Chapter 19
Chapter
Nineteen
XAVI
Friends. I should feel good about that. I do feel good about that. But I can’t help but feel a little disappointed. It’s not Enfield himself that’s the reason for my disappointment. It’s the entire situation in general. I should be happily engaged. We should be planning our wedding.
Instead, we’re preparing for a meeting with lawyers in three days to nullify this contract.
I keep trying to tell myself to think about it like Enfield is.
Freedom to live my life how I want to live it.
I’ll have my entire inheritance and don’t have to have a kid to do it.
That means if my parents don’t adjust the things in the contract I don’t want, I don’t ever have to have a contract at all.
That’s a huge success for Enfield. Sparrow thinks it’s the best news that’s coming out of this. I’m not so sure. I still want to be married. I still want someone to spend my life with. Someone to love me and for that love to grow every day.
I can try again. I know that. I know if I tell my mom I want to try another contract—a third, for fuck’s sake—then she will.
Hmm. I think that first failed contract is also one that should have been disclosed.
I’ve done such a good job blocking it from my mind that I didn’t even think to tell Enfield when he was telling me all the things his parents didn’t disclose.
Weird that they chose a single thing—a false accusation of domestic violence.
I kinda get it. Knowing all the things I do now, they wouldn’t include Enfield’s kids because they legitimately don’t consider them his.
Domestic violence is a huge deal. It’s one of the few things noted in the contract that can end it without all parties agreeing.
It also doesn’t paint Enfield in a bad light. When I read that, I didn’t think Enfield had anything to do with it. Some crazy person wanted something from him, and so she concocted this tale of Enfield beating her up. She lied.
The real story is even more wild. Nothing I would have ever considered.
Sparrow went home this morning to visit his family.
He’s also overseeing a house that’s being built.
He hasn’t said anything to make me believe this, but I think he’s actually building himself a house.
It’s no secret that he plans to live in the cul-de-sac beyond the field behind my house, where his entire family lives.
I don’t blame him. A part of me wants to live there.
Maybe that’s why I’ve always been so determined to stay in this house.
I know I’ll always be close to Sparrow. No matter where he goes, he’ll be back here in the end.
Knowing I was being forced to have kids meant that our kids could become friends like we are.
I catch sight of Shapiro down the hall and narrow my eyes. Where is he going? Pausing in the doorway of my shop, I watch as he disappears into another room. Is that a lounge? Which door did he go in?
Curiosity has me following him, and I wander down the hall, peeking in rooms when I get close to where I think he turned off. I’m surprised when I find him sitting on the arm of the couch beside Enfield.
Enfield isn’t looking at him. He’s staring into his tablet with a smile and… not moving. There’s no sound. Nothing at all. As I watch, it’s like he’s a statue. And Shapiro is in on it. He’s also staring into the tablet.
I feel like I just walked into some weird, alternate, twisted world.
Enfield looks up, and his smile widens a little. That’s a big improvement. It makes me relax, and for some strange reason, my heart skips a little. He’s a handsome man. That’s why. I can recognize that in him, even if he’s straight and not for me.
“What’re you doing?” I ask. “You have Shapi as entranced as you are.”
Enfield looks at my cat with amusement. “I’m watching my daughter sleep.”
“You’re watching her sleep?”
He chuckles. “Yeah.” He waves me over, and I cross the room to peek into his tablet. A sleeping baby fills the screen. Now that I’m close, I can hear the quiet hum of something. Noise machine? Or is that maybe just the static of the feed?
“She’s small,” I note.
Enfield hums. “She’s just over three months old. She mostly sleeps.”
“Don’t take this as an insult, but is this fun for you?”
He laughs. I look at the baby, expecting his laughter to make her stir. She doesn’t.
“It’s on mute,” he says and gestures to the seat beside him. I take it and join him and Shapi as I stare at the little baby. “Usually, I’m there holding her. Bathing her. Feeding her. She’s so young that I visit more often than I do with my sons right now.”
“You’re not supposed to have favorite kids,” I scold.
He chuckles. I like the sound.
“Nah. Think about when you… Actually, you’re the youngest. Your brother has kids, right? Plural?”
