BIRTH OF A BABY DADDY (The Baileys #3)

Chapter 4

Rome

I stand slack-jawed, watching the little girl stare over her mom’s shoulder, her green eyes wide with curiosity as they leave my restaurant. The edges of the small card poke my palm as I crush it in my fist.

“What the hell is that?” Denver’s gaze falls to the card that’s now a ball of paper. I open my palm, and he takes it. “It’s for some diagnostic place in Anchorage.”

Austin takes it from him, but Savannah quickly snatches it from Austin. “I’m calling Uncle Brian.”

“No.” I put up my hand. “This is my business and I’d like it to stay that way.”

“Rome, sweetheart, you need your family at a time like this.” G’Ma D’s kind and nurturing side is showing itself, which speaks to the severity of this situation. If memory serves, we usually only ever see it for a few moments on Founder’s Day every year, when remembering what we’ve all lost is front and center.

“I just need time to think.”

“It might not even be yours,” Savannah says. “Maybe that’s why she’s sending you to do a paternity test. You could be one of five.”

“Savannah,” Brooklyn scoffs. “This isn’t an episode of Maury Povich.”

“Sav’s right. I mean, seriously, Rome doesn’t even recognize her,” Phoenix jumps to my defense.

I think I remember her. Kind of. Sort of. Those eyes. I know those eyes. I run my fingers through my hair, expelling a long, deep breath.

Denver kicks out a chair and shoves my shoulders down. “Sit.”

I do.

“Rome was in Seattle. He admitted it,” Juno says.

If my sisters don’t stop arguing right now, my head is literally going to explode

“It’s mine.” I hold out my hand for the card and Savannah passes it over. Twirling it, I try to figure out a plan.

I’m a plan guy. Not like life plan, but when I’m thrown an off-speed pitch, I know how to react. Excuse the baseball analogy, but when you grow up playing the sport, you relate everything to that play when you have half a second to decide if you’re swinging or not.

I wasn’t as good as my brother Austin, but I had an eye for the ball. Off-speed, lay off until it crosses the plate. Curveball, look to take it on the inside. This is like a wild f*****g pitch I didn’t see coming that hits me right in the helmet. Now I’m lying in the dirt, trying to figure out if I’m still that guy who can take a pitch.

“You okay, man?” Denver grabs a chair.

Denver’s voice draws my attention from looking at the floor between my legs.

I glance at my brother. “It’s gotta be a joke, right?” I stare at the card. Diagnostic testing.

Denver presses his lips together but doesn’t say anything. He doesn’t need to. Not only are we brothers, but we’re twins. Not creepy telepathic twins, but we tend to know what the other is thinking.

“I don’t understand. Why did she track you down if she’s going to run off?” Liam asks.

“Because she wants money,” Savannah says.

Liam rolls his eyes at her. “You’re way too cynical.”

“I’m a realist. She got wind that Denver was some hero, and since doofus here used Denver’s name, she probably thought Griffin Thorne gave Denver loads of money for saving his life. Or she found out about Bailey Timber and is under the impression that we’ve got millions.”

“What must it be like to be in your head.” Liam shakes his head and tucks in his chair. “I think it’s time for guy time.”

Thank God for Liam.

“You want me to clear everyone out?” Denver whispers.

I say nothing but express my feelings with my face.

With a few hugs and pats on the back, my sisters and Holly leave. A cold rush of air floats through the restaurant as Brooklyn holds the door open and waits for G’Ma D—because right now, G’Ma D’s standing in front of me. waiting to say her piece. I heave a sigh and tilt my head up to look at her.

“I can’t say I didn’t warn you.” She looks down at me.

I nod.

“Baileys take care of what’s theirs, Rome. I hope I don’t have to remind you of that if that little girl is a Bailey. You need to figure out your priorities and do it fast.”

I nod again.

She pats my cheek. “First great-grandbaby. Ethel’s going to be so jealous.” A spring grows in her step as she heads out the door.

At least one of us is happy, even if it’s only out of spite.

