Chapter Two

Archie looks like Nolan.

Izzy couldn’t get the thought out of her head. Not in an identical way—no baby could look like a full-grown adult male with a delicious hint of blond stubble. She’d been studying their child since birth, overanalyzing every feature and detail. Any feature of Archie’s that didn’t match hers had to be from his father, and from that she’d reshaped the fading image of Nolan.

Yet the image in her head had nothing on the man. And she saw it now, the shape of his mouth, the angle of his jaw; father and son matched.

Her stomach churned, and she moved a hand there, wondering again if this coffee shop idea had been a bad one. She could have just told Nolan while they stood awkwardly in his office. But she needed a moment to gather her thoughts, to figure out how to tell him in the first place. Because, “By the way, you’ve got a kid,” didn’t fly. The man deserved something more than that.

Once she figured out what.

She’d searched for him since before she’d learned she was pregnant, back when she wanted to find him, rather than needed to. A year and a half—that’s how long she’d searched. He’d missed a lot with his kid, and regardless of what he did with that information, he needed to know his son existed.

She took a breath of the late afternoon air, reaching for her phone as she headed for the coffee shop, perhaps the most important coffee shop meeting of her life. In need of moral support, and a few extra minutes babysitting time, she dialed her sister.

“Izzy? How’s the new job?” Gaby’s cheery voice contrasted with Izzy’s spiraling life.

“It’s him.”

“It’s who?”

“Nolan Holtzman.”

“And that is…?” Gaby’s voice trailed off, a teasing quality as if Izzy spoke in riddles. Crap, she probably did.

“The media manager I’m helping. And Archie’s father.”

A beat of silence, and then, “Holy shit! You found him?”

“Found him, working for him, it’s a big mess.”

“How’d he take the news?”

Izzy paused at the entrance of the coffee shop. “I didn’t tell him yet. I’m meeting up with him now, outside of work. Please watch my kid for a little while longer?”

“Of course. Archie’s fine. This is important.”

Didn’t she know it. She yearned for the days when the most important decision she had was which party to go to. “How do I sign something like this?”

“Want me to text Levi while we talk?”

Izzy shook her head. Levi was Gaby’s fiancé, who happened to be Deaf himself and an ASL professor. They’d been nice enough to take her in and help her care for Archie. “No, you don’t need to text Levi. I can do that if I need to. I know what signs I need, I just… How does one say this?”

“You explain the facts. That’s all. Simple and straight to the point.”

Izzy’s stomach churned. She checked in the window and spotted Nolan already there, sitting at a small table. The lighting hit his blond hair, casting a shadow over his face. So handsome. She’d bring him home again if she could.

Which brought her right back to the initial problem at hand.

“Okay, I’m going in. Wish me luck.”

“Good luck, you’ve got this. You’re raising a nine-month-old on your own. You can tell the father.”

Izzy disconnected the call and put her phone away. She wanted to go home and cuddle her son. Maybe when she did, she’d be able to tell him he had a dad.

Inside, the aroma of coffee tickled her nose, reminding her that a hit of caffeine would be a good thing. Her hands shook, though, too nervous to deal with coffee or anything other than what she’d come here for. She wove through the occupied tables until she settled in across from Nolan.

“How was your first day?” he asked, a smile on his face. He held himself in a lighthearted manner she feared she’d destroy in minutes. She also knew she had to.

“Fine.” Oy, look at her, all short and curt. “I appreciate you helping me get set up today.” As far as being a supervisor went, Nolan was great. He’d reviewed the tasks he needed her help with and got her set up on her computer in the assistant/intern area. She kept glancing at him now, disbelieving she’d really found him, and feeling a little starstruck by his handsomeness.

The man was eye candy. Izzy already caught the college students in the corner glancing his way, even before the novelty of two adults signing had been introduced.

“Happy to help.” He looked so carefree, a sensation Izzy hadn’t felt since before her pregnancy test sported two little lines. A part of her wanted to wipe that carefree aura off him, his turn to deal with the reality of their one night. Another part of her wanted to let him keep it. After all, it had been her decision to raise their child whether or not she ever found him.