“Which brother—actually, yes. They all have kids. Plural.”
I enjoy his amusement. He looks like a very different person now that he’s not cold and angry. I like this look.
Absently, I wonder when the last time his parents saw this side of him was. How sad that they probably wouldn’t recognize it.
“Have you been around them?”
“Not often. Maybe when they’re older and not… obnoxious. Yes, that makes me a bad uncle.”
Enfield shakes his head. “No. You’re not a kid person. That’s okay. There’s no reason that kids should be forced on you. But I’m sure you’ve seen that the youngest kid always has the most attention.”
“Yes, unfairly.”
He laughs. “No. Necessity. Thea can’t even hold her head up.
Her only form of communication is crying.
Crying could mean she’s hungry, something hurts, she has a wet diaper, she’s uncomfortable, she’s cold, or she’s hot.
It’s a matter of trial and error to figure out what’s wrong.
My sons can speak and tell us exactly what they need.
Which do you think needs more attention? ”
“Huh. Clearly, I’d make a great parent. I never thought about it.”
“Out of curiosity, how did you plan to raise the obligatory kids in the contract?”
“I didn’t.” I shrug. “I told my mother straight out that I wasn’t even going to be there the day they were born. There’d be a nanny or my partner would do all the work, which should be disclosed up front. I want nothing to do with them.”
“Actually, that explains some of the verbiage in that section.”
“It would have likely prompted a conversation with someone who wanted this.”
I nod. Strangely, I’m still staring at the baby, Thea, as she sleeps. I glance at Shapi to find him absolutely transfixed. It makes me smile.
“I’m a little surprised that you’re such an attentive father,” I admit.
“Why?”
“You said you didn’t want kids. Didn’t you? That was one of the parts of the contract that you had an issue with. Or did I make that up?”
He raises one shoulder. “To be perfectly honest, I have no idea what I’ve shared with you in detail and what I haven’t at this point.
I despise everything about the contract, including and especially the details about children.
Not because I don’t want children, but because I have children who aren’t so much as hinted at. ”
“Oh, same vein then.”
Enfield inclines his head. “Yes.”
“I’m still confused about why you had three with three different women. Not that you need to tell me.”
He snorts. “Misguided attempts at the same outcome I’ve been fighting for over the last thirteen years.
I interpreted the children details as simple and straightforward.
At the birth of my first child, my trust will be released.
So I chose a woman—admittedly somewhat at random—and forced a kid on her. ”
I look at him with horror.
Enfield sighs. “Yes. I fucked up. I didn’t ask.
I was so narrow-sighted that I didn’t take her into consideration at all.
She’s been furious with me this entire time, and rightfully so.
I happened to choose someone who didn’t want kids.
Never wanted kids. That hasn’t changed. She still hates being a mother.
She hates me more every day for forcing this life on her, and I’m confident she resents Ronan for existing. ”
“I don’t understand why she didn’t end the pregnancy.”
“I begged her not to. I promised that I’d take care of them both financially.
All she had to do was be a parent. I was so fucking sure that my plan would work.
This was before I’d met Nash; before I had a lawyer.
Before someone was there to tell me, no, that’s not how the contract works.
Considering the contract wasn’t even signed…
yeah, I had a huge lapse of judgment. My single regret is the decision to fuck with Courtney’s life to get what I wanted.
Now my son is the victim of that situation until I can get myself to a stable place and him out of there. ”
“She’ll let him go?”
“She’ll gladly hand him over,” he says. There’s no mistaking the sadness that brings him.
“I recently introduced him to Lissander, my next child. They’ve gotten together twice.
I asked Amelia—Lissander’s mother—if she’d consider taking Ronan for a playdate while I was taking care of this mess. You’re the mess in question.”
I roll my eyes, but his teasing smile makes my chest flutter.
“She’ll be taking him overnight for his first sleepover with his brother in a couple days. Ronan is excited. So excited.”
“I take it the situation with Amelia is different, then.”
“Yes. I learned from the mistake with Courtney. So, Amelia and Sarah were on board with getting pregnant. They wanted a kid. They wanted to be mothers. They accepted my proposition.”
“That’s why you need more money. I see.”
