by Imani King
“Earth to Helena. You’re drifting off like you do when you’re working something out.” She snaps her fingers in front of my face. “I said before you went to your happy place or whatever the hell you were doing—that Saint Corbett might have said the first coherent thing that popped into his head.”
“And it had to be about money.”
“Yeah, Helena. It probably did. From what we saw, the man’s never had a relationship. He probably doesn’t know how to act around a woman with clothes on. And every single one of his brothers just got married in the past year or two. Most all of them had kids right away. He has every right to feel some type of way about what you did today—”
“I did what you told me to do,” I retort, trying to channel a feeling of self-righteousness.
“No, you didn’t. I told you to go check him out, and then later you could come back like a nice, normal person and tell him you were the mother of his child.” She smiles sheepishly. “When I say it all out loud, that doesn’t sound like the best idea either.”
A sinking feeling washes over me, and I bring my hand against my forehead, letting it trail down my face in frustration. “No, good God. None if it was a good idea. No wonder he was an asshole—”
“Yeah, I guess. No wonder.” Celia has lost some of her bravado since it apparently occurred to her that either way, I looked like I was trying to pull a con on a billionaire.
At that moment, there’s a knock at the door, and Celia and I both jump.
I gingerly walk to the door, feeling more worn out than I have in a long time. When I open it, I’m greeted by a smiling delivery man. Beside him, there’s another man holding a giant teddy bear that quite likely won’t fit through the damn door.
A man with blond hair that’s irrepressibly messy. Tall, lean, muscular, and smiling that smile.
Saint Corbett.
“Sorry,” he says with a grin. “I can be a bit of a dick. Ask every one of my ex-girlfriends.”
CHAPTER SIX
The gorgeous, mysterious woman I saw in my office just this morning looks at me with something akin to disdain. The cousin of disdain, perhaps. Deep skepticism? Mixed with disappointment?
Whatever the emotion is, it’s definitely not a lovely, genuine smile. That was what I was hoping for—because when she smiled at me this morning when I went through my quips that weren’t funny enough for someone like her—she had smiled. And it lit up the room.
My pulse quickens. This is where my daughter lives.
Helena Landon stares at me and slowly crosses her arms, obscuring her full, utterly perfect—full, natural—breasts. And yes, they’re definitely natural. Saint Corbett is an expert at pinpointing whether or not a woman has had breast implants. And if I have a nice handful, I can often tell you exactly which doctor performed the procedure.
But Helena, I can imagine just what those orbs would feel like in my hands. And—well, I shouldn’t be thinking of that anyway. I have a teddy bear here for my daughter—our daughter—and this woman and I, we aren’t even friends.
I clear my throat and speak again. “I think we got off on the wrong foot, Helena.”
“You could say that, Mr. Corbett.” She looks me up and down. The delivery man looks awkwardly between the two of us—I didn’t tell him anything of my relationship with this woman. And here he is, caught between two adult people, both of whom are just about as awkward as shit for the time being. We’re like a divorced couple, except we missed out on the good parts—the wedding night, the honeymoon, the lazy, sleepy mornings waking up together.
“Please, call me Saint.” I turn to the delivery man. “Lewis, is it? Here’s two hundred bucks. You can go. Thanks so much for helping me get this up the stairs. It was a little rough going there for a minute.” I hold out two crips hundred dollar bills for Lewis, who’s been a good sport.
Helena bites her lip. “Actually, Lewis. Trixie doesn’t need a teddy bear. At least not one of that size, Saint.” She turns to me and says my name pointedly, like she’s using at as an insult. I can work with that. But my heart sinks.
“Trixie?” My throat tightens for a second, and completely unbidden, something happens that hasn’t happened in years, not since mom got sent to the hospital with symptoms of a heart attack—that she told me in no uncertain terms that I had probably caused her to have. What happens is this—I taste salt and metal, and the warmth I felt before when I looked at that picture of Helena and her little girl, it increases tenfold. And utterly unbidden, my eyes grow just the slightest bit wet.
