“Beckham?” Eva’s covered in a pale pink gown and a thin, flannel hospital blanket. Wires run from a monitor around her exposed belly, connecting to a machine spitting out paper with zigzagged lines. She offers a delirious smile when she sees me. Eva radiates, a healthy flush on her tan cheeks. “You came.”
Her delicate Argentinian accent used to make my knees weak and my cock hard. Ever since things went south and our foray into fuck buddy territory ended with a restraining order, I can’t so much as think about Argentina without breaking into a cold sweat.
A woman sits in a chair in the corner, shooting daggers my way. Her arms are folded and she huffs before looking away. I’m assuming it’s her friend.
“I knew you’d come. I haven’t seen you in so long.” Her eyes close softly, the machine beeping. “I’ve missed you so much, baby. Have you missed me?”
Words catch in my throat, stopped by a heavy dose of apprehension. Dr. Brentwood told me not to engage her, not to feed her obsession. But if she is the mother of my child, if she’s hours from giving birth to my daughter, I can’t be an asshole.
Another time. Another place. Not here.
Eva winces, smiling though she’s clearly in pain. “I’m going all natural. It’s better for the baby that way. And I want to feel it all, Beckham. I want to remember it all. This moment. Bringing our baby into the world.”
She’s crazy.
But I already knew that.
“Have you spoken to Dr. Brentwood lately?” It might not be an ideal time to ask, but I have to know if he’s aware of her current…condition.
“Can we not talk about him, please?” She blows a slow, heavy breath. “Oh, these are picking up. Nikki, can you go get someone please? I think I need to be checked again.”
Her friend rises slowly, her dark gaze firing at me still, and treads out of the room. A moment later she returns with a nurse, who takes a seat on the edge of Eva’s bed and places a gloved hand under the sheet.
“You’re at a six, Eva. That’s great. We’re making progress. I’ll check again in a bit. Hit the call button if you need anything, okay?” The nurse pads away.
“I didn’t know you were pregnant.” I take a seat in a chair and pull it up to her bedside.
“You stopped returning my calls,” she sighs. “I tried sending letters. Those came back each time. You blocked my emails. Julie would never patch me through. And then the restraining order came.”
“Eva, you were stalking me. I had to do something. You’re lucky I didn’t have you arrested.”
She ignores me. “I tried, baby. I tried to tell you.”
Eva reaches for my hand. I don’t want to take it. I don’t want to send her the wrong sign. But her face is pinched, her eyes watering. She’s in physical pain. I hesitate before offering my hand, and she clenches it tight.
“We can finally be together again, mi amor. We can be a family. I love you so much.”
An alarm chimes behind us, sending Eva’s friend upright in her chair. I glance at the elaborate machine set up behind me, squinting at a flashing number on the lower left side of a computer monitor.
“What is it?” Eva’s expression is washed in panic, tears forming in the corners of her dark eyes. “Baby, what’s wrong? What does it say?”
Two nurses run in, shouting orders for us to clear the space. They lower Eva’s bed, and one of them mumbles something about the baby’s heart rate dropping too low with each contraction.
“Can’t you try giving her oxygen?” Nikki’s hands fly to her hips, her demeanor unnervingly calm. “That’s what we did with my fourth.”
Another nurse hurries in carrying a set of blue scrubs. “Are you Daddy?”
Fuck. I don’t fucking know.
I take them from her, following her to a changing area. She tells me I have exactly one-hundred twenty seconds to change or I won’t be able to go into the operating room with Eva.
When I woke up this morning, my biggest problem was the morning wood that wouldn’t go away unless I thought of Odessa again. My second biggest problem was choosing which tie to wear to the office.
Nothing about this moment feels real, but here I am, rushing out of a changing room tying a scrub cap and chasing after a nurse so that I might not miss the birth of a baby girl who may or may not be mine.
They point me to a little stool at the head of the operating table. Eva’s arms are strapped down.
