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I want to say it, but I stop. I fucking stop and step back, my hands firmly rooted to her shoulders.
"We can't," I breathe. "Ellie, we can't."
"Why not?" she whines. She whines like she wants it as much as her next breath.
"I need to tell you something." I cover my mouth with my hand. These words aren't easy. I don't say them often. Only a few scant people in my life know what I'm about to tell her.
My phone rings again. The sound is a lure to bide me more time. If I answer, I can think. I can fucking think without a raging hard-on about what I want to say to Ellie.
"What do you need to tell me?" She holds my gaze for a moment before her eyes drift to my office door. "Did you hear that? Was that a knock? Is someone at the door?"
I heard it. Eda knows better than to disturb me when I've asked her not to. There's only one situation that would warrant the incessant phone calls and the interruption by my assistant.
"Eda," I call out, hoping she can hear me. "What is it? Is it her?"
The double glass doors of my office open in one fell swoop. Crew stands directly behind Eda, his phone in his hand. He ends the call and my phone stops ringing, just as he brushes past Eda to stalk toward me. "Mayday. Now, pal. Let's go."
Ellie holds Crew's glance for a moment before she turns back to me. "What's going on? What is it, Nolan?"
As my eyes find hers, I say the words I've never said to a woman before. "It's my daughter. My daughter needs me, Ellie. I'm sorry. I have to go."
She lowers herself back into the chair in front of my desk as I follow Crew out of my office and sprint to the open doors of the elevator. I didn't want her to find out like this, but now it's out there. She knows. Ellie knows that I'm a father and the most important thing in the world to me is my five-year-old little girl and her broken heart.
Chapter 28
Ellie
A daughter. He has a daughter.
I didn't bother to ask his assistant any questions after Nolan left his office with Crew. I doubt she would have told me anything. Eda doesn't strike me as the type to gossip about her boss behind his back. Besides, this is something that I need to discuss with Nolan. It's a child. He's a father to a little girl.
I got up from the chair in Nolan's office after what felt like four hours. It was only a few minutes. I went down to the store and finished my shift. I spent the entire afternoon glancing at my phone, hoping to hear anything from Nolan. Nothing came. Not a text or a call.
I took a detour on my way home, walking past the building that his driver dropped him off at last night. It's a luxury high-rise that caters to some of Manhattan's elite. You don't secure an address there without a trust fund or a successful business in your portfolio.
The doorman gave me a curt nod as I passed by. I didn't stop to ask him if I could go up to see Nolan. I haven't been invited. I understand why now.
"He told you that he's never had a girlfriend and yet he has a daughter?" Adley dips her spoon into the container of cookie dough ice cream she pulled out of our freezer. "This has to be one of those broken condom babies."
I scowl as I look at her. "It's Nolan's daughter, Ad. Even if she wasn't planned, she's his daughter."
She quiets, her lips thinning as recognition brightens her eyes. I'm a baby that was the result of a mistake. My mother told me as much before she died. My father said otherwise after we'd buried her. I knew it was my mom telling me the truth. They never lived in the same house. I don’t recall a time the two of them were together in a room, other than at the funeral home when he paid for her service and kissed the dark wood of her coffin as tears streamed down his face.
"When they talked about Crew's niece they must have been talking about her," I murmur. "That's why he had the hay on his shoulder and the earring on his ear. It was because of her."
"They seem close enough to be brothers," Adley offers. "Kids are fun, Bean."
They are fun. Every moment I ever spent with Jayce, Tad's seven-year-old son, was a treasure to me. I didn't think I'd love him when I first met him, but the deep love I developed for him drove me to beg Tad to move his company headquarters to Las Vegas so we could be closer to Jayce after Tad's ex-wife remarried.
Our visits with him were limited to every Wednesday night and alternating weekends, but I made the most of the time. When Tad dumped me, I lost Jayce too. I never saw him again even though I held tightly to the faint hope that Tad would let me say goodbye to him. That never happened.
"I know they are." I cover my mouth with my hand. I don't want to say Jayce's name because it hurts so much when I think of him. Adley knows that. She's shied away from talking about him since Tad left me.
"Your nieces are a blast. You love them like mad."
I do love them. All three of them are unique, even though the two eldest are identical twins. I can tell them apart because I've known them since the moment they were born seven years ago. Megan has a freckle on the tip of her nose that her twin sister, Melrose, doesn't have.
"I haven't seen them since I've been back," I admit. "I miss them."