But Saint Corbett doesn’t cry. He might mist, but he doesn’t cry. God no.
And just as surprising, a half-smile forms on Helena Landon’s lips, one corner turning up. It’s just enough to change her whole demeanor. “Beatrix Adelind.”
“That’s a good name. Substantial. Like she could be a real powerful woman.” I can’t help but smile awkwardly.
Helena sniffs a little bit like she’s trying not to laugh. “I think you’ve got that right.”
Lewis looks between the two of us again, and the poor kid is sweating just a little. He doesn’t know what the fuck he just stepped into, and to be fair, I’m not really sure either. “Lewis,” I say again. “You can go. I’ll take it from here.” He starts to walk down the hall. Before he’s able to make it to the stairs, Helena lurches forward and grabs his arm. The door pops open behind her.
“You will do no such thing,” Helena says, in a partial panic. She has a look on her face like she has no idea what to do, and it occurs to me that she probably doesn’t have much of an idea of what to do, or what to make of me, or what comes next after this. She turns to me, anxiety written all over her face. “I can’t explain to Trixie where this is from, Saint. Not now—”
“Not ever? I understand if—” I’m about to tell her that I understand if she doesn’t want me to meet Trixie, but there’s a part of me deep inside that can’t say that. There’s a part of me—a big part, if I’m being honest—that doesn’t want to let go of this, ever. I don’t even know what this little girl looks like, but I want to meet her. I want to unfuck everything I said this morning, and I want this woman to like me, even if it’s never anything more than that. “What I mean is—Helena, we got off on the wrong foot, like I said. And I want to start over, regardless of whatever half-brained scheme you thought of for that interview. Now I’m out a personal assistant and I’m standing here like an asshole with a giant teddy bear. You’re the first person I considered hiring—all the rest of the women were, well, just not great candidates.”
Helena looks at me, and I think she’ll take the compliment. She’s still holding onto Lewis’s arm, and the poor kid looks like he might spontaneously combust. “Half-brained?”
“Admit it,” I say. “ You could have called me.” I look around the corner, and there’s a woman sitting on the couch, watching us intently. I wave at her weakly, and she waves back.
“Fine, but Lewis still has to take the bear. Trixie can’t—”
“I’m not a part of this,” Lewis says. “I’m really not—”
At that moment, a door opens from somewhere inside the apartment, and a little girl rushes out, pink plastic heels that are too big for her clicking against the floor. She’s wearing not only a tiara and a dark blue tutu with sparkly hearts all over it—but also a Wonder Woman shirt and red cape with a crown emblazoned on the back of it. Her skin is a rich olive color, her brown eyes gleaming with intelligence. And her hair is an impossible shade of gold. I raise my hand to my own hair, almost automatically. That’s mine, and my grandmother’s. And no one else in the whole Corbett family—not one of my brothers, not my mother or father. All mine.
She rushes up to Helena and hides behind her mother’s legs, peeking out from behind her hips.
“Trixie can’t what?” She says, beaming at me. “Ohhh, is that a giant teddy bear?” She squeals, and Helena groans. “I always wanted one of those! Are you the delivery man?”
Helena lets go of L
ewis, and the poor man runs off down the stairs. “Yes,” Helena says, her voice a little too clipped. “There were two delivery men. It’s uh—for your graduation from your kindergarten class.”
Trixie rolls her eyes dramatically. “I’m just going to kindergarten again next year at a different school, Mama. It’s not a big deal. It was really more like pre-K.”
“So you don’t want it?” If I’m not mistaken, there’s a gleam in Helena’s eye when she says that. Her whole tone changes when she talks to her daughter, and it’s like she’s a completely different person. I look back and forth between the two of them in total wonder--because right in front of me is a child who’s half mine, a child who has this whole life I’ve never known anything about. And Helena—her mother, astoundingly beautiful, though I wouldn’t exactly let her know that kind of thing—is actually talking about giving this teddy bear to her girl. The one she was so adamant I throw down the fucking stairs just a few seconds ago. I raise an eyebrow as the mother looks down at her daughter and brushes her hair gently back from her face.
