32. Liam
CHAPTER 32
liam
A month later, the sun slowly dips behind the mountains, erasing the last of the daylight as the three of us walk down the dirt road that leads to the house. The evening is cool, Charlie skips ahead of us, and I tug Hannah closer to me by the hand I’m holding. Her shoulder bumps mine forcefully, nearly knocking me off my feet from the unexpectedness of it.
“You’re such a little shit.”
“Yeah, but apparently you love it. Who knew?”
“Not you.”
“Ooo! Ouch, Liam Hayes! Too soon!”
I can’t help but laugh, throwing my arm around her shoulders and pulling her in tight, just as Charlie’s voice fills the air.
“Shh! Did you hear that?”
“Oh, mother above, please no.”
“You hear it right?” I ask Hannah in a whisper as Charlie releases my hand and walks up ahead, following the little cries. “Do strays just flock to her?” I say, slightly shocked that this is the second animal that has found its way to Charlotte .
“It’s a kitty! I know it! Bear, save it! It’s crying! Ms. Katie said kitties should never cry!”
Releasing Hannah’s hand, I join Charlie where she’s peeking into a sewer, looking for the crying animal. Not knowing what to expect, even though I’m fairly certain I know what it is, I ask her to take a step back and let me look just in case.
Bending down on my hands and knees, I peer into the open slit of the sidewalk and my eyes immediately connect with glowing slivers staring back at me, followed by the unmistakable cry of a kitten. Laying down so that my stomach is flat on the ground, I inch closer to the opening and stick my arm in as far as it will go until I reach the fur of the animal, grabbing it behind the neck and lifting, pulling it out of the small crevice it was hiding and into the open.
“Ahh!! It is a kitten! Sewer!”
“Charlie, we’ve been through this, we can’t name things after where we found them or where they were born. I’ll start calling you Kitchen, and I mean it.”
“Fine,” she huffs. “What do we name her then?”
“He’s actually a boy kitten and his name should be Penny, obviously.”
Hannah starts laughing hysterically from behind us and I slowly turn my head in her direction, arching a brow and giving her a devilish grin.
“Oh, it’s actually perfect. Of course his name is Penny. It has to be.”
“So we’re keeping him? He’ll be best friends with me and Garb-Billy.”
Hannah dips down next to where we’re crouched and looks at the tiny ball of fluff in the crook of my arm.
“Yeah, we can keep him. But no more animals after this one. The next one you find we have to place in a new home, we’re not a rescue,” Hannah tells her, but I give her a look that suggests that becoming a rescue isn’t a half-bad idea. We’ve got the space for it. She picks right up on that and stands, walking in the direction of our house.
“Not a chance, Mr. Hayes,” she singsongs.
“I don’t know, Ms. Hayes, I’m kinda digging this idea.”
She turns to face me, her expression a mix of surprise and satisfaction. I walk up to her, Charlie trailing right behind us, dropping my head so that my mouth is right next to her ear.
“Oh, baby. You like that, don’t you, wife?” I whisper, causing a chill to spread through her body. “Do you want to change your name?”
“I never thought I did. I always wanted to stay a Haven because of the shop, but nothing has ever sounded so right before.”
“On that note, there’s something I’ve been wanting to talk to you about. Let’s get inside.”
Nerves suddenly plaguing me, we walk into the house, Billy meeting us at the door and wagging his tail, already smelling the little furball we just found. After getting him thoroughly washed and warm, which was not a good fucking time, Charlotte is fast asleep in her new bedroom with Billy, and the new furball is snuggled in a blanket next to the fireplace. Hannah and I sit down on our bed, her pretty hair now dyed a slightly darker shade of lavender floating around her face haphazardly.
“C’mon, let me hear it.”
“I want to adopt Charlie.” Deciding to just go for it.
Hannah’s mouth falls open forming a little “O” as tears fill her eyes.
“Beauty, don’t you dare cry. It kills me.”
“You really mean that? You want to adopt her?”
“I’ve loved that little girl since the moment you told me she was inside you. I hope I’ve proved to you that I’m not going anywhere and that whether you say yes or no, nothing changes.”
“Yes. Fuck, Liam, yes. How would that even work?”
“I wanted to talk to you first, but I have an attorney ready for me if I got the go-ahead from you. Levi is either going to agree, or I’m taking him to court. A judge will hopefully look at him as a parental abandonment case and grant the stepparent adoption, but I don’t want to leave it up to chance. I’m confident he’ll sign the papers.”
