The Billionaire's Secret Love Child(109)

I looked at Philip and then at Matty, his cool eyes staring at me. His eyebrows were furrowed, like he was genuinely worried for me.

“Alright,” I let in. “Let’s go.”



“Zelda loves tater tots,” Philip fingered for a tater tot and began to slide it into his pocket.

I grabbed his hand and held it back out.

“But Zelda isn’t here,” I said. “And you don’t need to save it for her.”

Philip just gave me a wide smile, giggled, and ate the tater tot. Then, he leaned out under the table, as if I didn’t notice, and Matty deftly received a tater tot in his large hands and ‘hid’ it in his pocket.

“Seriously?” I said.

Matty let out a low chuckle and winked at Philip, who put his finger to his mouth and hushed secretively. I smiled. It caught me off guard to hear Matty’s laugh again, and to see the side of him that I remembered. When did he become so good with kids? And when did I begin to feel--

Philip tugged at my sleeve.

“Can I go look out the window?”

He pointed toward the floor-to-ceiling windows that lined one end of the cafeteria. It had a perfect view of the mountains in the distance, and the grass beginning to green, with pine trees scattered all about.

“Go,” I said, and he ran to smoosh his face into the window.

Matty chuckled again.

“He’s a fun kid,” he said.

I rolled my eyes and smiled.

“He’s a handful.”

I played with the straw in my drink before looking back at Matty. His eyes were already set intently on me, deep and piercing. My heart seemed to skip a beat.

“Thanks,” I said, diverting my eyes. “For helping, and for giving us a ride, and…”

“No, it’s alright. It’s the least I could do.”

“I’m...sorry for earlier, for being upset with you and yelling at you and--well, I know I was kind of a jerk. You’re right that I got too upset. I mean, I’ve been gone a long time and the town’s really grown and changed...”

I trailed off and fiddled with the sleeve of my sweater.

Matty let out a breath.

“I’m sorry, too. I got caught up in seeing you again--it--it brought back a lot of old memories. But we’re past that now, right?”

My eyes met with his again, and answered, “Yes.”

But in my heart, I admitted it to myself, the very fact that I had been guarding since I returned. It was stronger now that we were here, together. In that moment, I saw that the Matthew Gordon in front of me, was still the Matty Gordon I knew. Warm and compassionate, always ready to help, daring and kind.

And his laugh.

Just like his son...

We sat in silence for a few moments more. The cafeteria was mostly empty. A few workers cleaned the food lines, and a scattered bit of people sat quietly in the great hall. Philip was busy marveling at the landscape, spouting off ‘facts’ he learned about trees and birds.

Matty shifted in the booth, and opened his mouth as if to speak, when my phone rang.

I grabbed onto my phone. “Yes? Yes, we’ll be right there.”

I stood up and gathered my things.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “What was it you were going to say?”

He stood up and brushed his hand through his hair.

“Nothing. Let’s go.”



It was fitting, really. I first met Matty Gordon in the hospital. I don’t remember it, but when we first got engaged, it was the never-ending story that everyone liked to tell. A wealthy ranch owner and his wife, dawdling at their new baby boy, when just a few bassinets over, a curly-haired little girl was being ‘ooed’ and ‘awed’ at by her own family. Everyone always said it was meant to be. We were only three days apart, but from then on, we were always within each other’s sites.

It didn’t start off too great. Matty always had a way with getting in trouble, and I was always ready to follow. If there was ever an occasion, everyone could bet that Matty was out starting a fire, and I was sitting nearby stoking it. The McGarity farm was always way out of town, but the Gordons were about as close as neighbors came. So Matty and I had plenty of time, on plenty of space, to get to know each other.

As we grew up, however, things began to change.

My mother died when I was in high school, and it took its toll on my father, and me. I always admired my mom, and she always loved to share with me her love of books and adventure--but it was never something she had ever experienced herself. She spent her whole life never even reaching as far as the Wyoming border. It was at her death that I had inwardly decided I didn’t want that to be me, never getting to live out my dreams and experience life.

But life was exactly what came. I studied as best I could, spent my college days in Missoula, which for Montana, is all the best you can get for the city life, and in the summer before my final semester, Matty proposed.

We always knew it was coming. Everyone always knew it was coming. We had more than outgrown our childhood days of mischief, and had entirely fallen in young love by the end of high school. There wasn’t a day that I wasn’t sure I was going to marry Matty.

And then the night before our wedding, I found my mother’s old journal.

She spun marvelous tales--she loved to tell stories--and she recorded them all for herself. She talked of days when I was growing up, days she felt frustrated, and days she was filled with utter joy. She liked to write down interesting facts and tidbits she learned from her books about all the places she dreamed of one day going. It made me think. And for a split moment, as I began walking down the aisle the next morning, I doubted.