Surprise Delivery (Page 51)

Time I may not have.

“If it’s inevitable that it ends up with Duncan cutting all ties, leaving you alone,” he says, “why not get paid for it? Why not ensure you and your daughter a life of comfort? I mean, that’s what you ultimately desire, is it not? That your daughter be well taken care of – and by you?”

I nod slowly, the oppressive weight of fear and an impending sense of doom pressing down hard on me. I suddenly feel trapped – like a rat in a maze. Every turn I take leads me to another dead end or blind passage and I don’t see any way of getting out of this.

“Remember,” he says, “you have a choice. You can take your baby and leave Duncan now. Or you can let him take her away from you. You can lose just Duncan, or you can lose both Duncan and Aurora. The choice is yours.”

Henry gives me a small smile I think he means to be sympathetic, but it simply looks creepy and evil. Or maybe that’s just because that’s the perception of the man I have. I don’t know, and I don’t really care. I despise this piece of garbage of a human being.

“I’ll give you a few days to think it over,” Henry says as he stands up and taps the contract on the table. “And to read through this, of course. Review it and if you have any sort of questions, concerns, or any other considerations that will ease your mind in signing it, please don’t hesitate to contact me, Alexis.”

I sit back in my seat again, feeling completely shell-shocked. My stomach is churning, and my heart is thundering, as my thoughts and feelings swirl around inside of me with the power of a tornado. I don’t know what to say or think right now. All I know is that my feeling of disgust for Henry Clyburne is as deep and powerful as the ocean.

“Right,” he says. “I’ll be in touch in a few days and hopefully we can come to an accord, Alexis. There is no reason for any of us – especially that beautiful baby girl of yours – to suffer. Not when there is an avenue for her to have an amazing life.”

“Screw you, Henry,” is all I can manage to say, though it’s without much conviction behind it.

He chuckles softly, “I’ll see myself out.”

Twenty-Eight

Duncan

“Good evening, Doctor Clyburne.”

I give the doorman a smile. “Evening, Donald.”

I’m beat by the time I get home and want nothing more than a hot shower and a comfortable bed. It was a long day and I lost a patient – a kid who’d been hit by a car while riding his bike. I did everything I could think of to save him, but it was too little, too late. I couldn’t do anything. The hardest part was informing his parents – that was something I hated doing more than anything else on this planet. There is no easy way to tell somebody their loved one died on the table.

Watching the light snuffed out of the boy today made me think about Nizar – the kid whose leg I’d saved over in Syria. I don’t know why my mind conjured up that image all of a sudden. Maybe it’s to remind me of something good, or to try to blunt a terrible memory with a good one. I don’t know really. But, as I think about Nizar, knowing that by now, he’s probably back running around with his friends, playing soccer, it makes me feel a little bit better.

Not every day is going to be a successful one, and we are going to lose people. It’s inevitable. So maybe the lesson I need to take away from all of this is to hold onto and cherish those good days, those successful days, to help me get through the bad ones.

I ride the elevator up to my floor and get out. As I walk toward my door, a smile crosses my lips as I find myself wishing Alexis was here waiting for me. I can’t think of a better way to end a tough day than being in her arms.

It’s still amazing to me that all of this is happening. Going from being a guy who figured he’d never find somebody he connects with and was resigned to a life spent not really living, to being a man in love, whose soul is on fire, and is more alive than he’s ever been, has been an unexpected and wild roller coaster ride – a ride I don’t want to end.

The other thing that’s blowing my mind is that I never thought of myself as the fatherly type. I never even really considered being a dad. And yet, when I hold Aurora in my arms and look into her eyes, I feel so profoundly connected to her. There’s something about her – something I can’t put my finger on – that makes me want to protect her. To give her the best life possible.

I want nothing more in my life than to keep both Alexis and Aurora safe. I want nothing more than to spend my days making them both happy and living an amazing life, having grand adventures together.

Like a family.

That thought sends a bolt of disbelief shooting through me. It’s shocking, but it somehow still feels right. As I turn that word over and over in my mind – family – I still can’t get used to the idea that I’m a family man now. Sort of. I mean, they’re not officially my family, but given the way we spend our time together, it sure feels like it. It’s a strange sensation, but not in a bad way. Not at all.

