“Maybe the nanny agency will have something.” Even as I said that, I doubted it. I’d done three emergency covers, and that was only because I’d been the only one available. Management at the agency had never explicitly said that, but I saw and heard more than they knew. I loved looking after kids, there was something so wonderful about their excitement for the world, and very often nannying a toddler meant being there for the toddler’s sibling. There was nothing like spending time rocking a baby and talking about the stars with the older sibling. I’d had both those things with Emma—caring for her as a baby, and now showing her the beauty of the universe, and it was my reason for being.
I didn’t need a job at the stupid planetarium, I needed to get more nanny jobs until my degree was done—it was simple.
“Earth to Joseph."
I snapped out of my self-justification loop and sighed. “Or I’ll get another part-time job,” I said and watched as the nose cone of my model finally slip off with a plop to the step. It was so damn ridiculous, and I couldn’t help the nervous snort of laughter that was expelled from me with force. If I didn’t laugh, I would cry. At my stupidity, my need to always be right, and mostly that I hadn’t used enough glue for the nose cone.
“Come on, I left you dinner, and you’re home early so it might even still be edible.” She helped me stand and we headed into the cooler house. I shut the door, then poked my head into Emma’s room, seeing my sweet and sassy five-year-old niece sprawled on her bed, arms akimbo, and dead to the world. Somehow she made everything right and perfect.
Even though I’d fucked up, she still loved me.
I sighed and pulled the door shut, then stood for a moment in the hallway.
What the hell have I done?
Three
Colorado
The lyrics to one of the first songs I had ever written, at the ripe old age of eight, popped into my head.
The heavens rained black rain and I got wet.
Yeah, it wasn’t a great line. Too many uses of the word “rain” for starters. I was only eight. But this single chaotic moment in my mangled life fit that first attempt at being a lyricist well. I was soaked to the skin and needed an umbrella. Holding a baby to my chest as the world spun out of control around me, I yearned for a port in a storm. Hell, even a rope tossed into the churning sea of madness would’ve sufficed. So yeah, the line worked for the situation.
“Yo!” I called over the din of screaming baby, irritated Russian, a team owner pacing inside and out with his phone to his ear, and a really aggrieved head coach. All eyes landed on me. “Can someone take her while I go shower and pack?”
We were due in Vegas in two hours or something. Mark charged into the room, eyes as round as a kettle drum, and stepped right over what Vlad had been about to say.
“You are not to take that child out of state,” Westman-Reid barked.
I didn’t like his dictatorial attitude and bristled a little. Madeline cut loose with a wickedly loud panty puff that made me smile. She just might have been mine after all…
“We have playoffs,” Coach reminded his partner.
Mark gave him a scalding look. “I’m well aware of our post-season commitments, Rowen. I’m on the phone with legal now. They’re telling me that we have to call Child Services and hand the baby over to them until—”
“No! Fuck that noise!” I shouted. Madeline jerked and whined. I shushed her but continued to glower at Mark around her soft little head. “No. She is not going into the system. No. I forbid it. I know what happens to kids when they serve time in foster care.”
“Colorado,” Mark said, his voice growing softer as he neared me. I clutched my—the baby—closer, hiking her up until my scruffy cheek rested on her dark hair. “You have no legal rights here yet.”
“She’s mine. The note said so.” I thought about the purple ink on that note. Was it still in the yard? Or had it blown away like my previous life had just done?
“We don’t know that she’s yours,” Coach reminded me.
I took a couple of steps back, my foot hitting an empty Jager bottle. What did he know? He’d just told the guy at the airport that we’d be late due to an “unfavorable team situation that had to be resolved” before we could take off. I disliked the idea of my kid—alleged kid—being called a situation. It wasn’t her fault some irresponsible chick had dumped her on my doorstep like an unwanted barn cat.
“Rowen’s right,” Mark said, lowering his phone. “You’ll need to prove paternity before you can petition the court for some sort of termination of parent-child relationship for the mother or something along those lines.”
“I don’t know who the mother is!” I snapped, making Madeline whine again. I bounced her gently while easing out of the room. “It was like a year ago. I tend to spread myself around. It could be—”
“One of a thousand,” Vlad picked that moment to speak up.
I threw a glare at him. “Who asked you, Ivan Drago?”
He arched a sleek eyebrow.
“Colorado, this has to be handled correctly,” Coach stated. My gaze flew back to him as he slid between me and Mark, his voice calm and cool but strong as steel. “We can see that you’re attached to the child already, and while that’s admirable, she may not be yours. This might be some kind of ruse or blackmail scheme. We just don’t know, and to be brutally honest, this house and your lifestyle is not conducive to raising a baby.”
I opened my mouth to argue then my drummer staggered in via the
