Chapter 7
Molly
The night of the barbecue, Taz stops outside the bedroom door. I sit on the edge of the bed, listening to the handle stay still. At least he has understood that much.
"Molly." His voice is low through the wood. "I need to tell you what happened."
"I need you to give me tonight," I tell the door.
"If you'll let me explain—" he starts.
"I've just been humiliated in front of everyone we know," I say. "I am not ready to help you feel better about it."
"That's not why I'm here," he says, and I hear his forehead thunk softly against the wood.
"Then you can wait until I can hear you without being sick," I tell him. "Take the guest room. Please."
Silence. Then, quietly, "I'll be downstairs if you need anything."
I wait for his footsteps to move away before I call Maggie. She answers at once.
"I'm at a hotel twenty minutes from you," she says. "You can call me any hour."
"Maggie, you drove all that way," I say. "Go home and get some sleep."
"I booked the room," she says, in the voice that ends arguments. "I'm not going back to Ojai until that baby comes."
"I don't want to make you choose between us," I tell her.
"You're not asking me to disown him," she says. "You're asking for somewhere to put the hurt he caused. I've got room."
My mouth trembles. "I'm so angry I can't work out what to say first."
"You don't have to give a tidy account," she says gently. "I was there."
"Everyone saw," I whisper.
"They saw what he did," Maggie says. "That shame isn't yours to carry."
I press my palm against my belly. The baby moves beneath it, unconcerned by the catastrophe occurring outside her excellent accommodation.
"She's kicking," I tell Maggie.
"Good," Maggie says, and I can hear her smiling. "Tell her her grandmother's nearby. And tell yourself too."
He leaves notes on the counter every morning. Coffee's made. Called the OB about your swelling. She says call if it gets worse. And every single morning, I'm sorry. I throw every one of them away. Most of them I even manage not to read first.
Day three. I'm eating toast at the kitchen table when Taz appears in the doorway. He looks terrible: unshaven, eyes red-rimmed, wearing the same shirt he had on yesterday.
"Can we talk?" His voice is hoarse. "Please, Molly. Five minutes."
"No," I say, without looking up.
He grips the doorframe. "I just need to explain—"
"I said no." I take a deliberate bite of toast, even though my stomach is rolling. "You had seven months to explain. You had a hundred chances to tell me the truth. You chose silence every single time. So no, Taz. You don't get five minutes. You get nothing."
He stays in the doorway for a long moment, and I can see him fighting the urge to push. But my face must convince him, because he finally nods and walks away.
Good.
Day five. Maggie calls with news.
"Kendall delivered early," she says carefully. "Two days ago. The baby has a heart defect. They're at Cedars-Sinai."
I close my eyes. I'm supposed to feel a certain way about this, I think. Sympathy, maybe, or satisfaction, or some complicated mix of both. But all I feel is numb.
"Is Taz there?" I ask.
"He's been there almost constantly." Maggie pauses. "The baby, Hudson, she named him, needs surgery. It's happening in two days."
"Good for her." I know I sound cold. I don't care. "She has someone to hold her hand."
"Molly—" she starts.
"I have to go," I tell her. "My feet are swelling again."
I hang up before she can say whatever she was going to say next. A comfort, probably. A speech about how complicated this all is, how there are no easy answers.
But there are easy answers. There was always an easy answer.
Tell your wife the truth.
Day seven. I wake up with a plan.
I'm going to let him explain. It isn't because I'm ready to forgive him. I'm not sure I'll ever be ready for that. It's because I need to understand. I need to know every detail, every choice he made, every moment he decided his silence was more important than my sanity.
By early afternoon, I'm at the kitchen table with a notepad, writing down my questions:
When did Kendall first tell you? What exactly did she claim happened? Why didn't you tell me immediately? How many times did you lie directly to my face? Did you sleep with her? Do you believe the baby is yours? What the hell is wrong with you?
The last one isn't really a question, but I write it down anyway. It feels good to see it in black and white.
Tonight, I decide. I'll talk to him tonight, after dinner. I'll sit him down and make him answer every single question, and then I'll decide what happens next.
I'm folding the notepad closed when I feel it.
A pop. A rush of warmth between my legs.
Oh no.
I look down. The kitchen chair is wet. My dress is wet. And there's a puddle forming on the tile floor.
My water just broke.
"Taz!" I scream it before I can think, pure instinct. "TAZ!"
