Page 47 of Reeves

If I had opened that letter six years ago, would I have come back? The honest answer twists in my gut like lead.

Probably not.

The man I was then would have seen it as a trap. An anchor. A threat to run from.

And she knows it.

"You weren't wrong." The admission guts me to say out loud. "About what I wanted then."

She nods once, accepting this without surprise. We both know it's true.

The irony cuts deep. I make decisions fast. I don’t hesitate when business needs to be handled or look away when it matters.

And yet the most consequential choice I ever made was not a choice at all. It was ignoring an envelope on my windshield.

One moment of avoidance created a child I never knew existed.

I take a long swallow of bourbon, letting it burn all the way down. The past is locked in place now. There's nothing to argue or defend.

"What happens now?" I ask, shifting toward the present. "With Benjy."

Charli draws back slightly, her fingers tracing a pattern on the table. "Exactly what's happened, Reeves. He’s thriving and growing. I mean, if there's something you want here, you're going to have to tell me. I can't guess what this means for you."

I can't begin to guess what it means for me. I certainly can't expect her to.

"I'm guessing he doesn't know that his father is in New Orleans right now?"

"No." Charli tucks a strand of hair behind her ear. "I always planned to tell him the whole truth when he was older, when he started asking real questions. But until now, there wasn't a reason to make it complicated."

"That day I drove by your house." My voice comes out rough. "I saw you teaching him to ride his bike. I figured he was your son, but I never, ever imagined he was our son."

Charli nods. "I can understand that, now. If you didn't read the letter, how could you have known?"

"Is there someone in his life that he sees as a father figure?"

I know this is a dangerous question, but I have to know. At the very least, I deserve to know.

"Yes."

I'm suddenly nauseated. Now I wish I hadn't asked. What a stupid fucking question. Of course she's married.

"My father. We spend a lot of time with my parents, and my father fills in where a father might."

Where a father might. Where I should be is what she probably wants to say.

The bar hums quietly around us. Glasses clink somewhere near the back wall, and a low conversation from the next table is suddenly all I can hear.

Neither of us speaks.

I look up and meet Charli’s hazel eyes. The words come before I can run through the consequences.

“I want to meet him.”

They sit there between us.

Charli’s posture shifts almost immediately. Her shoulders pull back, and her expression tightens in a way I remember well. It is the same look she used to get when someone crossed a line she had already decided she would defend.

“That’s not a small request, Reeves.” Her voice stays calm, but there is steel under it. “I have spent his entire life building stability for Benjy. Five years of routine, of knowing what tomorrow looks like for him.”