The Rules of Dating(61)

“I got her back to sleep.”

“Thank you.”

She nodded. “Talk to me. What’s going on, Colby? I thought Saylor’s mom wasn’t in the picture.”

“She wasn’t. You know the entire story. I met her at a strip club on Halloween a few years back. She came home with me. We had a one-night stand, and she skipped out the next morning, leaving me a wrong number. Next time I saw her was when she showed up at my door with a baby, saying it was mine, and I needed to watch her for a little while because she had an important job interview. She ran out my door as fast as she’d showed up.” I shook my head. “Haven’t seen or heard one word since. I tried looking for her after she disappeared, but she was here illegally, so it was easy to vanish without a trace.”

“What did she say outside?”

I refilled my glass with whiskey and shook my head. “Not much. Just said she wanted a favor. I went off on her. Then she threatened that if I don’t meet her tomorrow at eight AM at the diner down the block, she’ll file those papers.” I motioned to the envelope with my eyes, then lifted the whiskey glass and chugged back a heaping gulp. It burned, but not enough.

“What’s in the envelope?”

I looked at it again. “Take a look for yourself. I can’t say the words…”

Billie slipped the packet of papers out. Her head moved slightly from side to side as she scanned the typed print. I knew the second she read the caption. Her eyes flared wide and her head snapped up. “A motion for petition of custody?”

I felt like throwing up, hearing the words out loud.

“Colby, oh my God, is she serious?”

I shook my head. “Looks that way. I only skimmed the papers, but she’s got affidavits from doctors saying she suffered from postpartum depression and that’s why she left. Some bullshit about her being worried for the safety of her baby. There’s even a certificate in there saying she took some sort of a parenting class. As if they can teach you to love someone and protect them with your life, or stay up all night watching them when they come down with a fever. Or teach you to forget you once had a life of your own.” I shook my head. “A fucking class.”

“Oh, Colby…” Billie reached across the table and took my hand.

I’d been so damn angry the last fifteen minutes, yet that one little touch made a chink in my armor. I felt all my nerves start to flood out through that crack.

I just kept looking down and shaking my head. “They can’t do that, right? Give my daughter to a woman who walked away from her child and never even called to check on her?” I swallowed and tasted salt. “They can’t, right?”

Billie shook her head. Her face was so sad. “I don’t know, Colby. But I do have a friend whose baby daddy didn’t see his kid for five years, and they gave him visitation. He was an addict and sobered up though, so it’s a little different.”

“Different than what? A woman who has a letter from a doctor swearing she had postpartum depression? Both are diseases, right?”

Billie squeezed my hand. “Let’s slow down for a minute. I think we’re getting ahead of ourselves by trying to guess what a judge might do. It may not even come to that. You said she didn’t file the papers yet, right?”

“I don’t think so. She said if I didn’t meet her at eight, she’d be filing them at nine tomorrow.”

“What does she want you to meet her at eight for?”

“I have no damn idea.”

“Well, I think you need to find out…”

***

I barely slept all night.

Billie had gone home after all. She’d said she wanted to give me time to think, and I didn’t fight her too hard on it. I wouldn’t have been good company anyway. Talk about a quick turn of events. One minute, I’m the happiest I can remember being, maybe ever—my girl’s going to stay over, Saylor and Billie clearly adore each other, and the woman I’d thought might run away when she saw what my day-to-day life was really like wound up running to me because of it. And then there was the knock.

The fucking knock.

With the same woman standing on the other side of the door who had turned my life upside down four years ago. And she was trying to do it a second time.

Maya.

Isn’t there a limit on how many times you can sucker punch a guy you’ve spent the sum total of less than eight hours of your life with? If not, there goddamned should be.

“Daddy…” Saylor padded into the kitchen where I was drinking coffee and held up a pair of my socks. “Are you being silly?”

My brows dipped together. “Why do you have my socks, honey?”

She grinned. “Because you left them for me to put on when you laid my outfit on the bed.” She pulled something from behind her back. “And these!”

I blinked a few times. Had I really done that? Left my underwear and socks for her to wear instead of her own? I guess I had.

Saylor tilted her head. “Are you sad, Daddy?”

Shoot. “No, honey, I’m not sad. Just a little tired, that’s all.” The last thing I wanted was to worry my little girl before I dropped her at school. So I scooped her off the floor as I stood and put on my best fake smile. She giggled.

“I was wondering why my underwear were so tight that they were going up my butt. I guess it’s because they’re yours…”