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He gave me a serious look. “Please, that’s not the only Adam you know,” he said, his voice dropping.
I couldn’t help it. My eyes dropped to his mouth for the briefest of moments, but I yanked my gaze away quickly. “Yes, well, I thought we agreed not to acknowledge those versions of ourselves. Besides, there are more pressing matters at hand,” I reminded him as I rose, moving away from him quickly.
There was still too much heat between us, and now, there was vulnerability added to it—the perfect mixture for another mistake. I hurried to my bag, which had been left on his kitchen counter. I procured one of my business cards from it and stuck it to his fridge with one of his magnets. “I’m leaving you my card in case you need anything. Make sure you’re on time for the reading. You might want to arrange for the supplies to make Wolfgang as comfortable as possible.”
“Right,” Adam said rising from the couch. “I need to get him a bed and blankets and…a pinball machine. That seems like something a six-year-old kid would need right?”
“Um, I would just stick with the basics for now,” I said, slipping my purse strap over my shoulder and heading for the door. Before I left, I turned back to him. He was watching me carefully, and once again, I had to fight the urge not to rush over to him and throw my arms around him to comfort him. “I know it will be much easier said than done, but try to get some sleep, okay?”
He looked like he was about to say something but seemed to think better of it and just nodded, muttering out a ragged, “Thanks, Reagan.”
I left his apartment with a lump in my throat. There was no relief for ripping off that band-aid, just a gnawing worry of what was going to happen next and how Adam and Wolfgang were going to get through this.
Chapter four
Adam
Reagan Miles had finally been inside my apartment again, but not for any reasons I would have ever imagined.
I looked down at the Christmas card of Ronnie and her family yet again. I examined that little boy smiling in the picture. He looked so happy in his mother's embrace. What the hell did I have to offer him? And what the hell had Ronnie been thinking? Did Henry not have any family? Surely, there had to be somebody. Definitely somebody better than me.
I'd barely slept. I tossed and turned for a couple of hours but finally gave up the ghost around three and decided to take care of some things early. There was an all-night mart where I cleared out the freezer aisle. What kid didn't like pizza bites? Wolfgang now had more than he could've ever hoped for.
I'd have to wait until normal business hours to find a bed…or maybe I should wait so he could pick one out for himself?
I would ask him when I finally met him. What else I would say to him, I still had no clue.
Around five in the morning, I decided it was late enough to call Brian. Lawyers got up early, right?
"Hello?" A groggy voice answered.
"Bri, it's Adam."
"Adam, are you okay? Did you lock yourself out again?" he asked sleepily.
"No, I just have some big news. Guess who was in my apartment last night," I told him in a teasing voice, needing something to feel normal.
"Another Knicks cheerleader?"
"No, but she would definitely make an interesting cheerleader, if the cheerleader said, 'Oh my God, Adam, please raise yourself to at least a middle school level of humor,’" I said, doing an impersonation that I'd performed for Brian several times before.
I could practically hear him bolting upright up over the line. "Reagan was there?"
Maybe I shouldn't have been talking about Reagan in my apartment to Brian. But they had been broken up for a long time, and he definitely did not know about our night together. I supposed I should feel more guilty for sleeping with my best friend's ex-girlfriend, especially due to how quickly after they broke up it happened. But Brian admitted to me that he had gotten a "head start" on playing the field ahead of the breakup. I knew there was no love lost between the two. Brian was mostly a good guy, but I'd never known him to be a particularly good boyfriend to any woman, especially Reagan. That woman required a whole different kind of man. Probably one who didn't exist, but she was definitely a force to be reckoned with.
Which was why I hadn't been able to get her off my mind after all these months. In fact, the only thing that had nearly toppled her out of my head was the impending arrival of Wolfgang.
"Yeah. Apparently, she was Ronnie's lawyer…" I trailed off.
I could hear Brian blow out a long breath. "That's right, I did refer her over to Reagan. Man, I'm really sorry you're having to deal with all this. I know she was one of your family members you actually liked."
"Yeah, well, I guess the feeling must've been mutual because…she left her kid to me."
There was a long silence and then laughter—quite frankly, too much laughter. "That's funny, man, you with a kid." Brian chuckled.
"Yeah, it would be funny if it weren't true," I told him.
"Holy shit, are you serious?"
