Built. Jay Crownover
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telling me I fathered a child with your dead friend?” It sounded harsh but my head was reeling and I was suddenly having a hard time breathing. The ground under my boots felt less solid than it had a minute ago and everything inside of me wanted to call her a liar and throw her off of my site.
She nodded. “Yeah. I mean, at the time I didn’t really think anything of it. Halloran has had a lot of boyfriends and Hyde has had a lot of ‘special’ uncles throughout the years. I wouldn’t bother you, would never have tried to find you if it wasn’t an emergency. Because of how she died and her history of drug use, the state took Hyde. He’s with Social Services now on his way to a foster home. If you don’t do something they’re going to put him in foster care and then try and adopt him out. He’s going to get lost in the system.”
I balked and fell back a step. “If I don’t do something? Seriously, lady, I don’t even know if what you’re telling me is true.”
She nodded and dug around in her back pocket until she pulled out a cell phone. “I know it’s sudden, and I know it’s crazy. But Halloran didn’t have much family and the ones that are left don’t have anything to do with her or Hyde, so there are no relatives that can or are interested in taking him. I offered, but I’m gone so much for work and my track record isn’t exactly spotless, so they turned me down as fast as they could. I also had some bad habits and liked the wrong kind of men when I was younger. Luckily I got myself straight before it was too late.” She gulped. “I very easily could’ve ended up like my friend.”
She blinked at me then turned her attention back to her phone. “It may be crazy and hard for you to believe, but you have a son, and if you don’t do something soon he’s going to end up nothing more than a case number in some social worker’s file.”
It was my turn to shake my head. I wanted to tell her to leave. I wanted to tell her she was crazy and talking nonsense, but I had never been the type of man to run away from the messes I created or my responsibilities. So when she thrust her smartphone at me I took it from her like it was going to bite me.
I held the little device in my hand and stared numbly at the picture of a very pretty blond woman with her arms wrapped around a little boy in torn jeans and a Transformers T-shirt. He had wavy dark brown hair, big eyes that were a clear, calm dark green, and a smile missing a few of his teeth. He also had a very familiar dimple indenting his chubby cheek. He was tall for a little kid, and as I gazed at the image before me I couldn’t help but feel like I was looking at a photo from my own childhood. My hand went numb and the phone tumbled to the ground.
Echo didn’t say anything. She just bent down to pick up the device and held it out in front of me. “There are hundreds more if you want to see. The resemblance is startling, isn’t it? That’s why I freaked out when you first came out of the house. It’s like looking at Hyde in the future when he’s all grown up. He looks just like you. He just turned five, so you can do the math if the picture isn’t enough to convince you that he’s yours.”
He did look just like me. He really fucking did.
I ran a hand over my beard and considered her thoughtfully. “Why didn’t your friend ever find me? Why didn’t she ask for help?” The idea that a part of me, a tiny human that I had helped make, had been out there in the world all these years without me knowing had some of that old rage and resentment I struggled to keep a lid on churning deep in my guts.
“I told you, she went back to the guy she had been with. I don’t think she really knew who Hyde’s dad was until he was born. It was pretty obvious when she had him, though, that it wasn’t her boyfriend since he was Mexican and Hyde obviously isn’t.” The girl flinched and shoved her phone back in her pocket. “The boyfriend beat her so bad when she got out of the hospital she almost died then. That forced her to clean up her act for a while because she didn’t want her newborn to be without a mother, but the older Hyde got the more Halloran started to slip back into her old ways. She probably could’ve tracked you down, introduced you to your son, but she was more concerned with chasing the next high and keeping her newest man to be bothered doing something that might benefit her kid. Like I said, Halloran was sweet and kind, but she wasn’t a very good mother. I mean, I think she tried to be, she just didn’t know how. Hyde has had a pretty shitty time of things in his few short years. You could make such a huge difference in this boy’s life, Mr. Fuller. He’s a great kid, outgoing and funny. You would never know what he’s been through. He deserves a real home. He deserves a parent that will love him and take care of him.”
I braced a hand on the top of my hammer and blew out a heavy breath. I felt like the entire world had shifted around me and had started spinning in the other direction.
“I have a kid?” I wasn’t sure the words came out or if I just thought them, but they felt so bizarre and foreign on my tongue.
She nodded again and this time her expression was full of sympathy and knowing.
“Look, I know this is a shock. I know you might go back in that house and do nothing because you think I’m a liar or a crazy person, but it was a chance I had to take because the last person that should be forced to suffer for his mother’s poor choices time and time again is that little boy. He makes me wish I had lived a better life, had been a better person from the start just so I could help him out.”
“My history isn’t exactly one that’s going to win me any awards or make anyone think I’m prime father material.” I was all too familiar with the sins from the past having a lasting effect on the here and now.
“Maybe. But don’t you think you should at least try? Are you going to be able to live with yourself if there is even a slim possibility that Hyde is yours and strangers are given responsibility for his care? I’ve been in the system. It isn’t pretty and most of the kids that come out of it end up in jail or way more messed up than when they went in. If you can stop that, why wouldn’t you?”
I knew she was right because Rowdy had spent his youth orphaned and then his teenage years in foster care. He wasn’t messed up per se, and had never been in jail, but whenever he mentioned his past it wasn’t full of happy memories and sunshine and rainbows.
I sighed again and lifted my hand to rub it across the back of my neck. “Okay, lady … I mean Echo, I won’t make any promises, but I do have a client slash acquaintance that practices family law, so I will reach out to her and see what she thinks I need to do. I imagine the first step would be proving the boy is mine legally. I don’t suppose your friend put me on the birth certificate?”
The brunette tugged on her lip again and shook her head in the negative. “It’s blank. I pulled it right after the funeral when the state came and took Hyde. I was hoping to find a name, but like I said I don’t think she really knew who the father was and she was so scared of her man at the time there was no way she was going to put another man’s name down. All I had was her mentioning you when she saw you on TV. I actually went to the tattoo shop and asked them for the name of the person that had done the renovations. The tiny blonde with all the tattoos at the front desk didn’t want to hand it over without a reason why. I told her I was looking to hire someone to renovate my condo. I don’t think she believed me. Luckily one of the guys that works there had your card and handed it over.”
I knew exactly the kind of attitude that tattooed and tiny blonde could throw, so I was grateful that one of my boys had stepped in. Even if this lady wasn’t on the up-and-up, I owed it to myself, to the kid, and, sadly, to the girl that had helped me drown my sorrows in booze and sex when I was feeling so lost and alone to find out if the little boy really was mine.
“Like I said, no promises, but I will talk to the attorney and see what she thinks needs to happen. Okay?”
The woman nodded and I could see the relief flash across her face. “I guess that’s more than I had hoped for when I initially decided to search you out. You honestly could’ve just thrown me off the property without hearing one word I had to say, so I’m considering the fact that you listened a win regardless of what happens next.” She gave me a wobbly smile. “Thank you.”
She turned