Enfield snorts. “No. Well, yes, but no. Courtney is the only one I fully support. Amelia and Sarah refuse that kind of support. They accept financial help because we do share a kid, and I should be financially contributing, but for both women, they want my presence in our kids’ lives far more than anything else.
They want our kids to have permanent figures in their lives to love them. ”
“That’s a good thing to have.”
He hums, nodding as he stares at the baby. “What I want is to have all my kids under one roof. I want them to have a relationship with their siblings. Good ones. Not weird, strained, practically non-existent ones like I have. I don’t think that’ll happen. Amelia and Sarah like their independence.”
I chew the inside of my lip. A hand suddenly appears in the tablet frame, and I practically jump out of my skin.
My first irrational thought is GHOST. But the hand pulls away, and the blurry figure in the distance leaves.
Safer to assume this is the mother checking on the baby.
This was Sarah, right? Or Amelia. I already forgot who belongs to whom.
A much more logical explanation than a ghost, anyway.
“Speaking of kids,” I say as I sit back and let my heart settle from a non-ghost experience.
“You have a hidden kid too?” Enfield asks.
“No.” I shake my head. “When I was nineteen, I was presented with a contract. All signed. We even talked once on the phone before he was set to arrive. The day came, and he didn’t show up.
I waited until the next morning to call my mother and tell her he never came.
My mom was furious. Honestly, I was a little crushed.
He didn’t answer my texts, or when I called him that morning before I called my mom.
I kept making silly excuses. He got lost. He drove off the continent and into the ocean.
He… took a plane to Mexico instead of California. ”
Enfield hums in disapproval and turns his attention to me. I wish he wouldn’t. I don’t want him to look at me right now.
Four years later, and I’m a little hurt over it still. I try to block it out entirely. Forget it happened. Most of the time, it works.
Most of the time.
“My mom called me later in the day to explain that the contract was canceled. This guy had a drunken night or something and slept with a woman who had suddenly come knocking with a baby in tow. Paternity tests were being done, but it looked like the baby was his.”
“Wow.”
“Yeah. He called me a week later and apologized. He said he was freaking out and wasn’t thinking straight and didn’t want to say something wild when I called, so he didn’t answer.
He apologized a lot. I believe him. He said his mother was now trying to force him to marry this woman.
Neither of them wanted that, and he’s gay.
One night with a girl doesn’t mean he isn’t gay.
It means he tried to be the straight boy his parents wanted, but he’s still gay.
Period. He said if they kept pushing, he’d simply disappear and fuck them. That’s the last I heard of him.”
“I kinda want an update,” Enfield muses.
“I blocked his number. Sorry.”
He chuckles. His hand grips my wrist like he did yesterday, and I stare at where his skin touches mine. So warm. Hot.
“I’m sorry. That was shitty. It makes this situation you’re in now shittier.”
“I never wanted kids, so if this contract had mentioned your kids, I’d have said no.
I think there’s some lasting trauma from that experience, which is ridiculous because everything I knew about this guy was on paper.
One conversation doesn’t make him the love of my life.
And yet, this innocent little human disrupted my promised future.
They tore it from my hands before it even began. ”
“It’s not the kid’s fault.”
“It’s not. It’s not even his fault. Or mine. Or anyone’s. It was an accident that resulted from an experiment almost a year in the past. But in my mind, the kid is the reason for the broken contract and… I asked my mom to hold off on finding me a new one.”
“Four years later, you get me,” Enfield says quietly. “With three kids, a chip on my shoulder, and more anger than any one person should have to deal with.”
I sigh. “Yep. Maybe this just isn’t going to happen for me.
It seems stupidly unfair since I have six brothers and they all got their exact happily ever afters.
Being gay is actually an easy contract to fulfil.
Being bisexual and polyamorous? Yep, that brother got his happily ever after.
My twin siblings who wanted a household where they and their families live together as one family?
Yep, they got that. Me, who only wants a single man to love me? Strike two.”
His hand tightens on my wrist. “I’m sorry, Xavi. I’m so, so sorry to have contributed to your negative experiences with relationships.”
I’m not sure how to answer, so I don’t. I stare at his sleeping daughter instead.