not much justice in our justice system. People like me twist it into a game every day.”

  I didn’t know how to respond to that. I just wanted to do whatever I could to make him feel better. So I slipped off my own shoes, crawled up on the couch, and wrapped my arms around him, snuggling against his chest.

  “I’m sorry this is happening. It’s so clear how much you love that little boy. A judge has to see that.”

  He squeezed me in response, and a few minutes later, after I thought he’d drifted off to sleep, he spoke again, his words barely a whisper.

  “You want kids, Oklahoma?”

  “I do. I’d love to have a few and maybe adopt, too.”

  “You’re going to be a good mom someday.”

  “We couldn’t find her. The address she left for forwarding was her brother’s place. Guy’s a loser. Got to his place at two o’clock, and he was still sleeping,” Drew’s chuckle rumbled over the phone line. “Well, he was until he was suddenly dangling in the air from Roman’s hands.”

  “You broke in?”

  “Didn’t have to. Front door wasn’t even locked. Trust me, he doesn’t need to. Roaches don’t even want to go inside that place.”