“No,” I answer her. “They’re mine,”
“This can go one of two ways,” she says placing a white file on my desk. “You can tell me. I’m not going to be as upset as him, sweetheart. I’m a mother of six. Knight is my oldest. We can set up a system that gives us access to my grandkids and we move forward. Or,” she sighs. “I will take them from you and believe me when I say, I am very good at my job. I’ve been protecting kids since I was twenty–seven years old.
“And I don’t want to do that, Phoebe. Not to you and not to them, but if they share my son’s blood you are going to need us. You’re a very rich and very powerful girl, but you” re new here. Everything you have can be taken away. Until all you have left is us. Because of your profile and Knightly’s all of this will get very ugly, very fast,”
I wipe my tears away because I knew the moment this tiny brown Latina woman introduced herself as his mother, I was fucked. Brown girls don’t fuck around. We’ve clawed our way out of the oppression and stigma of our race to get to where we are in a place designed for the white man. Her threats aren’t empty. That much I know.
“This is the last time I am going to ask. Are they my son’s children?” she holds my gaze. She’s completely unfazed.
This could get ugly. The media will fucking swarm me like killer bees. My babies wouldn’t survive that. They’re so protected and gentle. I’ve made sure to give them everything I was denied my entire life. I worked so hard for them and the last thing they need is for my stubbornness to fuck them up more than this entire ordeal already will.
“Yes,” I choke out and with that one word, I’ve betrayed every promise I made when I found out I was pregnant. She lets out a heavy sigh of relief. “Please, don’t do this,” I
shake my head. “This was my choice and if he were to take that out on me, that’s fine.
But not them,”
She comes around the desk and wipes my face.
“He would never hurt you,” she wraps her arms around me.
I can’t remember the last time someone held me like this and I’m not built for affection.
I start crying because I don’t believe her. Just because I got rid of my affliction with the music doesn’t mean that I didn’t see what he was up to.
The broken engagement that destroyed his ex’s career. The women, the drugs, the scandals. I’ve always known I made the right choice by keeping this from him. They were safe. We were safe from him.
“Then tell him to pretend this never happened,” I pull away from her. She looks up at me wounded. “I don’t want him near my kids. They don’t need someone like him in their lives,”
1/3
“You don’t know anything about my son,” she says tightly.
“I don’t know what rock you’ve been living under, Mrs. Blake, but I have a pretty picture of all the shit he’s done since I last seen him. I know the family he destroyed when he left Hailey Roden. My kids don’t need that.
“They don’t need a coke–snorting, womanizing, drunk setting an example for their futures. I’ve worked too fucking hard to give them the life only one percent of our population knows and I will rather die than let him ruin their chances,”
“Hailey wasn’t the person my son thought she was,”
“I don’t need an explanation. I don’t want one. Whatever she did, what he did in the end
was much worse,”
“Knightly is-”
“Please,” I stop her. I lift the file she placed on my desk and try to hand it back to her. Take this and leave us alone,”
“That’s not going to happen,” she shakes her head. “We both know that. I will not stop fighting for my family because you read a couple of articles written by people who don t know what the fuck they’re talking about. You should know that better than most. He s not the only one with secrets,”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” I scoff. She goes around the desk to take her purse from the couch.
“I’m going to give you until the end of the week to come to your senses. I will make a second appointment for Monday morning. You will have these documents filled out and we will address this calmly. Okay?” she takes a deep breath and looks me over before letting it out. “I really hope you reconsider, Phoebe. Believe me when I say, in a few months. You’re going to need him,”
With that, she leaves. I fall into my chair and finally break. This is how Cevin finds me. He shuts the door and runs over to me.
“Hey, hey. What’s going on?” he asks.
“I fucked up,” I try to calm myself but I can’t. “I should have taken my chances in Italy,”
When I moved back here, I didn’t think about him. I firmly believed I was never going to see him again. We were safe and now we’re not. What the fuck am I supposed to do now? How do I fix this,
implicating my babies? When the media gets word about this, everything is going to fall apart. I could lose my job for a scandal like this.
“Why was Knightly Blake here?” he asks softly. “I can’t help you unless you tell me what‘ s going on, Phoebs,”
“Knight is their father,” I whisper. His face softens.
“Oh, shit” he whispers back. “Oh, fuck. That guy is the twins‘ father. How did that even-” he pauses. “You’re human, right?”
2/3
H
“What? What kind of question is that? What else would I be?”
“I mean you’re not crazy like them,” he clarifies. “That little Mexican woman that came in with him, she’s the best lawyer in the music industry. She’s vicious as fuck. I love you and respect the fuck out of you for how far you’ve brought us, but Mama, you don’t have the stomach to go up against these people. What did she say to you?”
“She said I either let them in calmly or she’s going to kick in the front door
“Yeah, that’s their style,” he sighs.
“She gave me this,” I open the file to find she set up a paternity test along with what looks like a contract. He takes it and starts to read through it.
“Okay, it looks like a pretty basic shared custody agreement,” he says. “And he would like to pay you child support for the five years you did this on your own,”
“I don’t want his money,” I roll my eyes.
“You sure?”
“He’s not going to buy my kids,”
“I don’t know, Phoebs. Six million is a lot of fucking money. Three a piece,”
“What?” I tear my eyes off the paternity test appointment for tonight to look at him.
“That’s how much he’s giving them,” he laughs.
“I am completely and utterly fucked, aren’t I?”
“I mean you guys didn’t just make one super cute baby. You made two. Fucked is the whole reason why you’re in this mess,” he laughs. My jaw all but hits the desk.
“Cev,” I throw my pen at him. He snatches it from thin air and laughs. He’s always been like that. Quick reflexes.
“I am going to dismiss that because I know how stressful this can be. I had a similar situation with my Al- with my wanted his money. I think you should talk to him properly. Calmly. That last thing your want is to piss off an al- an asshole who is, you know. A rockstar,”
former boss. Only fe didn’t want the kids. She
“This isn’t about him or me. It’s about the twins. What’s best for them. I mean you’ve seen all the shit he’s involved in. What he did to Hailey Roden. How is that acceptable for them? You’ve met my kids. They’ve never known anything truly bad,
“I know. But he’s here now and from the looks of it, he’s not going anywhere. I suggest doing this the easy way, Phoebe. For you and the twins. Think of how hard this is. going to be on them,”
