Total pages in book: 227
Estimated words: 220940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1105(@200wpm)___ 884(@250wpm)___ 736(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 220940 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1105(@200wpm)___ 884(@250wpm)___ 736(@300wpm)
And there’s the biggest kick in the gut I think I’ve ever felt. He didn’t want me to know. He thought I wouldn’t accept him.
I’ve let us both down.
Going to the desk, I perch on the edge, and he struggles up from the chair. “You want this chair?”
“Sit down.”
He virtually drops to the seat, unable to hold himself up, glancing up at me briefly, before diverting his gaze away. And then the silence that falls is awkward. I don’t want it to be awkward.
“Clearly I’m not old enough to be your father,” I say flatly. He peeks up at me, the uncertainty in his eyes killing me. “But I know I am,” I add.
His body softens in the chair. And my fucking heart splits.
“I’m sorry for how I reacted,” I say softly.
He swallows, his eyes glazing. “I didn’t want you to know.” His voice is as small as I’ve ever known it. “I was worried—”
“Things would change?”
He nods.
“Things will change, Nolan. That’s a fact none of us can control.”
“I don’t want you to look at me differently.”
“You are different,” I say over a small laugh. “You’re my son.”
He blinks, as if hearing it is odd. It is. “Do you remember her?” he asks.
I can’t lie, it catches me off guard. I’m not prepared for this conversation. What do I tell him?
“I remember her,” I say. “But I was fourteen, so you probably have better memories.”
“Not really.” He shrugs, like it’s nothing, and I just know it is absolutely everything. “She wasn’t around much.”
“Working?” I don’t know why I’m asking. Even at fourteen it was obvious his mother wasn’t going far in life.
Nolan smiles up at me. “If that’s what we should call it.”
I inhale, nodding, hating myself right now. “How did you find me?” There must have been dozens of possibilities.
“She talked about many . . .” His lips twist. “Boys.”
I huff. Yeah, I was a boy. Stupid. Inexperienced. Cocky.
“She talked about you most, though,” he adds.
“She did?”
“We have the same hands.”
“What?” I look down, turning my hands over, frowning. I’ve never really taken any notice of my hands. They’re big. Capable. Can fire a gun with expert precision. And they can punch . . . hard.
Nolan holds his hands out, laying them on the desk. “Obviously we’re kind of alike in features,” he says. “But when I saw your hands, I just knew.”
I stare at his hands on the desk, then at mine, back and forth. The width of our palms, the length of our fingers, the shape of our thumbs. “Well, I’ll be damned,” I whisper, taken aback. I look up at him, and he smiles. How the fuck did I not see this before? Even his teeth are the same as mine. His smile. The cheeky glint in his eyes. “You’re a lot like me when I was your age.”
“I am?”
“Yeah.” I stand. “Fucking stupid.” I pick up a pen and throw it at his head, and he ducks too late. It ricochets of his forehead and hits the desk. “We need to work on your stealth skills.”
“I’m incapacitated,” he protests, outraged, rising from the desk with too much effort. So I help him, and he stands on one leg before me, his gaze lifting up my chest until he has my eyes. I see tears in his. Feel them in mine.
Fucking hell.
I swallow down the lump in my throat and reach for his cheek, cupping it, nodding mildly. “Hey, son,” I say quietly. “Nice to meet you.”
Tears run down his cheeks, a small snivel escaping. “Hey . . . Dad?”
Dad? Fuck, I never thought I’d get that word tossed my way.
I haul him into my chest and hug the shit out of him, making sure he knows he’s wanted, feeling an incredibly intense instinct to protect him. And an insane feeling of peace mixed with sorrow. I missed the first twenty years of his life. How will I ever make up for that? I’ve always had an inexplicable soft spot for the kid. Now, I can’t help but think it was the universe talking to me. “You good?” I ask, keeping hold of him.
“Yeah, I’m good.” He eases away from me, and I roughly wipe at his cheeks.
“Sit the fuck down,” I say, pushing into his shoulder, watching him struggle to remain standing on one leg. He falls to the seat, and I prop myself back on the desk, lighting up as I answer a call from Otto.
“How’d it go?” I ask.
“You should buy a hat.”
I smile. “Congratulations. What do you have for me?”
“I’m on my way to the boatyard. I’m dropping him off and leaving, okay?”
“Thanks.” I hang up and get back to Nolan. “We need to talk about Ella,” I say, blowing out the smoke over his head. “You know she can’t keep working the stage, don’t you?”