“Yeah,” I confirmed. “I’m about to get in the elevator now.”
“I also asked Dare’s lawyer to give you a call. He said he had some important news to share but needed to call me back. I’m literally about to walk into a meeting with Luke and the rest of the SWAT team, so I can’t talk to him when he calls back,” he apologized.
“It’s fine. I’m not doing anything today,” I said. “But I’m getting into the elevator, the call’s gonna drop any second.”
He laughed and said goodbye, disconnecting just before my phone went dead.
I rolled my eyes.
The hospital was like a dead zone. The moment that I entered the building it started acting sketchy.
The moment you rose up above the second floor, things got really crappy.
Which was why, as I was stepping off the elevator, I was kind of surprised to find my phone ringing.
“Hello?” I answered, not recognizing the phone number.
“This is Darren’s lawyer, Prater?” Mr. Prater, who was former military, said with an authoritative voice. “I’m calling for Regina Cox?”
“This is she,” I said. “How are you today, Mr. Prater?”
“I’m well, thank you for asking,” he said. “I have some news on the DNA test.”
My brows furrowed. “Really? What’s the news?”
Yesterday when the baby’s lawyer had sent this stuff to his lab. I hadn’t expected to hear back from them so fast. But when the judge had said that it would be expedited, she wasn’t kidding around!
“The DNA provided is a match for the father. However, the DNA that you gave us for the mother is not a match. The potential mother’s DNA that you gave us isn’t related to her at all,” Mr. Prater explained, having no clue just how much he’d just rocked my world.
My mouth fell open in surprise.
“We repeated the DNA test again with a fresh sample obtained from Ms. Foster. It was confirmed. She is not the baby’s mother,” Mr. Prater continued.
“Okay.” I squeezed my eyes tightly shut. “Okay. Thank you so much.”
I immediately tried to call Nathan and got nothing.
Again, I called.
Still nothing.
Fuck! Did he turn his phone off while he was in the meeting or something?
Growling in frustration, I moved toward the washing station and took care to make sure I was super, duper clean before gowning up and heading into the NICU.
When I saw Eerie, I almost wanted to laugh.
Little did she know that her entire show was about to be interrupted.
I walked over to the nurses’ station instead of going directly to the incubator where my guy waited.
The other charge nurse, Willet, smiled at me. “How are you today, dear?”
“I’m doing quite well,” I said as I smiled. “I have some news.”
Willet raised her brow in question. “And what’s that?”
“I just got a call from Dare’s lawyer. He’s said that there is no genetic match between Eerie and the baby. The baby isn’t hers, which means that from now on, she won’t be allowed into the NICU,” I said, guessing what Nathan would say the moment he found out.
Willet’s brows went up. “Do you have that in writing? Because, I swear, that’s the worst thing I can think of right now—telling her that she’s not allowed back.”
“I’ll have it to you by the end of the day,” I promised. “I’m calling our lawyer as soon as I can. I’m sure that she already knows, and is already working on it, but I just wanted to give you a heads up.”
Willet grinned then. “If I could’ve dreamed of anything for you, it would be that. I think that’s the best possible outcome.”
I agreed.
Out of every possible scenario, this one had never crossed my mind.
The scenarios that I had considered?
-Nathan and Eerie getting joint, shared custody.
-Nathan getting full custody, and Eerie getting visitation.
-Eerie getting full custody and Nathan getting visitation.
-Me killing Eerie.
Out of all of my possible scenarios that I’d figured could be a possibility, Eerie not being the mother had never, ever occurred to me.
How did stuff like that happen?
She’d carried the baby for nine months and it still wasn’t hers?
Jesus.
We really needed to talk to that doctor.
There was something more going on there that I had no clue about, and I had a feeling that he knew a whole lot more than he was telling us—including Eerie.
“Well, I’m happy for you,” Willet admitted. “She’s kind of a… pain.”
I had no doubt.
“All right,” I said as I steeled myself. “I’m gonna go.”
She snickered. “Good luck. God be with you.”
I tossed her a look over my shoulder that clearly conveyed that I was going to need it, then straightened my shoulders before making my way toward the back of the room where little man was set up.
I felt like my feet weighed a thousand pounds as I made my way forward.
Eerie looked up from where she was sitting on the chair next to the bed playing on her phone and sneered.