“Hold my hand, mi amor,” Eva smiles. Her dark hair is covered and a blue sheet hides everything lower than her chest. I take the hand of a woman whom I currently have a restraining order against, and swallow the lump that forms in my throat the second I hear the cries of a newborn baby.
Chapter 16
ODESSA
“I’m glad you’re back early.” Carly plops down on my sofa, mindlessly flipping through the pages of one of Jeremiah’s old cooking magazines. “So your boss had a baby?”
“He’s not technically my boss. And I don’t know. He didn’t want to talk about it. I’m not sure he even knew what was going on.” I collapse next to her, pulling a throw over my feet and curling into the overstuffed cushions behind me. “It was so weird, Carly. It all happened so fast. I guess if you want to scare the hell out of a playboy you tell him he’s going to be a father.”
“Serves him right.” She chuckles. “You talk to Jeremiah lately?”
“We texted a little this morning.”
Carly sits up, reaching for one of my old bridal magazines. “Oh, yeah? What’d he say?”
“You told him I was in Utah with a guy,” I say.
“Was it a secret?”
“No.” I swat her arm. “You didn’t tell him it was for work. I think he thought it was a romantic thing. He was acting kind of jealous, asking a ton of questions about Beckham.”
“Interesting.” Carly’s shoulders fall and she nibbles on a fingernail between her front teeth.
“I don’t know if you were intentionally trying to make him jealous,” I say. Carly is a mastermind at relationship manipulation. I could see her thinking she was doing me a favor. “I don’t want him thinking I’m running off with other guys when I’m doing all I can to prove that I still want to marry him.”
“Right.” Carly’s hands fall in her lap. It’s not like her to be this mum.
“Have you talked to him lately? Has he said anything about me? About the wedding?”
My fingers cross. My toes too. If Jeremiah’s opening up to anyone, it’s her.
“I mean, we talk sometimes, but he’s so busy shooting the show,” she says. “We don’t really talk about the engagement. I figure that’s between the two of you. And besides, if he did confide in me, you know I couldn’t repeat it. Just like anything that you say to me stays between us.”
“I appreciate that,” I say. “As much as I’m dying to know what he’s thinking. I told you he came over last Friday, right?”
Her brows meet. “No. You didn’t. Last Friday, you said?”
“Yeah, he showed up here. Cooked me dinner. Stayed the night.”
“Stayed the night?”
“Yeah,” I laughed. “Is that shocking or something?”
Her head cocks to the side, and she grabs a second magazine, flipping to the middle. I’m not convinced that she’s reading the words on the page.
“Carly.” My stomach drops. “You know something about him, don’t you?”
She nods no, curling a magazine page between her fingers and concentrating on an ad for engagement rings.
“Is there someone else? Oh. God. You have to tell me.” I sit forward, my hand grasping her arm. “I don’t want to sit around like some clueless idiot if he’s stringing me along.”
It’s all starting to make sense. All along, I was convinced I was the problem, when maybe someone else came into the picture when I wasn’t paying attention. I’ve been so focused on planning the wedding. Maybe something got past me?
“He’s testing the waters, isn’t he?” I ask. “Se
eing what else is out there before he settles down with me. And, God, I’m waiting around like a moron.”
“I don’t know what the hell he’s doing, to be honest,” Carly sighs. “He’s lost his damn mind. He should be with you. You guys belong together.”
“I mean, he’s allowed to screw other women. He’s technically single. I just need to know if I’m being strung along.” I don’t hear her. My mind is going a million miles a minute.
I pull out my phone, hands shaking.
“What are you doing, Sam?” she asks.
“Calling him.” I’m sunk. Carly can deny it all she wants, but I feel it in my bones. I need to hear his voice. Ask him to come over.
And then I’ll ask the hard questions. If he’s lying, I’ll know.
Carly grabs my phone from my hand and ends the call after two and a half rings. “Don’t do it. Don’t go there. You’ll scare him away.”
“Fighting for us will scare him away?” I can’t believe she just did that. “Or demanding the truth?”
