Chapter 27

Evan

Evan leaned back against the elevator wall and gazed at Leila as she paced back and forth in front of him.

“I’ll be back home in about an hour, Mama,” she said into her cell phone as the elevator ascended to the hospital’s sixth floor. “Two hours tops . . . So how’s it going? Is everything okay? . . . Izzy’s all right?”

Though Leila wasn’t quite the emotional wreck she had been while Isabel had been missing, she still was more tightly wound than a violin string. He noticed it from the way her lips were taut as she talked to her mother, from the way she clenched her cell phone in her hand to the point her knuckles almost were white. He hoped over the next few months she would return back to the Leila he knew and loved—at least, for their baby’s sake.

“So you know for sure she’s in her room, right?” Leila asked. “You checked on her, I mean . . . Yes . . . Yes, I know we told her we weren’t going to hover but I just . . . I just want to make sure Izzy is okay . . . that she’s there.”

Evan shifted his gaze to Leila’s stomach. Her torso was no longer relatively flat. A noticeable potbelly poked out over the top of her linen pants, pushing against the waistband, straining the pants button. She was four and a half months along now. It was about time she started to show! Evan smiled a little at the thought of Leila round and swollen with their baby in a few months. He never could have imagined this more than a year ago.

She paused mid-conversation and glanced at him quizzically. Leila followed the path of his gaze. Her cheeks reddened and she quickly tugged down her shirt to cover the exposed skin. His smile widened as he took a step toward her and placed a hand lovingly on her stomach.

“Don’t cover up the Buddha belly. I like it,” he whispered. She rolled her eyes and slapped his hand away but not before smiling at him.

“So you do know for sure Izzy is in her room, right?” she asked her mother again a second later as the elevator doors opened. “Oh, you’re in her room right now?”

Evan stepped out of the elevator into the maternity ward hallway. Leila trailed after him.

“Sure, you can put her on the phone, Mama. Thanks . . . Hey! Hi, Izzy!” Leila said with an unnatural chirpiness, the same voice you would use with a cooing infant. “It’s Mommy! I just wanted to say hi and tell you that I’ll be back real soon, okay?”

Evan grabbed her arm, making her stop as she strode past him. She stared at him in surprise.

“What?” she mouthed and he silently pointed up to the sign showing a drawing of a cell phone with a giant red X crossed through it.

She quickly nodded. “Look, honey, Mommy has to go,” she said into her phone. “I’m at the hospital and I can’t talk on my phone here. Hospital rules . . . No. No, I’m not sick! . . . Evan and I are here to see a baby.” Leila laughed and Evan’s heart melted a little. “Yes, exactly! . . . I will see you soon. Okay? Love you, honey. ’Bye.” She hung up, dropped her phone into her purse, and turned to Evan, still grinning. “She wanted to know if we were here to help give you some practice with babies. I told her yes.”

He reached for Leila’s hand and held it. They continued their way down the corridor. A nurse walked past them, holding a clipboard. “I’m glad you had the chance to talk to her. I hope it made you feel better,” Evan said.

Leila’s smile faded a little and she rubbed her stomach absently. She did that a lot nowadays. “I just still worry about her, you know? Every now and then I’ll flash back to that day when Mom called me and said Izzy didn’t come home from school and I just—”

“It’s not going to happen again.” He squeezed her hand tighter. “I talked to Izzy. We have an agreement.”

Leila narrowed her eyes at him. “I wish you would tell me what you said to her.”

“I told you the gist of it.”

“The gist, but not—”

“Trust me. It was nothing out of line. I wouldn’t do that.”

“I know.” Leila took a deep breath and nodded again. “I . . . I trust you, Ev.”

They rounded the corner and he saw Paulette and Antonio standing near the end of the hall. The couple turned away from the window they had been gazing into, looked up at Evan and Leila, and waved.

Evan didn’t know when was the last time he had seen Paulette and her husband together, let alone together smiling. It was a relief. They had been through so much and yet they were still making their marriage work. It was definitely a testimony to the belief that true love could endure just about anything because Paulette and Antonio certainly had faced some severe trials and tribulations lately—from an affair and now, the unexpected birth of their son. Evan still couldn’t believe that his sister had lied that long about her pregnancy, that she had let it go that far—to the point that she had actually delivered her baby before she was willing to tell anyone the truth. But then again, Evan didn’t have much room to talk; he was keeping his own secrets now. He still hadn’t told Leila about Charisse showing up at his office and giving him that ultimatum. But Leila had enough to worry about with Isabel and her own pregnancy. He didn’t want to burden her with that right now.

