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“I’ll let you meet Leo if –“
Rex beams. He hasn’t even heard the other part of my sentence and his face lights up like a full moon. So damn cute. “Yes.”
“I haven’t finished my sentence.”
“Don’t care. I’ll do anything.”
I’m thrown off balance. The only people I know who will do anything for Leo are me and my mother. And now Rex will do anything just to meet him.
Have I made a mistake keeping him away all this time?
“I’m trying to get him into a private school and they think I’m married. So they’re expecting me and my husband at the parent interview,” I explain as calmly as possible. “See what I’m getting at?”
Rex’s grin turns into a smirk. He tilts his head to the side like he’s sizing me up the way he did in that bar all those years ago. Fuck. How am I supposed to resist that? “You want me to pretend to be your husband, Isabella?”
“Don’t sound so excited.”
Rex chuckles, dropping his head forward, whole body hiccupping with the laugh.
While he’s not looking, I let myself smile. I may have known him only a short time so many years ago, but time doesn’t matter when you meet a kindred spirit. He occupies a place in my heart I wish he didn’t.
Of course, part of that is that I look at him every day in the face of my son.
“Yes, Isabella,” he says, straightening up. “I will happily pretend to be your husband if that means I’ll get to meet my son.”
I manage to keep myself together until Rex gets out of my car and I’m well on my way home. Suddenly, tears are streaming down my face and I’m heaving sobs I have kept inside for years.
My body will never forget the way he said “my son”.
Maybe that’s what Rex saw in the depths of my eyes.
Chapter 7
Rex
I rake my hand through my hair one more time, the gift bag knocking me in the head as I do so. Don’t have enough hands for the flowers, the present, and a last-minute touch-up to the hair. Can’t help it though. Force of habit.
I’m standing at the front door of Isabella’s house which is a short drive from the motel I’m staying at for the next week. Maybe longer if things go well and, damn, I hope they do.
Though all the houses in the subdivision look about the same, Isabella’s sticks out because the door has been painted green and a big crucifix hangs on it. I can almost hear the squabble that must have gone down between Isabella and Marisol over it.
I lift my finger to the doorbell but don’t press it.
There’s no way to prepare for a moment like this. I mean, I’ve tried. I made sure to get some nicer clothes than the bag of Walmart bullshit Mickey picked up for me when I was leaving the hospital, spent a profound amount on the flowers for Marisol, and the gift for Leo. I know nothing about him and only have that picture from the Christmas card to remember his face. So I had to do my best guess at what kind of toys he might like.
I settled on a Lego set. And some Hot Wheels. And some books. And a stuffed animal.
I wanted to cover all my bases.
It’s not every day a little boy meets his father for the first time.
Father…
The word sits in the pit of my belly like a pile of rocks. I’m not sure how to process the new role I’m stepping into.
“Stepping into” might be a stretch since the whole reason for meeting Leo hinges on the fact I’m doing something for Isabella in return. However, I’m hopeful that once she sees us together, she won’t feel so strongly about keeping me away.
Or who knows? Maybe she was right to keep me at arm’s length. Maybe meeting him will scare the shit out of me and I’ll –
