Chapter 3 - THE HARRINGTON STORM
I opened the door only a few inches,
keeping the security chain in place.
“It’s late,
Blake,”
I said,
my voice cold and level.
“I called Julian,”
he said,
ignoring my dismissal.
“I found the old records.
I tracked him down at a conference in London.”
He looked up at me,
his eyes bloodshot and rimmed with red.
“He told me everything,
Emma.
He told me about the appointments.
He told me about the high-risk scares.
He told me...
he told me you were trying to surprise me.”
I felt a pang of old grief,
but I pushed it down.
“And?”
I asked.
“Does that change the last five years?”
“It changes everything!”
he shouted,
his voice echoing in the quiet street.
“I was a fool.
A blind,
arrogant fool.
I let my pride destroy the only family I ever had.”
He slid a thick envelope through the crack in the door.
“What is this?”
“It’s everything,”
he said,
his voice cracking.
“The penthouse in New York,
the estate in the Hamptons,
forty percent of Harrington Energy.
It’s all in your name.
And the boys...
there are trusts for all of them.”
I looked at the envelope as if it were a poisonous snake.
“You think you can buy forgiveness,
Blake?
You think a few properties and some stock options make up for the fact that you weren't there when they took their first steps?
You weren't there when Ethan had a fever that wouldn't break,
or when Noah had his first nightmare.”
I pushed the envelope back toward him.
“Keep your money.
We’ve done fine without it.”
“I don’t want to buy you!”
he cried,
dropping to his knees on my porch.
“I want to be a father.
I want to know their middle names.
I want to know if they like the color blue or if they prefer dinosaurs over robots.”
He was sobbing now,
his forehead resting against the cold wood of my door.
“Please,
Emma.
Don’t punish them for my sins.
They deserve a father who loves them.”
I looked down at the man who had once been my whole world.
He was a shadow of his former self,
his ego stripped away to reveal a raw,
bleeding heart.
I thought of the boys sleeping upstairs,
and how Noah had asked me just last week why he didn't have a daddy like the other kids at school.
I hated Blake for what he had done,
but I loved my sons more than I hated him.
“One hour,”
I said,
unhooking the chain.
“You get one hour to talk.
But if you wake them up,
I will call the police.”
He stood up,
May you like
wiping his face with his sleeve,
and stepped into my home for the first time.