“I’m so glad you guys could make it,” Paulette called out as she walked toward them with Antonio at her side.

“Of course we made it,” Evan said, hugging his sister. He turned to Antonio and shook his hand. “In fact, we would have been here to see Little Nate sooner but . . . well . . . stuff happened.”

Antonio nodded. “Yeah, I heard.” He gazed down at Leila. “How is your daughter doing, by the way?”

“My baby’s home. She’s safe, which is all that really matters, right?”

“I agree,” Paulette said.

The two women stared at one another and Evan felt something pass between them, a secret message, perhaps, or unspoken words that only they could decipher.

Evan knew that Paulette had once viewed Leila as somewhat of a big sister and Leila had reciprocated those feelings, loving and protecting Paulette as fiercely as Evan or Terrence would. The two women had once been close. But lately, a tension seemed to radiate between them. At that moment, Evan felt the tension dissipate.

The two women stepped forward simultaneously and fell into an embrace. They cried softly on each other’s shoulders.

“I’m so sorry, Lee,” Paulette said between hiccups.

“No, I’m sorry,” Leila whimpered.

Meanwhile, Evan and Antonio stood awkwardly off to the side, watching them.

“Give them their moment,” Antonio whispered with a chuckle.

The two women continued mumbling heartfelt apologies for another five minutes or so until Paulette pulled away, wiping her eyes with the backs of her hands. “Do you want to go in the NICU to see Nate?”

Leila’s teary eyes widened. “Of course! I would love to! B-but would they let me in there?”

“I’d like to see them try to keep you out!” Paulette proclaimed with a grin before dragging Leila toward the NICU’s metal door.

“I’ll be right back,” Leila called over her shoulder as both women rushed through the entrance.

Evan watched them with bemusement.

“Glad to see them finally make up,” Antonio said.

“Me too.”

He and Antonio strolled toward the glass window at the end of the corridor, where Antonio and Paulette had been standing earlier. Evan now realized that it was a window leading to the NICU. Two blinds were drawn over the double-paned glass but one blind was open. Evan could see Paulette and Leila a few feet away from the window, gazing down at one of the incubators. A tiny infant lay inside it. The baby’s skin was almost translucent, revealing a web of veins, and was covered with a fine layer of dark hair. Wires were attached to thin legs and arms. A foam bandage was over his eyes. Paulette reached a hand inside the incubator and gently rubbed the baby’s torso. Her eyes filled with tears. Leila placed a hand on Paulette’s shoulder and whispered something into her ear.

“Nate doesn’t look great now, but the doc says he’s actually doing pretty good,” Antonio said over Evan’s shoulder, making him turn to look at him. “He’s off the respirator. He’s breathing on his own. She said if he keeps this up, they’ll be able to move him out of the NICU. He might even be able to go home with us in a month or so, when he can feed on his own and puts on more weight.” Antonio shrugged. “Of course, Paulette wants to take him home now, but she knows that it would be best to let the doctors and nurses do what they do. It’s the best thing for Nate to be here . . . for now anyway.”

Evan slowly shook his head. “I’ll tell you, Tony, you’re handling all of this a hell of a lot better than I would. I’ve had months to adjust to the idea of becoming a dad and I’m still freaking out a little. You had a couple of hours. And now you have to deal with all this.” He gestured to the glass.

“Trust me. I’ve been through worse,” Antonio said dryly, though Evan couldn’t fathom what could possibly be worse than this.

“I’m just happy our son is going to pull through and that Paulette didn’t die in childbirth,” Antonio continued. “Granted, I’m still pissed that she thought she could keep something like this from me, but you know, Ev, I’m tired of being angry. This is our happy ending, as far as I’m concerned.”

Evan slumped against the wall and nodded. “I feel you, Tony. There are so many things you can’t control. At some point, you just have to throw in the towel and say, ‘To hell with it! If this is the best it’s going to get, I’ll accept it.’ ” He pursed his lips. “And you know . . . if it weren’t for a few people fucking things up, life would be pretty damn perfect.”

Antonio furrowed his brows. “Any people in particular?”

“Leila’s ex-husband and my wife, for example,” Evan muttered ruefully.

