“Listen to me. If he is your father, we’ll deal with it. And if he does something to upset you, I’ll deal with him. Okay?”
“Okay.”
“I’ll be right here waiting for you.”
Her eyes got big. “You’re not going in with me?”
He shook his head. “You gotta do this on your own, Sky.” Then he led her the last few steps and tapped on the door.
“Come in,” she heard a man’s deep voice growl.
Shades reached for the knob and swung the door open, stepping back to let her pass him. She walked three steps into the room, noticing that Shades stayed in the doorway, his hand on the knob.
It was a very large office. There was a large desk with a couple of empty chairs facing it. Behind it sat a man. He was the only person in the room. He had his head down at first, and he was rubbing his palms together in a nervous way and suddenly she realized he must be as nervous about this meeting as she was. But that didn’t reduce her anger at him. Finally, his eyes lifted, hesitantly, reluctantly, almost as if he was afraid to look up and get his first look at her. Was he afraid he would recognize something in her or afraid he wouldn’t?
“Skylar?” he asked, standing.
She nodded and hearing a click behind her, she looked back to see that Shades had left her alone. Her eyes came back to the man who claimed to be her father. He walked around the desk and took a few steps toward her, his eyes running over her face.
“My God. I can’t believe it. You look just like her.” He stopped, a stunned expression on his face, it was almost as if he was looking at a ghost. “My Angie.”
At that, Skylar’s eyes flared. “I’m not my mother. I’m not your Angie. I’m not your anything!”
He visibly flushed at her outburst.
“I knew your mother.”
She looked at him, really looked at him. He was in his early fifties, maybe. His dark hair was peppered with gray, as was his goatee, but there was no denying. He was the man in the picture. She’d stared at it enough over the years to know that much.
“So, what of it?” she snapped, not about to make this easy for him.
“Angie and I had a baby together. A little girl. You. I loved Angie, and I loved you. But I got sent to prison shortly after that. After about a year, she stopped coming to visit, she stopped writing. I spent eleven years in prison. When I got out, I couldn’t find her. She’d moved and—”
“She didn’t move. She died,” Skylar snapped.
“I didn’t know. They never fuckin’ told me.”
“I was put in the system. Five different foster homes. One after another.”
“I’m so sorry, kid.”
“I’m not your kid.”
“You are. I know you’re pissed, but you are my kid.”
“You’re nothing but a sperm donor to me. That’s all you’ll ever be to me.”
“Baby girl don’t say that. I’m sorry. For all of it. But I swear to God, no one ever told me she died. I tried to find you both when I got out.”
“Apparently not very hard. Not hard enough.”
“Baby, you have to understand. We didn’t have computers back then. I couldn’t just do an internet search for her.”
“You could have found me. You didn’t try hard enough.”
“I’m sorry. I thought she left me. I thought she wanted nothing to do with a loser like me. I guess a part of me figured you’d be better off without me fucking your life up. Better off without me.”
“Well, you were wrong. I wasn’t better off.”