Thankfully, it’s only the guys left—my brothers Austin, Denver, and Kingston, along with Brooklyn’s boyfriend, Wyatt, and my buddy Liam sit around the table. I don’t bother saying anything to them, but I head straight behind the bar, grab a shot glass and a bottle of Jack, and fill the small glass with amber liquid before tossing it down my throat.

“Isn’t that what got you into this mess?” Austin says from across the room.

I stop what I’m doing and give him the best “f**k you” look I can muster. “How about being a brother instead of a father tonight?”

Denver pats Austin on the shoulder and sits on the barstool in front of me. I put out a shot glass for him and he watches as I pour.

“If there was ever a night to tie one on, it’s now,” Denver says before downing the whiskey.

“Pour me one too,” Kingston says.

“Don’t leave me out,” Liam says.

One by one, they each take a spot on the barstools in front of me.

I line up the glasses in a row and pour us all a shot then slide one in front of each of them. Wordlessly, we raise the glasses and down our shots.

Kingston grimaces. He still prefers the taste of beer over hard liquor. Thankfully, he didn’t ask for a chaser. If he had, I might’ve had to take his Bailey man card. It’s not summer yet, so he can live a little before his obsessive physical conditioning to fight bush fires takes over.

“So you think you’re the dad?” Kingston asks.

“Could be.” I sigh. “Probably. I didn’t recognize her at first because she had her hair back the night we met and more makeup on, but I did sleep with someone in Seattle around when she probably would’ve gotten pregnant.”

Each one nods slowly with their lips pressed together.

I get their sympathetic half glances. None of them want to make direct eye contact with me. From the time you start having s*x, this is pretty much your number one fear as a guy—some girl showing up, telling you you’re her baby daddy.

Everyone but Austin and Wyatt, because they’d probably welcome a kid in their lives at this point. They’re established.

I still sleep on a mattress on the floor. No frame. Just there, tucked into the corner with the cord for my phone in the nearest outlet. The makeshift apartment above the restaurant is less than stellar. Making it a decent apartment is part of my plan. Nice enough to have girls come back to. All that seems stupid and childish now. A father should have his s**t together. A damn bed frame at the very least.

“Savannah’s on it. She’ll call the diagnostic place first thing in the morning and figure out how we can get the DNA results back ASAP,” Austin says.

“No surprise there,” I mumble.

“What do you think she wants?” Kingston asks.

He seems the most thrown. At almost twenty-one, he’s just starting his bachelor life. I’m sure he gets plenty of offers when he’s out fighting fires. Then again, Kingston isn’t Denver or me. He’s always been more like Austin.

“I have no idea.” I reach for the whiskey bottle again and pour myself another shot.

Denver slides his glass over. Never one to let me go through s**t alone. I’m close to all my brothers, but we’re twins. Our connection is on a whole other level. We clink our glasses and toss them back, the liquid no longer burning as it runs down my throat.

“I always told you two that little game you played, pretending to be the other, would come back and bite you in the ass,” Austin says.

“C’mon, man, you can’t be a twin and not do it.” Wyatt chuckles.

I stretch my hand across the bar, and he fist-bumps me.

“It didn’t do anything to me except make me almost piss my pants for five minutes.” Denver leans back and catches my eye, guilt coating his features. “Sorry, man.”

“Maybe so, but you’re twenty-five. Time to grow up,” Austin says in the dad voice he’s perfected in the decade since our parents passed.

“I was twenty-three when I did it,” I argue the moot point. “Doesn’t matter. What’s done is done.”

My jaw twitches under the strain of clamping it shut so I don’t say something I’ll regret. I know my big brother can’t help himself. He was forced into the dad role, but right now, I don’t need the lecture. I need someone to tell me that it’ll be okay, that I can handle this, that if this is my child, I won’t be a shitty father.

I release my aching fingers gripping the neck of the whiskey bottle.

“What are you gonna do?” Liam asks.

“What can I do? I’m gonna figure out if I’m her father, and if I am… I don’t know. I guess I’ll figure it out from there.”

I’ve always been the guy who’s comfortable winging it through life, but there’s no flying blind in this situation. If I screw up a little girl’s life, there’s no sorry big enough to make up for it.

G’Ma D is right. I need to get my priorities straight.