Though he felt like he had the situation with Brad in hand, he wasn’t so sure about Charisse. She was definitely a wild card now. He thought back to how Charisse had looked in his office more than a week ago, so stubborn and filled with self-righteousness. He knew that he was in for a battle with her, but his conflicted emotions about their relationship made him less than willing to engage in an all-out war.

“And our damn brother, Dante,” he said. His voice lowered an octave. He had no ambivalence about his feelings for Dante; he hated that bastard. “Dante’s had it out for us from the beginning. He’s hell-bent on revenge and nothing seems to stop him. He’s gone after me, Terry, even Paulette. He—”

“When the hell did he go after Paulette?”

“Last year,” Evan said, returning his gaze to the NICU window.

The nurse had opened the incubator and now Leila was holding Little Nate against her chest, gazing at the infant lovingly. She waved at Evan. Evan waved back.

“Dante tried to blackmail Paulette into selling her shares in Murdoch Conglomerated,” Evan continued. “He found out about her . . .” He paused and glanced at Antonio, unsure if he wanted to bring up the topic of her past affair right now. “Well, anyway . . . Dante found out delicate information about Paulette. He basically told her he’d let the secret out if she didn’t cooperate with him.”

“What?” Antonio’s face darkened. He balled his fists at his sides. “She never told me that!”

Evan loudly cleared his throat, hoping that their conversation wasn’t reopening old wounds. “There wasn’t anything to tell, Tony. He didn’t get a chance to blackmail her. We confronted him. We handled it and he backed off, but . . . I have a feeling he’s going to try something again. I just don’t know what it is.”

“Guys like that never stop on their own accord, Ev,” Antonio said quietly. “You know that. I know that. They’ve got to be stopped.”

“Yeah, well, short of putting a bullet in that asshole, I’m not sure what else would work.”

In his darker moments, Evan had fantasized about killing Dante. He dreamed of marching up to him, pulling out a .38, and holding it up to his temple before pulling the trigger. But Evan wasn’t capable of murder—for now anyway. If Dante pushed him hard enough, he could start researching the going rate for putting out a hit these days.

Mark my words, Evan thought.

“It wouldn’t necessarily take a bullet to solve your problem.” Antonio crossed his arms over his broad chest. “There are more simple ways.”

“I’m all ears,” Evan said sarcastically. He watched as Leila handed Nate back to the maternity ward nurse.

“I could do it for you,” Antonio said.

“Do what?” Evan was barely paying attention now. He watched as the nurse stepped forward to lower Nate gently back onto his bed. She raised the plastic door to close the incubator.

“Take care of him. I’ve done it before. Paulette had a problem just like this one. I knew it wouldn’t go away on its own, so . . . I took care of it.”

Evan did a double take and stared at Antonio. “What problem?”

“More like ‘who’ than ‘what.’ Her problem was a wannabe thug named Marques,” Antonio continued quietly. He didn’t look at Evan as he spoke. Instead, he smiled benevolently at his wife and newborn son. “The one she cheated on me with. He was blackmailing her, too. She gave me his name and I Googled his address that very night. It was easier than I thought. That jackass’s name was plastered all over the Internet for his training services. I showed up at his apartment building and waited until someone was going inside and I stepped through the door. I knocked on his apartment door and pretended to be a delivery guy. When he opened it, I asked him if he knew Paulette. If he knew about me,” Antonio now whispered through gritted teeth. “He said he did. Honestly, Ev, I don’t know if I would have been more merciful if he would have apologized . . . if he would have at least pretended that he was sorry for what he had done. But he didn’t. I confronted him about everything . . . about the affair, about the blackmail. He talked a lot of shit that night, but by the time I was done with him, he wasn’t talking shit anymore. He wasn’t saying anything. The deed was done. I had it all cleaned up in an hour and I was back at my mom’s to get a good night’s sleep.” Antonio turned to Evan. He was still smiling. “Problem solved.”

Jesus Christ, Evan thought, taking a step back. The deed was done. What deed?

Had Antonio just confessed to killing a man?

“Oh, Ev, he is so adorable!” Leila gushed, making Evan jump in surprise. “I forgot what it’s like to hold someone so little. I can’t wait to have our baby.” She turned to Antonio, threw her arms around his neck, and hugged him. “Your son is so beautiful, Tony! You should be so proud.”

“Thanks . . . and I am,” Antonio said, hugging her back and giving Evan a meaningful look over her shoulder.

As their eyes met, Evan’s throat went dry.