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“You’d uproot a little girl’s life to serve your own purposes without blinking twice? You already walked out on her, isn’t that enough damage?”
Maya picked imaginary lint off her pants.
I couldn’t take it anymore. Her nonchalance had my blood boiling. I stood, the bottom of the chair scraping loudly against the tile floor. “I’m done here.”
When I turned, Maya grabbed my wrist. “Go see a lawyer,” she said. “Confirm what I’ve told you. Then meet me back here one week from today at the same time. I’ll hold off filing the paperwork until then. I realize this is a lot for you to digest.”
I pulled my wrist from her grip and looked her in the eye. “Go fuck yourself.”
“Same time next week, Colby. I’ll see you then.”
CHAPTER 18
Billie
It was one of those days where it was so rainy that it almost looked like nighttime. The weather was an exact match for my mood. I’d also been dropping things all morning. Deek looked over at me curiously every time. It would be great if I could get through this workday without losing my mind. Thankfully, I hadn’t screwed up any tattoos yet, but the day was still young. All morning, I hadn’t been able to think of anything except Colby’s meeting with Saylor’s mother.
Maya. She now had a name and a face. A face I wanted to punch.
Things had been so much better when she was just a blurry ghost, someone I could pretend didn’t exist. Everything had happened so fast last night that I’d barely gotten a look at her. My priorities were elsewhere. Namely, protecting Saylor so she would never catch wind of what a terrible person her mother was.
Finally, Deek and I had a break between clients, which gave him the opportunity to corner me about my strange behavior. I’d yet to tell him what was going on.
He came up behind me and shook my shoulders. “What the hell is up with you today? Something going on with you and Colby?”
I let out a long sigh. “You could say that…”
“I knew I shouldn’t have trusted a guy without tats.” His eyes narrowed. “Do I need to go fuck him up?”
“Believe me, there is nothing you could do to make him more fucked up than he is right now.”
A look of concern crossed his face. “Uh-oh. That sounds ominous. Spill.”
I explained what had happened. Deek always had something to say about everything. But this time? He stood with his mouth hanging open for a long while.
“What do you think she wants?” he finally asked.
“I don’t know. She dangled the custody thing in his face to get him to meet with her. So there’s obviously more. He’s coming here later to fill me in.”
“Wow.” Deek stared off. “What an asshole this chick is… To be out of the picture this entire time and then come back out of the blue like this?”
I exhaled. “We’d had the best night together before she showed up. The three of us. It was like the first time I could really see…” My words trailed off.
“See yourself as part of their family?”
I nodded, feeling my eyes well up. I didn’t want to cry, but better now than in front of Colby. He needed me to be strong and not make things harder. Colby didn’t need to be worrying about me and my feelings at a time like this.
“Are you worried this could affect your relationship with him?” he asked.
I shook my head. “I haven’t been worried about Colby and me at all. Saylor’s well-being is the only thing that’s been on my mind. I can’t imagine a scenario where she would be forced to spend time with this virtual stranger—or God forbid, be taken away from Colby. Those two are like extensions of each other. That can’t happen. Not even part of the time. It’s not an option, Deek!”
Deek shook his head slowly. “I don’t like the sound of this. Any person who would come out of nowhere and threaten Colby like that is probably capable of anything.”
“Exactly. Who does that?”
“An evil bitch,” he answered.
I rubbed my temples. “I would give anything to make this go away right now.”
“Well, I know a guy…” He teased.
“Last resort.” I chuckled.
“But listen,” he said. “Don’t freak out until you have a chance to hear what happened.”
I suspected Colby’s “breakfast” with Maya would only make things worse, not better. “You know sometimes you just have a bad feeling you can’t shake?”
“Yeah…”
“That’s how I feel about their meeting today. I know he’s gonna walk in here and tell me something I don’t want to hear. I can feel it in my bones.”
“The way this is affecting you? I can see how much you care about that little girl, and how lucky she’d be to have you in her life.”
“I would be the lucky one, Deek. I really would.”