Their child. Words she hadn’t thought until now.

Among the usual coffeehouse chatter, giggling hit Izzy’s ears. She turned, checking out the sound, finding the college-aged group not only the culprit, but also staring her way. Or rather, Nolan’s way. Izzy wanted to grumble. She was maybe two or three years older than them and it felt like ten.

A tap on the table had her facing Nolan again. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

She thumbed behind her. “You have a fan club.”

His eyebrows lowered as he glanced over her shoulder. “I’m sure they’re interested in the ASL, that’s all.”

Izzy shook her head, amused despite herself. “Nope. I caught them staring before I arrived.”

She expected Nolan to look at the group again. Instead those brown eyes studied her. “You were watching me?”

She raised her hands but didn’t sign. Crap. She had been, and she’d admitted it. Her cheeks heated and she willed them not to. This wasn’t a date, not in any sense of either of their imaginations.

It felt like one.

They hadn’t been able to chat like this last time, not that either of them wanted to do anything resembling talking. On that thought she really needed to pull this conversation back around. She had a baby to get home to.

She prepared to do just that, rip off the Band-Aid, tell Nolan the real reason she wanted to meet with him, when two shadows hovered over the table. She looked up at the man and woman standing there, as did Nolan.

“We…learn…ASL,” the woman signed.

Oh boy. Izzy wanted to hide her face. Not now, ASL students! And it occurred to her that that had been the extent of her abilities when she first met Nolan. How did he deal with her newbie signing?

Nolan smiled and gave the pair a thumbs-up. “Nice to meet you.”

Huh, he had slowed his signs down, and probably had for her, too, that fateful night. And she still hadn’t been able to catch his rapid-fire fingerspelling of his name. If she had, they wouldn’t need to have this conversation.

“You…deaf?” the man asked.

Izzy forced a smile when she wanted to shoo them away.

Nolan didn’t seem to mind. “Yes, I’m deaf.”

The students turned to her. “Hearing,” she signed.

The pair nodded. They didn’t appear to have anything else to say, shifting on their feet. This day didn’t need any more awkward. “We’re going to talk now,” she signed, amazing herself that she slowed down her own signs, when she’d been signing for only two years herself. It helped having a Deaf future brother-in-law and knowing she needed to sign if she ever met Nolan again.

The students waved and left, and Izzy tried to collect herself and get back on topic.

“Always nice to see more people learning ASL,” Nolan signed, taking a sip of his drink as he did so.

Izzy nodded and then decided, screw it, she needed to jump in with both feet, an Izzy specialty. “I meant what I said, I tried to find you. I had to find you.”

Those blond eyebrows lowered.

This should be a flirting thing. She should be reaching across the table, brushing his hand. Another time, another place. They were beyond that now, in more ways than one.

“I don’t know how to say this.” She tried to come up with the words all day, and right about now she wished she’d figured something out.

“Would writing help?” Nolan asked.

Izzy shook her head, ready to kick something. She signed better than those students, dammit! “No it’s not a language thing, it’s…” Her hands flailed, and she needed a few more moments without his gaze on her before she messed things up even further. “I need a drink. Excuse me.”

And then she scurried away to order a coffee—nerves or not, a latte had become a necessity. As far as impressions went, Izzy once again failed spectacularly.

…

Nolan chuckled as Izzy headed for the counter, amused and intrigued by her behavior. She hadn’t been a fan of the interruption, and if Nolan were honest, he could have done without it, too. He meant what he’d said, though. He appreciated more people taking an interest in ASL, because it meant more people he could communicate with.

Izzy’s ASL skills had improved greatly. Not fluent, nowhere near fluent, and her grammar was a mix of English and ASL. But she could carry a conversation, and he found himself as intrigued by her personality as he was by her beauty.

Wrong train of thought. Unfortunately, the allure still held.