Hanah looks at me with so much love and affection, something I had only allowed myself to dream about. All I’ve ever wanted was for her to love me back, and now that she does? My life’s complete.
“I love you. I couldn’t love you more.”
“I love you, beauty.”
“Now fuck me so we can go watch Scream .”
“How about I fuck you with the mask on while you watch Scream ?”
She pulls away from me, moving her head back far enough so she can read my face and see I’m dead serious. Her eyes are heavily lidded, her red, puffy lips pulled up in a shocked smile. I know she can tell how serious I am, I’ve been thinking about it since that morning at the bakery.
“Tell your husband what you want. Let me make my wife feel good.”
“Yesss, Liam.”
“Me and you.”
“Me and you.”
The next few weeks pass in a blur, the three of us falling into our normal routine, except my nights of sleeping on Hannah’s couch are long gone, and I’ve got the two of them in the home that I hope they’d occupy someday. As soon as Hannah gave me her blessing to adopt Charlie, I contacted the attorney and made a plan to move forward. We plan to tell Charlie after we know that it will be possible, and that starts with the paperwork currently sitting in the manilla folder next to me in the passenger seat.
After three hours of major highway, I pull up in front of the stupid-ass Seattle apartment, not feeling a damn thing except annoyance. Last time I was here, the anger overrode logic and all I wanted to do was smash his stupid fucking face in. But now? I’ve got everything and he’s going to go away, with or without a fight. I’ll win in the end.
I jog up the steps, rapping my knuckles on the door and waiting. Levi opens it just wide enough for me to be able to stick my boot in as he tries to immediately close it once recognition sets in.
“Nope, we’re gonna have a little chat.”
“Get the fuck off my property, Hayes, or I’ll call the cops.”
“Yeah, see, that’s not gonna happen. You’re gonna hear me out or I’ll break your fucking face. How many times do you think a nose can shatter before it leaves permanent damage to your breathing?”
“What do you want?”
“Like I said, to have a little chat.” I push my way through his door, knowing the dickface won’t actually call the cops. Levi leaves the door open and spins on me but I’m already taking a seat on his couch, dropping the manilla folder on the coffee table.
“This is more than you deserve, but because I’m a man, I’m coming to you like one first. I’m gonna give it to you straight, Jenkins. You don’t want Charlotte. You never have. You’ve never made an effort and she’s just a little girl who deserves more than that. So, here’s your out.”
I slide the paperwork I had my attorney draw up across the table, his stupid fucking face looking at it without touching it.
“What is this? You serving me now, Hayes?”
“Nah. That’ll come next, Jenkins. This is a relinquishment of rights. You see, I’ve been helping raise Charlotte since the moment she was put into her mom’s tummy by your sleazy, ungrateful ass. I’m her dad. I’ve been there every single day. Diaper changes, late night feedings, her first cold, holding her in a steamy bathroom while she had croup, every birthday, her first day of school, her first scrape, her first time on the ice. I’ve. Been. There. Not you.” I pause before I launch myself at this sonofabitch. “I’m adopting her. We’re going to do an easy and quick stepparent adoption and it’ll be like you never existed at all. You sign the paperwork, and you disappear. If you don’t, I’m going take you to court and make sure it is long and painful, and in the end, I’ll still adopt her. It’s your choice how expensive and miserable you want to make this. But I’m her father, and I’m going to see this through.”
Levi fucking smirks at me, and it takes everything I have, the strength of a fucking monk, not to rip his throat out and shove it up his ass.
“You can have her. But you’ll raise her and spend the rest of your life knowing she’ll never truly be yours, she’s got my blood running through her veins, and knowing you have to live with that makes me feel like I fucking won. ”
A toothy smile fills my face, and based off the slight tick in his jaw, I’d wager I look slightly unhinged and demonic.
“That’s the thing, I love that little girl so much, I’ve never given thought to what blood she has in her. She’s mine in every way that matters. I wouldn’t change a goddamn thing because I would never change who she is, and if that means she doesn’t share blood with me? Then so fucking be it. You’ll cease to exist in her life, and I’ll get to spend mine knowing I chose to be in hers every day because she’s the most important thing in the world. I’m the fucking winner here, Jenkins. You’re nothing.”
Levi signs the paperwork, his stupid ass initialing all the places I’ve marked. Once I’ve checked that it’s legit, I stand and walk away without saying another word.