by Falon Gold
Then he extended the cup to me from ten feet away. He outweighed me by a house but he might just be scared of me. Now, that was funny, and I started to laugh, beginning with tiny giggles breaking loose that turned into an explosion.
“No thank you to the coffee. Are you telling me that you took care of her by yourself, Chance? How did you discharge her from the hospital? You’re not…” My hilarity and voice ebbed away because I was about to hit a sensitive subject with a Chance that I didn’t know completely, but his smile that I recognized and loved never faded as he set the coffee down on the table.
Moving to stand in front of me, he hooked his thumbs in his jeans’ belt loops. “Yes, I took care of her by myself here. My mother helped at the hospital… a lot and I believed you were about to say that I’m not legally registered as Majestic’s father or allowed to take my own child anywhere without your permission,” he finished for me, and when put that way, it had to sting him.
“Yeah, but those weren’t the words I would’ve used.”
“You may have found a diplomatic way to say it but I’ve been working on fixing it.”
“What does that mean?”
“Dr. Blane started the process for discharging Majestic yesterday after you left. He found a fourteen-thousand-dollar bill added to the paperwork. He discreetly brought it to my attention that Majestic’s hospital-stay and medical bill had exceeded the state’s portions of her insurance.”
My stomach bottomed out. My credit was okay for now, but it wasn’t going to be. Weekly checks from Tommy’s Cuisine and the little money left over from the financial aid for school provided necessities and a few extras, but not enough to pay for a five-day hospital stay that costs more than my car when it was brand new.
Chance’s expression switched from amused to concerned. “Mahogany, I can see the thoughts whirling around in your head like a tornado, but everything’s okay. The bill’s been handled, and I have to tell you something. With the bill, I saw an opportunity to get something done that would be to yours and Majestic’s benefit, so I took advantage.”
I stopped panicking about what I was going to do about the hospital bill, and start worrying about what opportunity had the debt presented for Chance. “What did you do?”
“I struck a deal with Dr. Blane: I would pay her doctor bill in full right then if he could start the paperwork to unofficially make Majestic a Jefferson-Middleton on her birth certificate, or he was going to get installments. Everyone likes paid in full better.”
“You applied to change her last name without asking me first?”
Nothing would change unless I signed on the dotted line too, but I was impressed with Chance for taking to being Majestic’s daddy like a duck would to water: effortlessly. Doing things for our daughter without consulting me first sounded just like a daddy and him. I’d rather argue with him for doing too much than not enough for her.
“I started the process on changing her name so she’ll officially be my heir,” he explained, “and everything I leave to her and you in my will can’t be contested because she’s mine.”
The forceful way he said ‘mine’ was hard enough to jolt my stomach, hot enough to create a firestorm between my thighs, and make me see him in a different light. The same light I thought would never shine from him when I tried to tell him I was pregnant. What would’ve happened if he had said I was his?
You’d have spontaneously combusted for sure.
“That’s all, Chance?”
He grinned, his eyes dipping to my breasts. “Unless you decide to make her just a Middleton.”
“Just Middleton is fine. Her last name doesn’t matter to me.”
Majestic’s near death had put a lot of things in perspective. Last names weren’t even on the list of things that mattered, but I’d bet my last dollar that her name mattered a hell of a lot to him. She had earned it just by being born. I had screwed up my chances for taking his name, but took comfort that I hadn’t messed it up for her.
“I do have a question though, Chance,” I announced as I palmed my hip and dropped all my weight to one foot. “How did you work all this out with just Dr. Blane? You should’ve had to go through the courts to change her name.”
“Right, but the hospital’s birth records department is just as good as a court if you know the right people. Dr. Blane hooked me up with a very nice clerk that didn’t mind helping me out with the changes for a favor. Once you sign the certificate, she’ll stamp it and file it, making it legal herself without there being a big fuss with a judge. The new birth certificate can be picked up a few days afterwards.”
“Did you say Dr. Blane hooked you up with a… very nice clerk who wants a favor?” If ‘hooked him up’ meant what it usually means, the clerk was going to have to wait her damn turn to get to Chance because I wasn’t done with him yet.
His predatory gleam graced his mouth, but he was about to become my prey. I hadn’t just signed up for the ‘dating pact’ to help him but to help me too, with four days left to perform that miracle. Clearly, I was nowhere near close to it because I was about to go nuclear on somebody. He and the clerk were absolutely cruising for a bruising if they thought I’d share the little time I had with Chance—life would be so much easier if I could move on from him like he had done from me. Or moved with him to wherever he wanted us to go as a couple. Utah didn’t sound so bad either. I would go anywhere as long as I came home to him and Majestic.
Well, you’re not coming home to him so back off that idea, Mahogany. But I couldn’t because I was pissed, couldn’t think straight. And jealous. About to put up a fight anyway for the good guy in my kitchen and the bastard side that came with him whether he wanted me to or not, once I put some clothes on.