Izzy returned with a to-go cup in hand. She took a deep breath and blew it out and his curiosity peaked again. “O.K.. I need to jump in or I’ll never do this. I missed your name when we met, and we didn’t exchange numbers. I tried to find you but couldn’t.” She wrung her hands together.

“I had taken a job out of state.” He had hoped their paths would cross again, but the out-of-state job had been an opportunity he couldn’t pass up. At least, it had been at the time.

Her eyes darted back and forth between his, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose. This wasn’t a “what a small world, how ironic we meet again” thing after all.

She lifted her cup, then put it down without drinking. “That night, you and I…I got pregnant.”

Nolan blinked. Blinked again. But no, those were the words she signed.

He shook his head. It was one night. They had used protection. Though his own existence was proof that protection didn’t always work.

“Pregnant?” he asked, in the off chance there was any possible way he’d misunderstood. He studied her, his mind full of questions. Did she have the kid? Did she abort or give it up for adoption? Did she lose it? Whatever happened, he realized with a sinking feeling, she’d had to do it all on her own.

She nodded. “We have a son. He’s nine months old.”

He. Had. A. Son. With the woman he hadn’t been able to stop thinking about. Everything he knew had changed in the span of the last two minutes.

Breathe, Holtzman, you’ve got responsibilities now.

Izzy woke up her phone and set it in front of him. The image of a baby with a few wisps of brown hair and two bottom teeth stared back at him. Could be any kid, with any parent. But the smile…that same smile existed in his own baby pictures.

“What’s his name?”

“A-R-C-H-I-E.”

His son had a name. He was looking at the boy’s face, even. And still, it didn’t quite feel real. When he woke this morning, he was a single twenty-five-year-old, living alone, with only his mother for family. Now he had a kid.

He shot his eyes from the baby photo back to Izzy. She’d been a college student when he’d been a recent graduate, so she had to be younger than him, and she’d opted to bring their child into this world and raise him. He was feeling too many things at once—shock, anxiety, uncertainty, and a hell of a lot of respect for the woman sitting across from him.

The mother of his child.

“I’m sorry I couldn’t find you,” she signed.

“Not your fault.” He wanted to reach out and soothe her, tell her everything would be fine, but he didn’t know how to be a father. He’d support the kid, that much was a given. He wasn’t an asshole like the man who created him. But beyond providing material necessities? He had no father figure. Not a fucking clue how to fill those shoes.

“Father” was a meaningless word to him that could mean sperm donor, and considering Archie’s creation, the same could be said about the next generation.

Damn condoms. Virility must run in his genes.

Nolan had been known as the screw-up around here. Part of the reason he left town after that night with Izzy was to get a job away from where he’d grown up. And now that he was back he had one chance, this new job, to prove he wasn’t the kid who evacuated the high school.

Accident. Of course. And not the cool smoking behind the bleachers way or pulling the alarm as a prank. More in the science experiment gone wrong way. The model rocket worked great, in an outdoor area, but inside the gym it turned into target practice with his classmates.

He’d been a freshman, and the event was famous enough that his sign name had been changed—“rocket” with an N shape instead of an R.

He hadn’t grown out of being awkward, either. Case in point, this moment. He sat there, not signing a word, captivated by Izzy’s brown eyes. Somehow, even with this bombshell dropped at his feet, she still drew him in. He still wanted her.

The screen turned black and Izzy pulled her phone away. “I know this is a lot and unexpected. Trust me, I know. If I need a new job or…” Her hands trailed off. She signed a hell of a lot better now than when they first met, but English was her first language and it showed.

“No. It’s fine. We’ll work it out.”

Izzy nodded. “I don’t need anything from you. I just wanted you to know.”

Why did that hit him low in his gut, a sucker punch on top of the initial shock of having a kid in the first place? “I don’t know what’s right here, but I can pay child support.”

Something changed, the warmth in Izzy’s eyes closed off, a fierceness shone in the set of her jaw. “Fine.”

Crap. He didn’t know what he did wrong, only that he’d done it again.

Once a screw-up. Always a screw-up.

And now he had a kid.