Being with Alexis and Aurora feels right. It feels like being home.

My head is still in the clouds as I slip my key into the lock and open the door. It’s only when I feel a sudden weight crashing into me from behind, and feel something sharp poke me in the arm, that I snap back to reality.

The force of the blow from behind knocks me inward and I stumble into the foyer of my condo. I roll over quickly and scramble to my feet as a man wearing a black ski mask steps inside and closes the door behind him. The dim lighting glints off the long blade in his hand.

My upper arm is stinging, so I quickly strip off my coat and take a look. There’s a spot of blood on my shirt – the fucker stabbed me. Not badly, I don’t think he got more than the tip of the blade through the thick material of my coat, but he stabbed me all the same.

The man is facing me, and although I can only see his eyes through the cut-out holes in the mask, I know exactly who it is.

“Are you fucking kidding me, Brad?” I sneer.

“I warned you,” he growls. “I warned you a bunch of times.”

“So, this is your big plan for revenge?” I ask. “You’re going to murder me to keep me away from her?”

“Desperate times call for desperate measures,” he says.

“The flaw in your plan, though, is that even if you do succeed in killing me – big ‘if’, by the way – Alexis still isn’t going to want you, Brad,” I say. “As they say, she’s just not that into you.”

“Yeah, well, we’ll see about that,” he snaps. “When you’re fucking dead, she’s going to need somebody to help comfort her.”

“Yeah, and I’m sure you’ll be the first person she turns to.”

I shouldn’t be taunting an armed man, I know this. But, it’s also really hard to take Brad seriously as an assailant. If he’d wanted to kill me, he should have put that pig sticker through my ribs from behind in the hallway when had the chance. Instead, he gave me a half-hearted kind of poke in the arm – which tells me that he’s not only not thought this all the way through but is too scared to actually do it.

“Let’s not kid ourselves, Brad,” I say. “You’re not going to kill me.”

“The hell I’m not.”

I laugh softly. “I can see your hand shaking from here, man.”

“So, what?” he sneers. “Doesn’t mean I can’t still kill you.”

I shrug. “True. But I think if you were going to kill me, you would have given it a better shot when you had the advantage out in the hallway.”

“I’m warming up to it.”

I laugh again, which seems to irritate him. As I think about it, I realize that maybe taunting him isn’t such a bad idea. Brad is irrational, and clearly off his rocker. He’s liable to be sloppy and make a mistake when he finally does work up the nerve to try and kill me. And because I used to do some martial arts when I was a kid and am still in good shape, I should be able to take advantage of his mistakes.

We remain in our standoff – I’ve moved back from him and am standing near the stairs that lead down into the living room area. Brad is still standing in front of the door, clutching his knife. Given that I know who he is, he finally peels his mask off and drops it to the floor at his feet. He looks at me with the rawest, most visceral hatred I’ve ever seen in a person’s eyes.

“You do realize you’re not good for her, don’t you?” Brad asks.

“How do you figure that?”

“I know your type, Duncan,” he sneers. “You’ll eventually get bored with her. You’ll get tired of playing a family man. And when you do, you’re going to drop her like all the rest and leave her a shattered mess.”

“Yeah, you really have me pegged there, Brad.”

“I know I do.”

“Except for the fact that everything you just said is one hundred percent wrong,” I say and laugh. “I mean, you couldn’t have been more wrong if you tried.”

“Shut up,” he growls. “Stop laughing at me.”

“Stop being a fucking idiot and maybe I’ll consider it.”

He takes a menacing step forward and I consider my options – of which there aren’t many. I don’t think I’ll be able to get to the door before he’s on me, and I refuse to go hide in my bedroom behind a locked door. There is no way in hell I’m going to back down from a piece of garbage like Brad. Which means I’m going to have to fight.

“I’m the one who’s good for her, you know,” Brad continues. “I’m the one who’s devoted. Loyal. I’ll be true to her and will never hurt her. I’ll never dump her just because I’m bored and ready to move on to the next beautiful woman.”