“Yes, Dr. Blane hooked me up with someone that could get what I needed done quickly.” Then he stepped closer. “But the sort of hook up you’re thinking about isn’t the way we went about it, Mahogany, and I have a confession. I exaggerated the situation with the clerk. She’s older than my grandmother and was sharp enough to get more out of me than I got out of her. Want to know what that is?”
Damn him and his mind games.
“Okay, I’ll bite. What does she get in return?”
“A donation to a soup kitchen she runs in Spindle.”
He moved nearer until I had to crane my neck to maintain eye contact. His hands slid around my waist and pulled me into his rock-hard chest, then he licked his lips. Suddenly, I needed to cool off, or I’d be climbing his body like a tree to start a real fire from the friction of my mouth on his when I kissed him and me both senseless.
“I’m going to go take a bath before my munchkin wakes up, then we can go back to the hospital to sign her birth certificate.”
“Not yet. I haven’t said hello to you today.”
His hands glided up my back, arms pushing up mine, then he dipped his head. Oh God, he was going to kiss me and I hadn’t brushed my teeth yet.
I quickly covered my mouth with one hand. “Morning breath, Chance, that’s spilled over into the evening.”
“Coffee breath, Mahogany, same length of time.” Then, my hand was down by my side and his lips were on mine.
If I could just resist him. Well, I couldn’t, so I waged war with his tongue until we were both breathless and his phone beeped in his pocket.
*********
~Chance~
With one hand, I dug out my phone and held Mahogany to my chest. The text that had come through frustrated the hell out of me immediately, though I tried to hide my reaction to Julia summoning me back to Utah this Monday, not the next one.
Mahogany’s eyes bounced between my phone and me. “Chance, what’s wrong?”
Damn, she must’ve picked up on my pissiness anyway.
“It looks like I have something else to confess, baby. I have to go back to Utah earlier than I expected for work. It seems Orion Townsend, a potential client I was meeting with when you called me about Majestic, can’t wait until next Monday or he
’s going to take his business elsewhere. It’s a big account if I land it. Since children really are expensive, I figure it would be wise to go—” She covered up my mouth with one hand before I could finish.
The saddest of expressions crossed her face. “Will you consider something for me before you go?”
I reached for her hand to remove it, but she pressed tighter. “Just nod or shake your head, Chance. Don’t s-speak yet.” Her voice wobbled.
I frowned as much as I could around her fingers and nodded, would do anything for her. Would tell her that if she’d let me.
“I need you to work on being friends with me. That’s all I ask of you, not a new car or house, clothes or even money, and it’s for Majestic’s sake, not mine.”
Then she stepped back. I practically heard her heart breaking as she reversed, a bad but good thing. I was finally in tune with my girl again, and she didn’t want me to leave but would let me if she thought it was the right thing to do. It wasn’t.
“I didn’t say I’d been gone for good, Mahogany, I said for work. There’s a difference. Unless…” I pulled her right back into my arms where she belonged. “…you want to go with me to Utah, but I want to live here. You see, I’ve changed my mind, I think you still owe me and I want all I’m due. Your love, your heart, your body, because I need them all so I don’t have to go through another damn day without you while loving you. Not being able to touch you or kiss you. Working myself to death to keep from thinking about you. Not being able to feel anything other than you even while dating useless bodies of flesh so I can feel wanted, but they are not enough. They’re not you, and Majestic has a damn good oncologist here. If she needs him in the future, I want to get her to him faster than I can say I love you, Mahogany.”
Her mouth fell open. “Why didn’t you say that when you first arrived in Arrow? Why let me stay gone for three damn years? Letting me be without you if you felt that way? Missing you and trying to trick myself into believing I could live like that every damn day for the rest of my life?”
“One question at a time, love. I would never force myself on you if you didn’t want me, but when I got here, all I knew was that I had to have you again in any way I could get you. Desperate enough to con me and you into believing you owed me something to get what I was dying for. You.”
“I did owe you.”
“You didn’t. Had every right to do what you thought was best for Majestic, but I took the first chance I got of relieving some of the ache from being without you. Only you could lessen the pain. Then you made a mistake while you were sleep the other night.”
“What did I do?”
“You said yes to me while I was complaining about proposing to you to get me out of my misery. I knew you still loved me then. Now, you’re stuck with the old and the new Chance all rolled into one.”
And then she smiled and lit up my world that felt like it was spinning the correct way on its axis for once. “That’s not being ‘stuck’, Chance, that’s being blessed with a good man who gets really angry sometimes and wants to fuck the pain away, really well I might add, and he just about gives everything he has away, including his heart. That’s all I, we need from you… and your strength. I can’t carry that damn crib by myself, although we could just leave it here for the next single mother. It serves no purpose after ten minutes anyway. Majestic climbs out of it when she’s tired of being in it or wants to get in the bed with me.”
“It’s good you feel blessed because I’m not going anywhere and the next time you run I’m chasing… when I’m not chasing Majestic. Sounds like she needs her own room badly and we need a lock on our door now.”
“The new Mahogany knows to run towards you not from you, Chance.”