“You know how he is,” she says.
“I’m calling him again.”
Carly hides her head in her hands, turning away. “Bad idea, Sam. I wouldn’t do it.”
My gut aches. It’s not like Carly not to fight harder for us. She’s been our biggest cheerleader for the last six years.
My corner feels empty without her in it.
The call goes to voicemail, and for a second it seems the whole universe is conspiring against me.
“Jeremiah, call me back. It’s important. We have to talk.”
Chapter 17
BECKHAM
“You shouldn’t have gone.” Dr. Brentwood chides me with his signature lulling voice from his end of the phone. “Hopping on a plane, flying across the country, and sitting by her side as she delivered her baby was the worst thing you could’ve done. You’ve undone almost a year’s worth of work for all of us.”
“Missing the birth of my child isn’t something I could live with.” It sounds weird. My child. I still don’t know. She’s got a full head of dark hair, like both of us, and her mother’s dark eyes. I tried not to get choked up as I held her for the first time last night, and I couldn’t help stroking her cheek as she nursed her mother’s breast. On the off chance she is my kid, I don’t want to have missed those early moments.
“Do you truly believe she’s yours?” Dr. Brentwood has the patience of a saint. Usually. But not today. I hear him sigh through the receiver. Nine months ago, we thought we’d put this issue to bed. She was seeking help. The restraining order was filed.
“Did I think this would happen?” I ask. “No. I’ve had a vasectomy. We always used condoms. But she works at the fertility clinic where ten vials of my…product were cryogenically frozen.”
“They have very strict chain-of-custody protocols. It’s one of the top fertility clinics in the nation,” he says.
“Right. And Eva’s the lab manager,” I say. “Everything’s coded with numbers to protect patient confidentiality and prevent mix ups. Guess who has access to all that information? Guess who’s in charge of semen prepping when patients come in for procedures?”
Dr. Brentwood is silenced by my theory.
Eighteen months ago, I decided to have a vasectomy.
I thought I was doing the responsible thing.
I went the cryogenic route on the extremely slim chance I might change my mind someday. That’s when I met Eva. Bumped into her in the hall, right before I was about to deposit my tenth and final batch. I’d never seen anyone so exotic and mysterious before. Long neck, high cheekbones, naughty gleam in her eye, and an accent that slayed.
One dinner turned into drinks, and within weeks we were hooking up on a regular basis until I had to end it months later. She was getting attached. Dirty talk turned to pillow talk, which escalated into Eva allowing herself to fall in love which wasn’t part of the agreement.
I jumped that sinking ship while she rearranged deck chairs.
Eva capsized as soon as she realized I wasn’t coming back.
“I’m waiting on a call back from my attorney. I spoke with him last night. He’s going to get in contact with the clinic.” I run my fingers through my hair. It’s product-free for the first time in a long time. I barely had the motivation to take a shower this morning having stayed most of the night at the hospital staring at that innocent little girl and searching for a sign that she was mine. “The clinic will probably come back and say all ten vials are accounted for. If Eva switched numbers or swapped out a vial of my specimen with someone else’s, there won’t be anyway to tell without unfreezing the samples. That’ll destroy them.”
Fuck.
“You’ll have to do DNA testing,” Dr. Brentwood said. “Which could take weeks. Possibly months.”
“What do I do?” I slink back in my chair, glancing at the time. It’s half past eight. Odessa should be rolling in here any moment. “Do I pretend she’s not mine? Pretend that didn’t just happen? Ignore Eva? What if she threatens the baby?”
“She won’t,” he says. “If she believes that baby is yours, or if indeed that baby is yours, she won’t do anything.”
“You and I both know we can’t guarantee that. Eva’s unpredictable. Unstable.”
“Exactly.” He clears his throat. “Which is why you should’ve called me first before going to the hospital.”