“I didn’t say that!” Trixie says, grinning. She’s missing one top tooth, which makes her S sounds sibilant when she speaks. If someone asked me to describe the feeling I have looking at this child, I don’t think I could adequately describe it with words. It’s not often that something so life changing opens up in such a short span of time. The time I’ve spent thinking about having children—well, it probably adds up to about ten minutes of time in the past twenty years of my life. But here is this little being, separate from me, yet filled with some of the same things that make me who I am. In a word, I’m utterly breathless.
“It kind of sounds like you did,” Helena says, still tilting her daughter’s face up toward hers. There’s a hint of amusement creeping into her voice, whether she likes it or not. I know one thing for sure—I do like it. And I’m not entirely sure why I do, except that I do.
“No, Moooom. I didn’t say that.”
“Since when did I become ‘Mom?’” Helena laughs and then gives me a glance like she’s remembered that there’s something distasteful sitting in the corner of the hallway. “Okay. Yes, let’s see if we can take it back to your room. When I ordered this thing, I thought it would be smaller, but it’s ridiculously extravagant and probably too much for a five-year-old to have in her room.”
“Probably,” I echo. And she’s right. But I’m getting a bit of a clearer picture now—Helena didn’t change her mind. But she wasn’t about to take away something from her daughter that was clearly a present for her. She could have said we had the wrong door, but it was clear we didn’t. And even though Trixie’s said only a few words in my presence, intelligence radiates off of that child like fire. I might claim that part of Trixie’s personality—I could always memorize information pretty damn well, but it’s probably Helena that gives her that... that... radiance.
Helena takes a deep breath and steps forward, wearing an expression like she doesn’t really want to step any closer to me or the bear. “All right, let’s get this thing in,” she says, eyeing me.
“Can you help us, Mr. Delivery Man?”
My throat constricts again. “Oh, um, yes.” I fumble with the bear awkwardly, not even using the opportunity to say that it might be too big to fit inside, but we can make it work. Instead, I just keep looking back and forth between Trixie and Helena, feeling like I’ve missed something big in my life, and there’s not really anything to be done about it. As I shove the bear through the door, watching Helena as she tugs on its red bow and pulls it through her apartment door, Trixie twirls around in her superhero princess outfit, apparently content that a random delivery man showed up with a random giant bear she wasn’t expecting.
What did you think was going to happen, Saint? That you’d bring the bear, apologize, and then form some sort of long-lasting bond with the girl? Or that the mother would forgive you just like that? Or maybe that you’d just say hello and be absolved of all other responsibility?
In fact, I don’t know what I was thinking.
And maybe Helena didn’t either when she came into my office this morning.
Maybe neither of us did. We carry the awkwardly-sized teddy bear back to the girl’s room, the blondish woman on the sofa getting up to help us.
“I’m Celia,” she chirps. “And I think Trixie and I will take a little time to play in her room right now.”
I nod and swallow hard, watching as Celia and Helena prop the bear up next to Trixie’s bed. It towers over everything else in the room, but Trixie doesn’t seem to mind. Instead, she jumps in the bear’s arms and immediately makes a nest there. “Come on Celia!” she exclaims. “Let’s have a tea party with the bear. Celia nods and ushers Helena and me back out to the living room, closing the door behind her.
And I swear I’m as awkward as a chess team champion asking out the prettiest girl in school. St. John Corbett doesn’t feel this way, not ever. But here I am, tugging at the collar of my t-shirt and trying to think of something to say that will make this whole situation less awkward. Instead, this woman gathers her composure and speaks before I can even think of one thing to say.
