Chapter 18 #2
There was no way I was going to be forced to accept this baby as my sibling. I was my father’s only child. I was the sole beneficiary to his entire estate and legacy. I’d been put through the fucking gauntlet and come out the other side a better man than my father ever was.
This woman was lying and I was going to prove it.
A sibling at the ripe age of thirty-four. No fucking way.
“I’m not willing to negotiate anything else until a test is done,” I said, shoving my chair back from the table.
“We can wait until after the baby is born,” Steele suggested.
“Then we’ll be putting all of this on the back burner until then. There are plenty of tests that are non-invasive if you don’t wish to go down that road. But like I said, I’m not negotiating further until this is proven to be my father’s child.”
Because if, god forbid, Ana was carrying my sibling, then we’d be forced to stop all of this anyway and reevaluate the will altogether. Maybe even having to get a judge involved if it came down to Ana fighting me on every little thing she wanted her baby to be entitled to.
The unfortunate part about my father’s will was that the language had been ambiguous enough to allow for loopholes like this. Stating all of his ‘naturally born children’ were to receive the inheritance with no language stating how it was supposed to be split up in the end.
As his only child for the better part of three fucking decades, none of it was supposed to be this complicated. In fact, being an only child was the kind of cut-and-dry type scenario that any lawyer in Ted’s shoes had wet dreams over.
How much easier could it get?
Everything was to go to me and that was final.
This added complication was only going to fuck everything up at an astronomical level that even I struggled to comprehend. Some things I’d already had my hands in, like the cars and getting them fixed up to sell.
Would I be forced to compensate for that too in the eyes of the law?
How much of this would be left in a stagnant state until this child grew up to be old enough to make decisions based on what they wanted?
How long was I supposed to be kept in limbo until it was deemed unfair to me?
Fuck.
I wanted to scream.
My hatred for my father ran deep, but this was on a whole other level.
Pointing at Ana, I said. “Listen to me. Get the paternity test and then we’ll talk.”
Her lips remained fused together while her hand worked overtime in rubbing her belly.
Ted pushed back from the table, too, standing while gathering his papers together and shoving them back into his folder. “We’ll be in touch.”
Steele merely sighed. “All right. Ted, I’ll be in touch.”
Both he and Ana stood up from the table, the latter far more pregnant than I’d realized when I’d first seen her with the way the table had covered up the lower half of her body from view. My stomach churned in an uncomfortable way.
The possibility of this being some kind of scam was incredibly high. High enough that I shouldn’t be this sick to my stomach with anxiety. Sure, my father could’ve reversed his vasectomy and gotten this woman pregnant, but doing so after twenty-six years?
He got married after twenty-six years, too.
Fuck.
Fuck, fuck, fuck.
Steele bid us a goodbye and stuck close to Ana’s side while she exited the conference room.
The door was left open for us, both of them disappearing from view quite quickly.
My legs felt boneless, wanting badly to settle back down into my chair and fold my head into my hands while the entirety of life was contemplated.
“We’ll get this figured out, Avery.” Ted grabbed my shoulder again, shaking me slightly. “Don’t you worry.”
But I was worrying.
Hadn’t I been waiting for the third shoe to drop?
It seemed like the universe hadn’t wanted to keep me waiting long.
All this time I thought it would be something to do with Brandon or work. Never was I expecting this dumpster fire of a mess.
God, what the fuck.
“Go home,” Ted instructed. “Give yourself the day. If she refuses the paternity test, there’s nothing to move forward with.”
That wasn’t the part that I was concerned with.
If she took the paternity test and it turned out that the baby’s DNA matched with mine...
Then what?
“Go on.” Ted shoved me toward the door. “I’ll be in touch.”
I stumbled out into the hallway, blearily making my way back to the main lobby where Ivy was waiting for me. She said something that I couldn’t quite catch due to the roaring of blood in my ears.
Passing her by, I waved and headed back out into the afternoon heat, greedily sucking in the fresh air while my body shook from pent up rage.
Across the parking lot, Alexander Steele was holding the door to a corvette that was parked backward open for Ana, his back turned toward me. She came around the front of the car, slipping past him to slide into the passenger seat.
Once the door was shut behind her, Steele moved around to the back of the car to pop open the trunk, swinging his bag of documents around to toss inside.
Through the windshield, Ana stared directly at me, her face falling into a slight frown that could’ve easily been mistaken for that flat face she’d worn during our meeting if I wasn’t already paying such close attention to her.
Suddenly, I had the urge to lift my hand up, four of my fingers folding back until only one was facing her. Childish, of course, to flip her off. But at this point, I didn’t give a single fuck.
Fuck her and fuck my father.
Her eyes widened for a single second, and then she smirked.