Daddy’s Accidental Little Heartbreak by Penny Snoak
CHAPTER TWO
Nathan
“Are you sure you want to do this?” Sarah asked as I examined the documents in my hand. “We’ve lived in that house for three years now. “We built a life there and everything. Are you really going to throw it all away over a misunderstanding?” Unable to believe my ears, I looked up and stared into her dark, brown eyes.
Why was she acting like I was the unreasonable one? She was the one who had cheated on me with one of her co-workers a year ago. Thanks to her fling, she ended up pregnant with the man’s baby and tried to convince me it was mine until the baby was three months old, which is when I finally got the doctors to do a paternity test. Now that the baby was confirmed to belong to her co-worker, I had nothing holding me back from leaving her, and I immediately put the house up for sale. Ever since I put the house up, she had been by every day, trying to convince me not to sell the house. The co-worker had disappeared out of town, and she had no one else to turn to, but I made up my mind. There was no way I was going to stay with a cheating Little and care for someone else’s baby. It just wasn’t fair to anyone.
“I’ve made up my mind,” I stated as I reviewed the cash offer the real estate agent had brought me.
The house, which my parents had given me almost twenty years ago for graduating from Harvard, was deemed to be worth approximately four hundred thousand dollars, and the buyer was offering me three hundred eighty-five thousand dollars. I believed it was the best offer by far, and I really wanted to leave town as soon as possible. The money from the offer would be able to pay for me to move to Chicago, where my cousin, Derek, owned a law firm. He had offered me employment as the consulting agent at the real estate company his Little owned, and the job was easy enough. I would be reviewing the offer with the buyer,seller, and real estate agent, and offer any legal advice they requested. It seemed like a step down from the DA’s office in Houston, but I was looking for a true change in scenery. As I tapped the pen against the desk, I nodded.
“It looks like everything is in order,” I stated as I looked up at Ralph, the real estate agent that was helping me sell the house. “I’m ready to accept the deal.” Sarah whimpered as she hoisted the baby on her hip.
“Please, you have to leave us the house,” she whined, her big brown eyes pleading as she begged me. “Where will the bab and I go? Where will we stay?” As heartless as it sounded, I truly didn’t care.
“Unless you’re buying the house from me, you’ll need to go back wherever you came from,” I informed her as I signed the documents. “I don’t know where you have been staying ever since we broke up, but I don’t see why you can’t stay there.” As soon as I was done signing the documents, I handed the papers over to Ralp, and he reviewed the documents once again, making sure he had all the signatures needed to proceed with the sale. Seeing that everything was set, he rose to his feet and offered me his hands.
“Congratulations, Mr. Chase,” he said as he shook my hand. "I'll alert the buyer, and I'll call you after everything is taken care of." I thanked Ralph and followed him out of his office. Sarah trailed behind me, carrying the baby in one arm while struggling to help the diaper bag and her purse in the other.
"Wait for me," she protested breathlessly. I noticed the various harsh looks I got from the associates while on my way out the door, and I already knew that they thought I was a cruel man who made his wife or girlfriend do everything while he watched her fail. "Nathan, please!" I stopped and turned to look at her.
"Why should I wait for you?" I asked calmly, refusing to let any emotion show. The last thing I needed was accusations of abuse when I was so close to getting out of here. "We are not together, nor have you been any of my concern for a year now. If I have to, I can always go back to the judge and press charges for harassment." Her mouth hung open like that of a fish as she stared blankly at me.
"You wouldn't," she stammered. "You wouldn't do that to your child." I looked over at the baby, a polite baby boy with gorgeous blonde hair and blue eyes.
"That is not my child," I reminded her coldly, the bitter sting of the year old betrayal fresh in my mind. "I have the paternity test to prove it, and the baby daddy already admitted it was his. Considering the fact that I never adopted the child nor intend to, that baby is none of my business." Her eyes searched mine, looking for any form of weakness she could use against me as I stood my ground. After a few minutes, her shoulders sagged in defeat, and she lowered her gaze.
"Please, don't leave us," she pleaded one final time. "We need you… I need you." Not wanting to be around much longer thanks to the scene she created, I shook my head.
"Goodbye, Sarah," I responded coldly. "I hope you have a great life." With that, I turned around and walked right out the door, leaving the stunned Sarah to deal with her fussy child.
As soon as I reached the driver side door of my silver Lexus, I took a deep breath of the fresh city air and looked up at the clouds. Selling the house had lifted a terrible weight off my chest, and I actually felt like a new man on a journey of self discovery. As the sun hovered high in the sky, I opened up the door to the car and drove off into the city.
