didn’t want me feeling guilty for living my life. As she put it, I wasn’t the one who got knocked up, so
there was no reason for me to sacrifice my own dreams. But I did regret not being here for her when
she needed me. I was her big brother, the one who was supposed to protect her, or at the very least I
could have beat the shit out of Jayden’s sperm donor for laying a hand on my baby sister.
I decided there was an approach that would both be safer and still get me the information I needed
from her. “What was it like raising Jayden?”
“Hard as hell but we made it through,” she replied. “Why?”
Did I tell her about Corey? If I did, she might be able to give me some insight as to how I could
ease his burden. But she was just as likely to clobber me upside the head and accuse me of using him
to atone for my absence in her life.
“There’s a kid at the club,” I began. A flash of Jayden’s face appeared in my mind. Nope. I was
not betraying his trust like that. This wasn’t about him, and as he’d been all too quick to remind me,
he was an adult of legal drinking age, which meant I couldn’t have kept him out of the bar if I’d
wanted to. I shook my head, bringing my focus back to Corey. I wondered if his daughter looked like
him. I could almost imagine a miniature version of him with curly brown hair and honey brown eyes.
Corey was so screwed in another decade.
“A kid? Is this one of those weird kinks? And what does that have to do with me being an unwed
single mother?” The rapid-fire questions made my head pound.
“No, it’s nothing kinky.” Well, it was but not in the way she was thinking. Corey’s reluctance
made a lot more sense after he told me about his daughter. It wasn’t uncommon for parents to have
issues separating what brought them peace and allowed them to live their true lives from those same
activities in their children’s eyes. “He’s one of the bartenders, and I found out he’s a single dad. I feel
like an asshole for not knowing sooner.”
“How long has he worked there?” Vivvie asked, waving away the billow of steam over her mug
before taking a sip.
I stared across the street as I tried figuring out when Corey had started. “Has to be going on a year
now? I should have known, right?”
“It’s not like you’re his boss or anything,” Vivvie pointed out. “Do you know everything about the
rest of the employees?”
“Well, no, but wouldn’t something like being a single parent come up in passing at some point?”
