Reed's Reckoning

“Can we never talk about that night again? There are only two other nights in my entire life that were worse than that. One was the night I lost my parents.”

There’s pain in her voice and I want to ask her to clarify, but don’t want to upset her further.

“Yeah, we’ll never talk about it again. But are you okay with my mom coming in a few weeks?”

“Let me talk to her and think about how we’re going to tell Davis. But yes, she needs to meet her grandson.”

“Thank you,” I say as sincerely as I can, “it means a lot to me.”

She shakes her head and lies back, soaking up the sun’s rays, and holds my hand peacefully. I continue watching her and thinking about the feelings that overwhelm me when it comes to Arianna Williams.

After two hours, we pack up and I take her home. I don’t tell her about my meeting with Luke. He obviously has his reasons for wanting to meet privately.

“Baby, I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty. We’re going to a casual restaurant downtown.” I kiss her lightly outside her door in case Davis is inside with Katy. I don’t want to get caught mauling her.

“Okay, see you then.”

She goes inside and when the door closes, my heart jumps. She’s not even four feet away and I miss her.

I’m out of the shower and dressed for dinner when the doorbell rings. I take in a deep breath before opening the door, preparing myself for whatever Luke has to say.

He stands there with a six-pack of beer in one hand and the other braced on the doorframe. His gaze is indifferent with no signs of kindness.

“You serious about Ari and Davis?” he growls.

“What the fuck, Adams? Yeah I am.”

His face softens and he pushes himself past me into the house. “Then we need to talk.”

Chapter 10

Reed

A car door slams outside and I stop pacing to try and get my anger under control. Anger isn’t the word for how I feel right now. Rage, fury, and murderous come to mind.

Luke spent an hour talking and when he was done, I wanted to kill someone. I knew I had to handle this immediately. The only way to do that is to confront Jack personally.

Ari sounded disappointed when I canceled our date, but I told her I would explain tomorrow. The insecurity in her voice killed me. The only thing that gave me any ease was that Luke was on his way to her house. He wanted her to hear it from him.

The knock at the door does nothing to calm my nerves.

“Reed, man, what the fuck? I haven’t heard from you since you called me to find you a PI. You fall off the face of the earth and move to the beach an hour away? Then call and demand I come up here? What the hell is going on?”

“Jack, we need to talk.” I step aside for him to pass and he notices the tone of my voice.

He whistles when he sees the view from my living room. “Must be nice to be a multi-millionaire. This place have any hot women—”

“I have a son.” I cut him off.

His expression changes to fear. “No shit?”

“No shit. He’s three and a half. He’ll be four in September.”

“Are you sure he’s yours?”

“I’m holding it together loosely, brother. From the look on your face, you’re not surprised.”

He plops down on the sofa and runs his hands through his hair, not looking at my face. I heard Luke’s side of things, but I’m going to give the man that has been my best friend forever a chance to explain. Then I’ll decide if I beat the shit out of him.

“Reed, I don’t know what to say.”

“Why don’t you start with the truth and we’ll go from there.”

He sighs and scrubs his hands down his face. “Our senior year, Luke something or other—”

“Luke Adams, his name is Luke Adams.” I growl.

Jacks eyes grow wide but he continues. “Okay, Luke Adams cornered me at the gym. I knew how tore up you were about he and Ari dating, so I tried to blow him off. I really wanted to beat his ass for fucking your girl but you had just started to move on. You’d been so torn up and we were only weeks away from the draft. He caught me alone after my shower and told me Ari was pregnant. I laughed in his face and congratulated him.”

My stomach feels tight. I stay silent waiting for more.

“He threw me up against the wall and told me the baby was yours. Even though you left her, he thought you had a right to know. I didn’t believe him. I’d seen them around campus, and knew how tight they were. It was too close to you getting a number one pick, following your dreams, and becoming a millionaire. The whole situation was too fucked up for me to believe it. So I told him no way was I going to help them scam my best friend. He backed off and told me I had a decision to make. If I was really your best friend, I’d let you know you were going to be a father.”