No other words sounded sweeter.
“Thank God. That saves me a lot of time and jet fuel. It’s expensive. Although I can afford it, I’d rather be spending the money on my girls in some exotic location we’ve all flown to on vacation… together, the only word that best describes us who should’ve never been without each other from the start.”
“Ditto, baby.”
“There are some other words I like to hear from you though.”
“I love you, Chance.” She didn’t even hesitate.
“And I love you, sweetheart.”
I leaned in for another kiss. A thump in the other room where Majestic was halted my progress. The noise was too close to my child. I turned to walk off. Mahogany caught my waist with both hands, pulling me back into my original position.
“Mahogany, that came from the bedroom.”
“I know. Count with me. One.” She pressed into my side, her hand wrapped around my shoulder, unconcerned.
“Do what?”
“Count, Chance.” I realized she knew what had happened, so I said ‘one’ with her.
On two, Majestic veered around the corner of the bedroom then ran to us. Mahogany was right, the damn crib was useless.
My daughter wrapped around my leg and announced, “Mommy’s woke, daddy.”
I bent over to tousle the curls on her head. “I know, baby girl. Finally.”
“Let’s eat chocolate.”
“No!” Mahogany and I chanted together.
Majestic huffed then eyeballed Mahogany before leaning over to get a good view of her mother’s ass. “Mommy?”
Mahogany sighed. “I know, Majestic. Mommy should be dressed but it’s your daddy’s fault I’m not. He distracted me again.”
Majestic grinned. “Can I walk around naked too now?”
“No!” Mahogany and I hollered again… together.
Epilogue
~One month later~
Fifteen miles away from my apartment, I stopped in the street at the beginning of a long curvy driveway running up to an upscale red-bricked home in a gated community that seemed too uppity for my taste, just like all the other houses that Chance’s realtor had suggested to me. This was the umpteenth time I entered an atmosphere so stiff the neighbors would probably turn up their nose if I walked to the mailbox hand in hand with Chance. Since he was out of town for the next two days, and it was my day off, I drove myself to this house showing with Majestic for company, and I wasn’t feeling the love here either.
House hunting was started to get tiring, boring, and I was about to pick something just to be done with it, completely sure Chance would approve of this house when he got back from Utah this time. Orion Townsend was just as demanding as Chance, and requesting almost daily meetings about architecture designs for his new cellular companies that he liked one day, then didn’t like something about them the next. I was over that too. The flying back and forth was wearing Chance out, so he decided this morning that he’d come home tomorrow after he either finalized the plans with Orion or referred him to another company. I had three years of missing sleeping next to Chance to make up for, and Orion was getting in the damn way.
My pissiness and already missing my man might be why I can’t pick a house.
“Majestic, what do you think of this house? Is it too big?”
A pretty big question to ask your two-year old, Mahogany. Who else was I going to ask?
I glimpsed back at Majestic kicking her feet while munching apple slices out of a Ziploc bag in the back of the BMW that Chance purchased from the rental company because it was relatively new and I couldn’t decide on what kind of car I wanted.
“Don’t know, Mommy. What’s ‘too big’ mean?”
“You can’t wrap your arms around it, baby.”
“Yep, that house is too big.” Doesn’t mean she didn’t like it.
“It’s a status symbol definitely though.”
“Definitely though, Mommy.”
I turned in my seat to glance back at her. “You know what a status symbol is?”
“No.”
Laughter shot out my nose. “I didn’t think so, but daddy can entertain business associates in comfort here and not bump his head on anything.”
“Don’t want daddy b
umping his head. It hurts.”
Majestic shook her head in a serious manner that reminded me of her father who grew sillier by the day, especially when his father was around. And he tinkered around the apartment, fixing things whenever he was there. Our love and Majestic were lightening Chance up and I couldn’t be mad about that. He deserved to have a real home to come to when he wasn’t working though.
“Right, so we’ll go inside and meet the realtor then. I think this is the house. If I view another, I’ll probably shoot somebody.”
“Shoot somebody,” she repeated loudly just as a car with its windows rolled down rode by us slowly.
Nosy neighbor number one was an older white lady who frowned at us then hit the gas.
“Changed my mind, Majestic. This is definitely not where I want to stay. One more house, and then we’re either moving in it or staying put in our apartment and Chance can just stoop down until we luck up on something.”
I drove off. My cell phone’s ringtone cut through the air already filled with Majestic’s crunching on the fruit. Chance’s name displayed on the car’s radio screen. I touched the green icon on it and answered, “Hey, baby.”
“Hey, baby yourself. Where are you?”
“Getting the hell out of the third snobby community that your realtor keeps finding. Can she find something with less houses and more land so if I want to walk to the mailbox hand in hand with you, I don’t have to worry about who we’re making frown up?”
“Curse, Mommy,” Majestic chastised, now an official member of the swear police thanks to Chance, who convinced her that her job was to catch the bad words and remind us we weren’t supposed to say them around her. She has been doing a damn good job so far.
