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“Right now, we head over to Cal’s and figure out what’s going on with him. Tomorrow, we work on everything else.”
forty-five
BELLE
We all piledinto Maverick’s small sporty car. Willa and I are crammed in the back. I don’t know what the point of putting seats back here was if someone as short as Willa is still cramped. Thankfully, the drive to my brother’s house is quick.
“His fucking lights are on! And that’s his car!” Maverick yells as we pull into the driveway. Clearly, I’m not the only one pissed off at Cal’s disappearing act. By the time I’m able to get myself out of the car, Mav’s already pounding on the door.
“We know you’re here Cal!” He yells. I’ve never seen Maverick angry before and it’s scary.
“Do you hear that?” Willa says. “Mav shut up for a second.”
The moment silence falls on us, I hear it. Crying.
“Is that a fucking baby?” Kai says. His eyes are wide.
Cal swings the door open. He looks exhausted. “You woke my daughter up you assholes!” he yells before quickly moving away from the door.
“Excuse me? Your what?” I ask, running after him.
“My daughter,” he says, sounding both awed and terrified.
“Dad?” I say as I round the corner and see my dad holding a crying baby girl wrapped in a soft pink blanket.
“Hi my beauty,” my dad says happily, even with the screaming infant in his arms. “Come to meet your niece?” Then my dad looks up and his smile drops. The current state of my face would do that to most people. It’s a testament to how tired and frazzled Cal is that he didn’t even notice.
“I was coming to check to make sure Cal was still alive after he fell off the grid. Imagine my surprise to hear a baby screaming.”
“What happened to your face?” my dad asks, ignoring everything I just said and coming over to me. The baby girl is still screaming between us.
That gets Cal’s attention, and his tired demeanor quickly changes to anger. “Who did this? I’ll fucking kill them!”
The baby starts screaming louder and Cal flinches. “I’m sorry, baby girl. Daddy didn’t mean to raise his voice. Your Auntie Belle just has a scary booboo.”
I stare at my brother, more confused than I’ve ever been in my life. “Daddy?” I ask.
“Uh, yeah,” Cal says, rubbing the back of his neck. “This is Cora. She’s my daughter.” I look down at the sweet, red face of the angry little girl in my dad’s arms.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Willa blurts before pushing past everyone and snagging the baby from my dad. “Formula. Where is it? When was the last time you changed her?”
“Kitchen and just before you banged on the door,” my dad answers easily. His eyes bounce between his children. Inotice the concern when he looks at me and the annoyance when he looks at Cal. So not much different from normal.
Willa takes the baby to the kitchen, probably to make a bottle. My dad gestures to the couch and chairs for the rest of us to take a seat.
“You didn’t tell anyone about this, Callahan?” my dad asks, sounding exasperated. “And you,” he points at me. “What the hell happened?”
“Belle goes first,” Cal shouts, sounding like a twelve-year-old version of himself. I roll my eyes.
“Brad,” I answer and wait for the shock of that to set in. Is it mean? Yes, but he scared the shit out of me only to turn up with a baby who is apparently my niece. The dumbass deserves it.
Kai is next to me on the couch, with Cal sitting in the armchair across from us. I can feel his gaze swing back and forth from a tense and shocked Cal to an overly smug me. He sighs.
“Just put the man out of his misery, mo chridhe,” he whispers and then kisses my hair.
“Fine.” I tell my dad and brother everything that transpired earlier. I can see the guilt written across Cal’s face when he realizes the reason I was at that house was because I thought he was there and probably hurt. My dad’s hands are in fists, and they only loosen when Kai explains that Brad is now in police custody.
“You heard from your dad?” Cal asks Kai.