“I don’t mean to be unkind, Mr. Corbett—” she begins.
That doesn’t sound good.
“Saint—seriously, please call me Saint.”
“Saint, okay. After this morning, I don’t think we need to be on a first name basis, do we?” She crosses her arms again, shutting me out. When I think about it, this is exactly what my mother would do. We boys weren’t the best of kids, but our mom would put her body in between us and any danger, any that might come our way. That’s just what Helena is doing right now—she’s a wolf, protecting her pup. And I’m the bumbling bear that came knocking at the wolf den door.
“Touché. But I want you to know, my reaction—I know what I said was stupid.”
“And offensive. You think every woman who comes to your office is looking for a handout?”
“No, I—” I stop. Tread lightly. “I didn’t know what I thought.”
“I wasn’t dumb enough to think Trixie or I have any legal claim to your—whatever it is that you have. Your stupid company.” She waves her hand at me like she’s summing me up, and everything that I do for a living.
Infuriating woman.
“It’s not stupid—it’s my, it’s my retirement plan,” I say with a grin. “And it’s what I have in my life. Goddammit, you got me off topic. When you came today—t was such a shock that I didn’t know what to do. But I’d like to get to know your little girl—”
“That’s right. She’s my little girl.”
I run my fingers through my hair. Damn, this woman is really making me sweat. “Yes, that’s right. She is. I’d just like a chance to get to know her. She seems really... cool.” Is that something you say about a five-year-old kid? But something in Helena’s face softens at that moment, and I think maybe it was the right thing to say.
“She is. She’s smart too, and sensitive. Which is why I wouldn’t want her to get the wrong idea.” She pauses and purses her lips. “The last man in her life left us high and dry, hurt me, liquidated my bank account, and stole my grandmother’s ring. She doesn’t know all that, but she knows he left. And she knows that it’s just mom now. I showed up this morning because I thought it might help her to know who her father is—but when you said that stuff to me—”
I sigh. “I’m sorry—”
She puts up a hand like she’s not finished. “When you said that stuff, it made me realize that I’d done the wrong thing seeking you out, especially like I did. It wasn’t fair to you. When I was driving home today, I realized that you might not be ready for something like this.”
“I’m ready.” I say it with conviction, but as the words come out of my mouth, I realize she might be right. I might not be. But how do you ever know something like that until you’ve done it?
Helena raises an eyebrow at me. “I just think—maybe we shouldn’t do this right now.
We can think about it—for six months or a year, and maybe we can set up a date sometime after she starts public kindergarten, when she has more friends and more of her own life—”
Helena’s rambling now, and acting on instinct, I put my hand on her arm to stop her. “Helena.” She flinches like she’s touched something hot, and there’s a flicker of something in her eye. “What?”
There’s a warmth that courses from her to me, and it’s strange because it’s not something I’ve felt before when I’ve touched any woman. And I’ve touched a lot of women.
“If you don’t want me to get to know Trixie, let me get to know you instead.” The words tumble out before I even know what I’m saying, and I swallow hard again after I say them. “I can see that you have your daughter’s best interests at heart—”
Gently she pulls her arm away. “That’s all I keep on my mind these days.”
“And if you get to know me, maybe you’ll feel better about me meeting that little girl someday—as her dad.”
She flinches again at the word. Even though she didn’t say it, I think that’s what the little girl must have called the idiot man who ditched them.
“Her biological father,” I say, correcting myself. “Maybe you’ll let me meet her as her biological father, someday. Let me take you out—”
“What—like a date?”
“Lunch or—maybe dinner? And maybe I could have you and Trixie down—as friends—sometime after that?”
“I don’t know.” There’s a doubtful quality to her words, so I latch onto that doubt, hoping beyond hope that I can sway her. And why on earth am I? I’ve never taken the time to think about things like this, but once I get something in my mind, I’m bound and determined to make it work. That’s what my mother always called me—“bound and determined.”
