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“I can’t believe you just said that,” Parker said with a shake of his head. His features were creased with anger. A vein in his forehead bulged.
“I wish I could be sorry about it. Don’t you see how desperate I am? You have to help me. His life could be in danger.”
“After everything that went down between us, give me one good reason why I should help you?” Their gazes were locked. There was an electric pulse vibrating in the air.
Cadence knew this was the moment of truth. For almost three years she’d been wanting to tell Parker her truths. The day of reckoning had arrived. She knew she had no right to be angry at him, but all of a sudden she felt fury rising up inside her. For so long now she’d been doing the right thing for everybody but herself. It had brought her nothing but pain and isolation. She jumped up from her chair and faced him head-on. She folded her arms across her chest and prepared for battle.
“He’s your son, Parker. Okay? Is that a good enough reason?” she asked in a raised voice.
**
There were certain moments in a person’s life when everything came into sharp, clear focus and everything else faded away into nothingness. Parker felt as if he was having a strange, out of body experience. He shook his head, immediately refuting Cadence’s statement. She was a desperate mother in search of her child. She would say anything. Do anything. She was tricking him so he would assist her. Although he couldn’t say he blamed her, Parker resented being jerked around by her. Been there, done that.
“That’s a lie!” he said in a strangled voice. How could Cadence be so dishonest about such a thing as paternity? She knew as a Donahue how much he valued family ties.
“No, it’s not, Parker. God knows I’m speaking the truth. Logan is your son. He’s almost two and a half. Do the math.”
Do the math. His mind scrambled to calculate how long it had been since he and Cadence had been together. A little under three years. They had been intimate on a few occasions which they had both regretted. Giving in to their physical wants hadn’t been something either of them had been proud of and they had both vowed from that point on to wait until marriage for such an act of intimacy. Was Cadence suggesting she’d been pregnant when she had ended their relationship? Had that played a role in her decision?
He shook his head, unwilling to believe something so incredible.
She fumbled around in her purse, then pulled out her cell phone and began flipping through it. “See! Look for yourself! DNA doesn’t lie.” Cadence shoved the phone at him. He hesitated for a moment before accepting it. There was a photo of a toddler on the screen. Parker stared at the child looking up at him. He let out a gasp. Cadence’s son was the spitting image of him, all the way down to the cleft in his chin. Same eye color. Same dark hair. Same shape of the face. Same brows.
Logan was his son! There was no question about it. The weight of it slammed against his chest with the force of a tsunami.
“He looks—” he began, his words cut off by emotion. It felt like a huge lump was sitting in his throat. Parker couldn’t manage to get the words out.
“Just like you,” Cadence said. She nodded, tears swimming in her eyes. “Because he’s your son.”
“My son,” he said in a raspy voice filled with wonder. “I have a son.”
Cadence smiled at him. She nodded. “Yes, Parker. You have a son.”
He shut his eyes and reminded himself to count to ten. He had a son who had been taken away from him—one he hadn’t been aware of until this very moment. Not only had Mason Price absconded with his son, but Cadence had failed to tell him over the past two-and-a-half years that he was a father. He’d lost years of his son’s life. Parker hadn’t been there at his birth. He hadn’t rocked him to sleep. Parker hadn’t given him a bottle or changed a single diaper. Little Logan didn’t even know Parker existed.
And if he couldn’t find Price he might never meet Logan. He might never be able to claim his child.
Dear Lord, please protect my son. And grant me the wisdom to find him.
“How could you?” he asked Cadence, his voice filled with condemnation. And a rage that frightened him.
She reached out to touch his arm, but he shook her off. He didn’t think he could bear her touch at this moment. She’d betrayed him. He hadn’t thought Cadence could hurt him any more than she already had in the past, but this felt like a stab in the back. It was staggering information. It was such a huge, painful loss.
Parker began pacing back and forth. He threw his hands up in the air. He wanted to scream and yell at Cadence, to accuse her of every sin he possibly could. A part of him wanted to give in to his emotions, while another part of him knew it wouldn’t get them anywhere. And no matter how angry he felt, his parents hadn’t raised him to rail against a woman under any circumstances.
Parker needed to find his son. And no matter what he felt toward Cadence, she was his son’s mother. She was the only person who could help him locate Logan.
What he needed at this moment was to be alone to process everything being thrown at him. He let out an angry cry of frustration, then yanked open his patio door and stormed outside. He kicked off his sneakers. Within seconds he was walking on the beach with the sand between his toes and the night breeze ruffling his hair. He began running at breakneck speed, desperate to flee as fast as possible from Cadence’s news. He was a father to a two-year-old boy. And his son was missing. He didn’t like feeling so helpless.
Parker felt as if he might explode. He stopped running and looked out across the water. There were some bright lights shining in the distance. Parker focused on them and began to breathe deeply, in and out.
You’re not alone. God was with him. Always. Even though the situation felt monumental for him to handle, Parker knew he wasn’t alone. Not when Jason and his other siblings were only a phone call away. That was the best part of being one of eight kids in a big bustling family. Donahue strong, he reminded himself.
After a few minutes he sat down in the sand and buried his face in his hands. He knew he wasn’t simply reacting to this bombshell from Cadence. Although he’d tried to downplay his feelings, he had been crushed by his parents’ separation announcement. How was it possible that so much had changed in his life over the course of one evening? It made him feel helpless and completely out of sorts. He didn’t know up from down at the moment. All he could do was pray. And try to hold on to his sanity. He was barely hanging on by a thread.
Dear Lord, please help me. This rage is threatening to consume me. I thought I’d put Cadence in the past and now she’s back with this amazing but shocking news. I need to find my son. I need to put this anger aside long enough so that I can formulate a plan to track my son down. And I’m afraid—for the first time in a long time. What if something’s happened to him? What if I never get to know my boy? How in the world will I be able to handle it?
“Parker.” The sound of Cadence’s voice caught him off-guard. He hadn’t expected her to follow him down the beach. He felt her hand on his shoulder. “Please, talk to me. If for no other reason than for Logan. He needs both of us.”
