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“Just hold him,” she said, pushing him closer to me.
With shaking hands, I reached for the child, and she set the little bundle into my hands. He weighed next to nothing as I took him. I held him, not sure what to do next, and stared into his face. The little guy opened his eyes, staring right up at me, and my heart clenched for the first time in my life as more thunder rumbled around us.
Chapter Two
Davina
Iwas a nervous wreck as I pushed the stroller through the torrents of rain into the office. What a day to be doing this. The storm was unleashing buckets of rain, and the thunder and lightning were on the seriously scary side.
A woman much more put together than myself sat behind the desk in the entrance and smiled at me before her gaze dropped to the stroller I was pushing, and one neatly manicured brow rose slightly.
I had no idea how Trevor Vaughn was going to take this, but I was pretty sure it wasn’t going to be with open arms and a wide engaging smile. When Carol had first found out she was pregnant, I told her she needed to get in touch with him. Especially after she found out that she had an underlying heart condition that was going to prove difficult with a pregnancy. She had refused, saying that this time was for her and the baby alone. I disagreed, but I’d kept my mouth shut.
Maybe Carol had known that she’d never make it through delivery and that her nine months of carrying her child would be all she would ever have. Personally, I thought it was extremely selfish of her. Not only to have a baby knowing it could kill her but not to tell the father that he was going to have a child that he alone would be responsible for after she was gone.
When Carol had told me a little about him, I’d considered searching for him on my own, but she had kept his identity under lock and key until she was in delivery. Anytime she had spoken of him, she called him by the single letter of T.
“Can I help you?” the woman asked as I paused beside the desk.
“Yes, I need to speak with Mr. Vaughn, please.” The building rumbled as thunder vibrated around us. Could she hear my voice shaking, or did the thunder mask it enough? I was usually so professional, and nothing could shake me, but this did.
“And does he know what this is about?” she asked, and I unconsciously glanced at the stroller, shaking my head. “Well, Mr. Vaughn is in a meeting right now, but let me tell him you’re here. You are?”
“Thank you. My name is Davina Daniels.” I pulled the stroller to the side and took a seat in the lone chair near the door. So far, Devon had been somewhat content, but I knew he would need to be changed and fed soon as he’d been sleeping for over two hours already.
I stared at the little boy, seeing his mother’s face and blinking back the instant tears. I missed Carol so much already. She had been my best friend since high school, and we had done everything together in the last sixteen years. I held back a sob as my mind drifted back to right before Devon was born.
Carol lay exhausted; her hair clung to the sides of her face; beads of sweat rolled down her cheeks. Even in her exhaustion, she was still beautiful. She took my hand. “I’m not going to make it, Vina. I know it, you know it.”
“Hush, you are going to make it. You have a baby to raise, Carol.” I clung to her hand, tears filling my eyes because deep inside, I did know the truth.
She shook her head. “No, I’m not, and you need to accept it.”
“Never,” I cried toward her. “I don’t want to lose you. I can’t lose my best friend.”
“It’s going to be okay. I promise. Vina, I need you to do me a favor.”
“What? Anything!”
“Find T. Find Trevor Vaughn.”
“Trevor Vaughn?”
“Yes, that’s Devon’s father. Take Devon to him. Tell him I’m sorry.”
I stood there, gaping at her. I finally had the name of the man that she had spent the weekend with. For nine months, she had spoken and looked back on that weekend with sighs and smiles, saying she had wonderful memories of her time with T. She told me that she had loved a lifetime in those few days with him. I doubted that, but I respected her positive thoughts enough not to say anything.
“You want me to show up with Devon and say, hi, this is your son. Take him.”
She chuckled and then winced as another contraction began. A few moments later, she looked at me seriously. “I wrote Trevor a letter. You’ll find it with Devon’s things. It will explain, or at least, I hope it explains to him why I didn’t reach out. I did try once, but when he wasn’t available to talk, I changed my mind. He’s a wonderful man, Davina. He will be a fantastic father to Devon.”
Thunder snapped me back to reality. I sure hoped that he was a good father. After Carol died, I had done exactly what she had requested of me. I had found not only the note but information on Trevor, along with phone numbers and where he worked. Obviously, she had known more about him than she let on or that I had known about.
I hadn’t expected it to take almost two weeks to get in touch with him, though, and in the interim, I’d been granted temporary guardianship over Devon for sixty days. It had been a rough couple of weeks, and I was exhausted. Between the constant care that a newborn required, dealing with my grief, my full-time job, and the classes that I was taking to get my master’s degree in IT, I was on thin ice with my sanity.
The receptionist told me it would be a few minutes, and shortly after, Devon woke up when a huge crash from the lightning made us all jump, and he let out a cry that I’m sure everyone in the building heard. I hurriedly pulled him into my arms, standing to jostle him around a bit with hopes to calm him down. I winced as Devon let out another high-pitched wail and looked at the woman behind the desk apologetically.
She smiled at me as if she completely understood and went back to her work. When Devon wouldn’t quiet down, I wondered if I should find a place to feed and change him, but just then, the door behind the receptionist opened and several large men strode out. One glared at me and then walked in the opposite direction. Several other men approached me, all smiling and reaching toward the baby.
