I walk back over to Mallory, wheeling her suitcases beside me. She has the kid on her hip now and she’s staring at me. Her bottom lip quivers. “Look, I don’t know where you’re at with all of this. I don’t think you even know, so let me focus on what I do know.”
The palm trees rustle in an ocean breeze as traffic zooms by on the busy, popular boulevard on the other side of the gate. She takes a breath that I can see, even from a few feet away, is shaky. "I have nowhere else to go right now. Eventually, I will make my way to Silver Bay, once Dylan is settled, legally. I don't have much money that is mine. Diana's former fiancé gave me some money to get him settled, for my troubles he said, but I'm trying not to spend it so Dylan can have it, as a trust or whatever. And I have paperwork for him that I can pass on to you so you can organize custody. If you don’t want him… well, I can help you deal with that, but I can’t do that tonight. So can we please just stay with you? Just tonight?”
Wow. I thought this development had knocked me on my ass but her speech was a drop kick on top of a roundhouse. “You can both stay with me as long as you need to. Without question. Did you really think I was going to send you away?”
“I don’t know what to think about anything anymore, Tate,” Mallory confesses, her voice weary.
“Come on.”
The entrance to my townhouse faces the interior courtyard of the building. It's a few feet from the freeform pool, which thankfully is gated. Unattended pools and babies don't mix, even I know that. As we climb the stairs to my front porch, I pull open the storm door, unlock the main door, and instantly realize there isn't much about my space that works for a nine-month-old.
There are stairs off the entry down into the living room and dining room. The kitchen is open to the rest of the space with top-heavy bar chairs he could tip over. Nash once got hammered and tipped over in one so I'm sure the kid could knock it over.
I'm not a slob, and I have a maid that comes once a week so the place is clean, but are there sheets on the guest bed? Have they been changed since Crew hooked up with some girl there two weeks ago, too drunk to make it home to his house at the Venice Canals? Did I tell my housekeeper about that? Because she doesn't tend to do more than dust the guest room unless I tell her I've had or am having guests. I can't be sure I've told her, all of a sudden. I definitely didn't tell her Mallory was coming because I didn't get a chance.
Mallory brushes by me, familiar with the space because it’s where she and Di stayed when they visited, and scoops a suitcase from my hand. The brush of her fingertips is cool and brief. With one hand around the kid’s waist on her hip and the other on the suitcase she walks straight into my living room and gets to work.
She plops him on the floor and hands him a toy. She opens the suitcase while he plays and starts pulling out stuff. Juice packets and baby food in jars, all bubble-wrapped. I watch, amazed and stunned, waiting for her to tell me what to do. I wish someone could tell me how tofeelabout all of this.
"If you keep him, we will have to baby-proof this place," she surmises and it feels almost like she's making an internal thought to herself public and not telling me, specifically. "I can help you before I leave."
“Yeah. I… I mean I have bigger things to sort out than baby-proofing, right?” I sound as panicked as I feel and she stops on the way to the dining room and turns back to me. She’s holding this seat contraption with, like, poles sticking out of it that she pulled out of the suitcase. “Like, I mean, how do I keep him. Legally? Am I even on his birth certificate?”
"No. No one is listed as the father," Mallory says as she marches to my dining room table, slides a chair out of place, and replaces it with the contraption in her hands. Is it a… seat? It doesn't look all that safe but I trust she knows what she's doing.
“Mal, this is all… I can’t… I mean what the fuck?” I swallow and start to feel lightheaded, which it takes me a second to realize because I have never been lightheaded a day in my life. “Were you just going to keep this a secret forever if Di didn’t…”
“It wasn’t my secret,” she reminds me, her tone defensive.
“Was she never going to let me know?”
“I don’t know,” Mallory admits and sighs. “I was… encouraging her to tell you before Felix adopted him.”
“Who the fuck is Felix?”
“Diana’s fiancé,” Mallory replies.
“He wanted to adopt my…” I can’t say it. “Where is he now?”
"In London. Grieving, I guess," Mallory's tone sounds less than empathetic. She shakes her head as if dismissing a thought before she can express it. "He loved Diana and he wanted to be Dylan’s father, but I guess not without her. But he got us here. He made sure I got Dylan to you."
“Well, fuck him,” I mutter, not sure if it’s because he was going to steal my child or because he changed his mind and dumped him when he needed someone the most. “Whoa!”
I swear we just had an earthquake. Everything starts to move to the left, like theentireroom.
The next thing I know Mallory’s grabbing my shoulders, tightly, and guiding me down onto one of the couches. “Just sit there and take some deep breaths. Do you want me to call anyone? Tenley?”
"No!" Okay, that flew out of my mouth with the force of a jumbo jet taking off. Mallory looks appropriately shocked. I lean back into the couch and close my eyes. “Sorry. I just. Yeah. I need to process.”
The kid lets out a wail. “You do that. I’ll feed him.”
I don’t respond. I just sit there, head thrown back, eyes closed, and think. This is actually happening. This kid is mine. Diana never told me. Not one fucking word. Where has she been this whole time? What was in London that was more important than telling me about my offspring? Or letting me meet him before this? If she hadn’t died, would she have told me about him, like, ever?
And how the hell do I tell my family about this? About him? And how the hell do I travel for work if I have a kid? And no wife? And who is even going to let me have him? Is it just, like, a given? Because I share his DNA? I must need paperwork or something, right? Oh God, what the fuck do I do?
I hear some gurgling and giggling and open my eyes to see Mallory sitting next to the kid at the table, facing the living room. He’s in the contraption hanging from the table. His legs are swinging and he’s grinning with green crap all over his cheeks. The green crap is from a jar that Mallory is shoveling into his open waiting mouth with a smile on her face. She looks… well still as exhausted as she looked before but also happy. Content.
“Can you tell me how this happened?” I ask.
