Roman (Cold Fury Hockey 7)

"Why didn't she tell me?" he asks, and finally I hear a bit of anger in his voice. I figured it would appear at some point, because let's face it, I just dropped a hell of a bomb in his lap and then detonated it.

"You made it clear to her that you didn't want a relationship," I tell him with my Brannon chin lifted in the air, and he actually winces at the reminder. "You broke her heart because you couldn't let her inside, and she didn't want to burden you further with a baby."

"A child never would have been a burden," he growls at me, even more pissed now. He takes two steps toward the chair and sits back down. He extends his hand...perhaps to take mine or perhaps to lay it on my shoulder again in a show of fatherly affection, but then decides against it, dropping it back down to the armrest. "Why are you just coming to me now?"

Good question. I'm twenty-six years old and meeting my father for the first time. I debated long and hard whether or not to do this, but as the months rolled by after my mom died, I couldn't stop thinking about Brian Brannon. I'd read everything I could about him and he seemed like a decent guy. And here I was, without any family left except a distant aunt and a handful of cousins I didn't know all that well, and I just wanted to have someone.

I was simply lonely.

And even more than that, I was always seeking the next grand adventure. I felt that Brian Brannon was a wondrous chapter just waiting to be read in my book of life.

I cough slightly to clear my throat. "I didn't know about you until just before my mom died. She was sick for a long time, and as the end was approaching, she told me about you. I was just as shocked as you are now."

"But you said she died ten months ago," he says softly.

I want to say I hear a slight degree of skepticism in his voice, but I don't see it in his eyes. I have no clue what he must be feeling, but I guess I'll find out sooner or later before I walk out of here. So I tell him the truth. "I was scared, to be honest. Not sure you'd believe me. Accept me. I moved to Raleigh from Hartford about three months after my mom died, but it never seemed the right time to approach you. I don't want anything from you, or Gray for that matter, but I just thought..."

My voice trails off, as I'm too terrified to put my desires out there. I'm strong, but I still have some fears, I guess.

He's having none of it, though. "Thought what, Lexi?"

"I don't want to mess your life up or anything," I assure him hastily. I see a flicker of annoyance in his eyes, but I keep barreling forward. "I was hoping...I don't know...maybe we could have dinner every once in a while."

"You want dinner?" he asks slowly.

Skeptically.

"I don't want your money," I snap at him, and feel tears start to sting my eyes.

Brian offers a sympathetic smile and then his hand is on my shoulder again, giving me a warm squeeze. "You want a family."

My head drops and I stare at my lap, blinking my eyes hard so I don't cry. I nod and say, "And you seemed like the type of man who would want to know."

Another squeeze to my shoulder, and when his hand falls away, I look over at him. He leans back in the chair and stretches his legs out, staring up at the ceiling. He expels a mighty breath of air from his lungs and murmurs, "Well, I have to say...I don't know that I've ever received such a shock before in my life."

Brian's head turns and his eyes come to rest on me. "I'm at a loss."

"I understand," I say quietly. "It was a shock when she told me too. I'd grown up thinking my father abandoned me. She'd never tell me anything about you, only that you left when she was pregnant."

"I swear I didn't know," Brian says as he sits up and leans toward me. "I swear to God I didn't know."

With a nod of understanding, I tell him, "I know. She admitted she never told you."

"I have to tell Gray," Brian says with a heavy sigh, and I can't tell if that's because I've just thrown him for a loop or because I've just complicated his life in a very bad way.

"I don't want to impose," I interject, all of a sudden more intimidated by the prospect of Gray knowing than Brian. I've read up on my half sister as much as I have on my father, and Gray Brannon is a powerhouse. Genius-level IQ, gorgeous, and driven. Frankly, she scares the crap out of me.

"You're not imposing," he says firmly. "It's just...this is going to be hard for her to take. She's pregnant, overworked, and I daresay, a bit emotional."

"We can take a paternity test," I blurt out, because even though he hasn't uttered a single word of doubt, he surely can't be taking everything I'm saying at face value. "In fact...I bought one at the drugstore and it's in my purse. I've already done my swab. You can do one too and we can send it off. It takes a few weeks for the results to come in."

Brian smiles at me and chuckles. "That's probably a good idea, but I can see you have my chin and nose. I also have no reason to doubt your mother. She was a good woman. I'm pretty sure I know what the results are going to be."

"I am really sorry for dropping this on you," I tell him again. "I thought about writing you, but I couldn't be sure you'd ever see it. So I thought face-to-face was the best."