No answer. The house is silent.
Right. He's at the hospital with her, at Hudson's heart surgery.
I fumble for my phone, hands shaking, and dial his number. It rings once, twice, three times, four. Voicemail. His stupid recorded voice saying he'll call me back as soon as possible.
I call again. Voicemail.
Again. Voicemail.
"Goddamnit, Taz, answer your phone!" I'm crying now, tears mixing with the sweat breaking out on my forehead. The first contraction hits, and it's nothing like the Braxton Hicks I've been having for weeks. This is real. This is happening.
I call Maggie.
She answers on the second ring. "Molly? What's wrong?"
"My water broke," I sob into the phone. "Taz isn't answering. I can't—I can't reach him."
"I'm on my way." I hear her grabbing keys, a door slamming. "Twenty minutes, sweetheart. Breathe."
"Where is he?" I ask, and then again, louder. "Maggie, where is he?"
Then a pause that goes on too long.
"He's at Cedars-Sinai," she finally says. "Hudson's surgery. The family lounge on the cardiac floor. He said he was turning off his phone so he wouldn't be disturbed."
Of course he did.
"I'm delivering at Cedars-Sinai," I say. "He's in the same building."
"Then that's where we're going." Maggie's voice is tight. "I'll get you there. We'll find him."
"Who's staying with you?" the nurse asks once we're in the delivery room.
"Me," Maggie says, setting my bag beside the chair. "Whatever she needs."
"My husband is upstairs," I say. I hate how quickly it comes out, like I have to account for him before anyone notices the empty place beside me. "His phone is off."
"We can have him paged," the nurse says, already reaching for the monitor straps. "Right now, tell me about your pain."
Another contraction pulls tight across my back. I grip the bedrail and wait for enough air to speak.
"I would like to cancel my subscription to having a spine," I gasp.
The nurse doesn't even blink. "Let's talk about what we can do to make you more comfortable."
"The epidural," I beg. "Please. I want the epidural."
She explains the next steps, and I answer her questions. Maggie stays where I can reach her. When the nurse leaves to arrange things, I turn toward her.
"I had a whole bag of snacks for him," I tell Maggie. "Can you believe that? I was worried he'd get hungry while I gave birth."
"Then I'll eat them," Maggie says, and reaches for the bag. "I carried him for nine months. That entitles me to his crackers."
I laugh once, and it catches in my throat.
"I don't want to do this angry," I whisper. "I don't want her first day to be about him."
"It won't be." She takes my face in both her hands. "Look at me, sweetheart. Today you get your daughter. He cannot take that part away."
"But he'll be in every question," I say. "Where is he? Has anybody called him? Doesn't he know?"
"Let me deal with those," Maggie says. "You don't owe anyone an explanation for a grown man who knows how a telephone works."
I hold her hand while the next contraction starts.
Every hour, a different nurse glances at the empty chair and asks some version of the same question. Every hour, I give some version of the same answer.
Around the fourth hour, a nurse checks my chart and looks toward the door.
"Is Dad on his way?" she asks gently.
"I don't know," I say. "I can't reach him."
The contraction crests and I grip Maggie's hand so hard I'm sure I'm breaking bones. She doesn't flinch, just smooths my hair back and says, "One at a time, sweetheart. You only have to get through this one."
"You're doing beautifully," the nurse says, checking the monitor. "Eight centimeters. We're getting close."
Close. Close to meeting my daughter and her father isn't here. The thought hits me between contractions and I have to swallow down a sound that isn't quite a sob.
"Should I page Mr. Williams again?" the nurse asks, her voice careful in that way medical professionals get when they're navigating family drama they don't want to touch.
"Please," Maggie says before I can answer. "He's upstairs. Pediatric cardiology waiting area. The baby up there is—" She stops, recalibrates. "He's with the other family."
The nurse nods and steps out. Maggie squeezes my hand.
"I'm going to check the lounge myself," she says. "That boy needs to be here. I raised him better than this."
"Maggie—" Another contraction steals whatever I was going to say. I curl around my belly and breathe through it, the way the books said, except the books are liars and nothing prepares you for this.
When it passes, Maggie is already at the door. "Five minutes. I'll drag him down by his ear if I have to."
She's gone before I can tell her not to bother. Before I can admit that part of me doesn't want him here at all, doesn't want to see his face when our daughter arrives because I'll be looking for guilt and I'm terrified I'll find it.