“Forgive me for not thinking clearly.” My fist clenches the handle of my desk phone, resisting the urge to slam it. He’s not helping. I need answers. I need directives. There’s no protocol on what to do in a situation like this. Surely someone somewhere has had their ex-fuck-buddy-turned-stalker impregnate themselves with their cryogenically frozen sperm?
I laugh because this situation is as absurd as it is real.
“Can you go to the hospital, Dr. Brentwood? Talk some sense into her? Try to get some answers?”
“I can’t go unless I’m called for a consult,” he says. “The only reason we’re speaking right now is because of the signed release in her file. That expires in two months by the way.”
“Great.” I grit my teeth. “So what do I do now? She’s discharging in a couple days. She’s going to need help getting home, getting around. Caring for the baby. Her friend goes back to Baltimore tonight. She’s all alone.”
I have to ensure the baby gets the care she needs. She didn’t ask to be born into this. I’ve never been so protective of anything before, but seeing her helpless face cradled in the arms of a mother who is clearly mentally unstable brings out the bear I never knew resided in me.
“Can I hire someone? A nanny?” I ask.
“No,” Dr. Brentwood says without pause. “Again, Beckham, we do not want to send the wrong message. You cannot allow her to manipulate you this way. You cannot give in to her demands.”
“It’s not about Eva right now. It’s about the baby.” I don’t know what to call her. Eva asked me to name her, flat out refusing to offer any suggestions. It’s another one of her attempts to manipulate me, to forge a bond between the baby and me. The child needs a name, but I need to prove a point to Eva.
I need to talk to someone else about this. Not Dr. Brentwood. He doesn’t understand. I understand he can’t legally tell anyone what to do. Should anything go awry, he could be held liable, and psychiatric patients of the Eva Delgado variety can be particularly unpredictable.
Xavier’s not exactly level-headed these days, and Dane will just lecture me.
A knock at my door ushers in Odessa, two cups of coffee in her hands.
“I’ll call you back,” I say to Dr. Brentwood.
“Beckham, whatever you do, do not engage with Eva,” I hear him say before I hang up.
“Figured you could use one of these.” Odessa places a cup on my desk, her gaze scanning the bags hanging under my eyes. “Long night?”
“Very.” I take the Styrofoam cup. “Thank you.”
She takes a seat across from me, her tablet tucked neatly u
nder her arm.
“Shit. The website,” I say. “Sorry. I completely forgot.”
“It’s fine, Beckham.” There’s something softer about her today, like she’s going easy on me. “You’re going through some stuff. I understand.”
I almost wish she’d fling a jab at me. Make an underhanded remark. Anything to make my life feel like it did twenty-four hours ago.
Fuck, life was simple then.
“Everything go well?” She crosses her legs and sits straight. “It was a girl, right?”
“How’d you know?”
“The friend. She told me. I didn’t want to be the one to tell you,” she says. “Not my place.”
“Fair enough.”
“Have any pictures?” Odessa asks. I suppose her question is only natural.
I take out my phone. “I don’t know.”
“You don’t know?” She laughs, leaning closer.
I honestly don’t recall. I spent most of last night in a daze. Thumbing through my photo album, I come across a picture I must’ve snapped toward the end of the night, just before going home. The memory of taking it escapes me but there it is.
I hand my phone to Odessa who smiles at the photo of the sleeping baby in Eva’s arms.
“She’s beautiful,” Odessa says. “Like her mother.”
My lips part, the truth lingering on the tip of my tongue.
She hands the phone back, and I go to tuck it away but it starts to ring. My attorney’s name flashes on the screen.
“I have to take this,” I say. Odessa rises, hurrying out of the room. “Roger, what do we know?”
Chapter 18
ODESSA
The second I shut Beckham’s office door, I hear him mutter something about a DNA test.
Seriously?
Some woman he obviously had sexual relations with in the past just had a baby and his biggest priority is doing a DNA test? The fact that he flew back to New York the second he got the news leads me to believe he feels the baby is his, so I’m struggling to find sympathy for his little predicament.
The Perfect Illusion Page 35