He nods at me thoughtfully and then stands from the chair again. "What are your plans for the rest of the day?"

A moment of panic surges within me; I'm afraid he's going to take me right down to Gray's office and introduce us. Still, I squeak out, "Nothing for a few hours. I have to be into work at 4 P.M."

"Good," he says as he leans across his desk and picks up his phone. He stabs a button, pauses, and then says, "Mary, cancel the rest of my appointments today."

When he hangs up the phone, he turns back to me and smiles warmly. "Come on...let's go take a drive and talk. I want to hear more about you."

"You do?" I ask, stunned he just canceled his appointments to spend time with me.

"Well, assuming that chin and nose you're sporting aren't coincidence and you're roughly twenty-six years of age, and given the fact you look just like your mother, outside of the chin and nose, I'm going to accept the fact you're my daughter. So yes, I'd like to learn more about you."

He then winks, and it drives away all of the nervousness and fear I'd been feeling.

I give him a tentative smile as I stand. The next chapter in my life is starting. "Okay. I can do that."

Chapter 3

Brian

I sit in Ryker and Gray's driveway, drumming my fingers on the wheel...trying to work up some courage to tell them about Lexi. And it pisses me off that this is remarkably hard to do. It shouldn't have to be hard.

On the one hand, my life changed drastically the minute Lexi walked into my office. Nothing is going to be the same again. Not for me, and not for Gray. But on the other hand, I'm filled with this amazing euphoria that I've got another daughter. I barely know her, and yet my soul recognizes her as part of me, as corny as that sounds.

We spent a few hours together, and while sometimes the conversation was awkward, most times it wasn't. I found Lexi to be bright, free-spirited, and funny. While she's independent to a certain extent, you can tell she clearly craves deep connections with people. No doubt she's been incredibly lonely since her mother died, and it's clear that she's hoping to develop a bond with her newfound family. I don't think she considers me a replacement, but I do think she might see me as a potential comfort to her existence.

The one thing that I believe to the depths of my soul is that Lexi isn't looking for any financial gain. To the contrary, she seems happy with her simple and modest life.

I was able to get a brief glimpse into it when she took me to The Grind, the coffeehouse where she works. I'd actually driven past it on a few occasions and had thought about going in a time or two, but I never seemed to have the time to stop.

We went in.

We had coffee.

We talked some more.

&n

bsp; My daughter--at least I believe she's my daughter--is nothing like me. And I mean that in a good way. She's down-to-earth; the type of person who could strike up a conversation with just about anyone. I tend to be a bit more reserved, and that's probably just due to the fact that I've always been a businessman first, and just a man second. But I watched Lexi talk to the customers--some of them she knew, others she didn't--at the curved bar that serves all kinds of coffees and teas, and she was genuinely engaged with all of them. More important, they were engaged with her. Drawn to her, actually.

Lexi is hilarious and witty. She can crack out a joke or whip out a pun during the middle of a deep conversation. Yet when she listens to you, she really listens. I'm not sure I've ever told a joke in my life, and while she had me laughing quite a bit, I kept thinking that I don't remember laughing like this before. It made me realize just how staid my life has become, all work and no play.

Finally, she's a free spirit. She goes where her mood takes her. While she was incredibly close to her mother, I learned that she was sort of a vagabond-like traveler, having lived in several places across the country. In addition to her hometown of Hartford, Connecticut, which is where I knew her mother, she's lived in Portland, Tucson, Little Rock, Nashville, and Pittsburgh. She's always worked in service-oriented fields like the coffee shop or as a bartender. Once she worked as a short-order cook at a diner in Nashville, but she said she was a horrible cook and then laughed about the fact she may have inadvertently given some of the customers food poisoning.

Bottom line: I was entranced by my daughter.

Before I brought her back to her car at the arena, she reached into her purse and pulled out a small box that contained the paternity test. Inside were two plastic tubes with flip caps that held cotton swabs. Hers already held her DNA, and all I had to do was rub the inside of my cheek on the other, mail it, and we'd have verification. I plan on doing that tomorrow and paying for express shipping, although it will be a few weeks before the results will be ready.

I expect they will tell me what I'd already figured out based on the timing of events with her mother and her classic Brannon chin and nose.

Lexi is my daughter.

Now I just have to break this news to my other daughter, and I don't quite recall ever being this nervous before. Gray and I are close. As close as a father and daughter can be. It's just been her and me for most of her life, and she's not just a chip off the old block.