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“I don’t know, but I don’t think so. No one knew. They were just told to stay away from each other. You know? The dispute over the land was real, but what really put the wedge between us was Lucas leaving his family.”
“Was it worth it?” she asks without elaborating.
“Yes.” I answer without asking for clarification because it was all worth it.
“For the year I had with the love of my life. For the son we made together. For the life our son got to lead. I would do it all again. Hindsight is easy, but it’s what I did, and it was hard. And it took me a long time to recover. When you’re a mother, you’ll know. Doing what your child needs instead of what you or they want is hard.”
“I can only imagine,” she says, and I can’t read whatever’s really in her eyes. “We’ll see you tomorrow.”
And only because I know he’s in good hands do I let myself out of their house.
* * *
HAYES
Confidence slides into bed with me and she doesn’t say a word. She lays down so we’re face to face.
“Hey,” she says and takes my hands in hers. She lays them on the soft swell of her lower stomach and whispers, “Here we are. We’re safe in here.”
I close my eyes and make promises to that little life growing inside of my life. My love. My everything.
That as long as I draw breath, he will know only love—the tough but yielding kind—from me. That no one would be able to convince me to walk away from him.
That I’m ready to be his father.
That I’m the man his mother needs.
That I know that his inheritance is more than just money and name. It’s our values; it the synchronicity between who we are in private and who we are when the world is watching.
“Do you think less of me?” I ask.
“No. Never,” she says. Of course.
“Still want to marry me?” I ask.
“Yes, and before I start to show, please,” she says.
“Your wish is my command,” I say. They’re the last words we speak before we fall asleep.
JUDGEMENT
HAYES
TWO WEEKS LATER.
“Thank God, that’s over,” Confidence says. She steps into my side and slips her arms around my waist. We step out of Kingdom’s office building and out into the bright afternoon sun. The building is casting a shadow onto the big granite courtyard where overworked employees come to escape the air conditioning and their computers for a few minutes.
“Yes, it was ugly for a second at the end, but it’s done,” I agree.
“Will your uncle be okay?” she asks. Bleeding heart.
“He’s going to be just fine. I think retirement in exile on his ranch in the beautiful Texas hardly amounts to hard time for all of the shit he’s pulled over the last year,” I say.
We settled the case today. Kingdom paid damages that were negotiated by Amelia and Wilde Law. The Foundation established a Project School Bell that will deploy mobile classrooms to neighborhoods that are recovering from the flood so their children can continue to go to school close to home while their schools are being renovated. It’s the first in a string of programs that the foundation will fund over the next few months as part of its commitment to the city of Houston. Some of them are being done in conjunction with Wilde Law. When I think about Wilde—and Remi—my stomach contracts painfully. I still don’t know how to tell him that his father is my father. And that his father may not be dead after all.
“Hayes?” Confidence calls my name and bumps me with her hip. I look down at her, and she’s got a concerned look on her face.
“Yes, my love?”