The minutes stretch through another contraction, then another. The nurse comes back, shakes her head slightly.
"Page went through," she says. "No response yet."
I nod because what else is there to do? My body is doing this whether Taz shows up or not. Clem is coming whether her father cares enough to answer his phone.
Maggie returns twenty minutes later, her face tight with frustration and an anger I've never seen on her.
"I found Jensen," she says, settling back into the chair beside me. "He said Taz and Kendall moved to one of the private family rooms. He's going to get him right now."
"Okay." The word comes out flat. I'm too tired to feel the anger properly anymore, too focused on the pressure building low in my spine.
"He'll be here," Maggie insists. "Jensen promised he'd bring him straight down."
I want to believe her. Any second, my husband could walk through that door, apologetic and panicked and ready to hold my hand. There could be a good reason his phone is off. Jensen could find him. I keep watching the handle, willing it to turn.
But the minutes keep passing. The contractions keep coming. And the door stays closed.
"Nine centimeters," the nurse announces. "Almost there, Mom."
Mom. I'm about to be a mom and the man who made me one can't be bothered to check his messages.
Maggie tries calling Taz directly, and it goes straight to voicemail. She texts Jensen twice and gets no response.
"I don't understand," she keeps saying, and the genuine confusion in her voice is almost worse than anger would be. "This isn't like him. This isn't—"
"Please stop explaining him." My voice shakes. "I need you looking at me now."
Maggie puts the phone away. My body is ready to push.
"We need to start," the nurse says gently. "Baby's not going to wait."
I look at the empty chair where my husband should be sitting. At the door that hasn't opened. At Maggie's stricken face.
Then I bear down.
Clementine is born at dusk.
The room is golden with the last light of day when I finally push her into the world, screaming with effort, Maggie gripping one hand while a nurse grips the other. And then she's here: red-faced and furious, tiny fists waving, her cry the most beautiful sound I've ever heard.
"It's a girl," the doctor announces, though I already knew. "A healthy girl."
They put her on my chest, warm and slippery and perfect, and I look down into her face and see Taz's green eyes staring back at me.
"Clementine," I whisper. "Your name is Clementine."
She doesn't know her father isn't here. She doesn't know anything except the sound of my heartbeat, the warmth of my skin. I hold her and cry, and I can't tell if it's joy or grief or both at once.
"She's beautiful," Maggie says, tears streaming down her face. "Molly, she's so beautiful."
"She's mine." I trace my finger along Clementine's cheek, her tiny perfect ear. "She's mine, and he missed it."
Taz arrives an hour later.
I hear him before I see him: footsteps pounding down the hallway, his voice asking a nurse which room. Then the door bursts open and he's standing there, wild-eyed and breathless, still wearing the surgical family lounge wristband.
"Molly—" He stops. Stares at the bundle in my arms. "Is that—"
"Your daughter." My voice is flat. "Born at 7:43 PM. You missed it."
"I didn't—my phone was off—I didn't see—" He crosses the room in three strides, falls to his knees beside the bed. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I ran the second I saw the calls, I swear—"
"You were two floors up." I look at him, at the tears running down his face, at the raw desperation in his expression. "In the same building. Two floors."
"Two floors," he repeats, gutted. "God." He reaches toward Clementine with shaking hands. "Can I—can I hold her?"
Part of me wants to say no. Part of me wants to clutch her tighter, turn away, make him suffer the way I've suffered.
But he's her father. Whatever else he's done, whatever lies he's told, he's still her father.
I pass Clementine into his arms.
He falls apart.
There's no other way to describe it. Taz Williams breaks. Sobs shake his whole body as he holds his daughter, and for one minute, watching him, I almost let it go.
Almost forgive everything.
Almost.
Then he shrugs off his jacket, shifting Clementine's weight, and a piece of paper falls out of the pocket, folded into quarters, and lands face-up on the linoleum floor.
Maggie picks it up and unfolds it. Her face goes white.
"What?" I reach for it, and she hands it over without a word.
It's a paternity test result. Taz's name at the top, Kendall Brooks below it. And at the bottom, in cold clinical print: Probability of paternity: 99.9%.
The date on the report is from December. Seven months ago.
"Taz." My voice is very quiet. "What is this?"
He looks up from Clementine's face, sees the paper in my hands, and all the color drains from his expression.
"Molly," he says, "I can explain—"