Chapter 2 - The Night Roman Garza Found a Baby
I stared at him.
“No.”
Roman said nothing.
“You don’t get to say something like that and then stand there.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
Lily lifted her head.
“Mommy?”
My knees nearly gave out.
I crouched beside her.
Roman spoke carefully.
“Don’t frighten her.”
I looked up.
“Don’t tell me what to do.”
One of his men shifted.
Roman raised one hand.
The man immediately stopped.
“Ava is not to be touched.”
I stood.
“Then unlock the doors.”
“When you hear everything.”
“I want to leave.”
“And if Lily is your daughter?”
Silence.
Roman pulled out a chair.
“Sit.”
“I’m not one of your employees.”
“No. You may be the mother of my child.”
That sentence made me sit.
Roman remained standing.
“Two years ago, I was driving outside San Antonio during a storm.”
“The highway.”
“Yes.”
I remembered fragments.
A truck crossing the center line.
My steering wheel jerking.
Glass.
Darkness.
Roman continued.
“My driver saw your car leave the road. We stopped.”
“You pulled me out.”
“You were pregnant.”
“I was thirty-seven weeks.”
“You kept asking about your baby.”
My fingers curled around the tablecloth.
“What happened?”
“The ambulance arrived. I rode behind it.”
“Why?”
His expression hardened.
“Because somebody tried to force me off that road ten minutes before we found you.”
I stared at him.
“You thought my accident was connected to you?”
“I didn’t know.”
Roman sat opposite me.
“At the hospital, you went into emergency surgery.”
“I remember.”
“I needed surgery too.”
His eyes moved briefly toward his shoulder.
“When I woke up, you were gone.”
“And Lily?”
“A nurse brought a newborn into my room.”
My stomach twisted.
“She said the mother had died.”
I whispered, “No.”
“She said the baby had no family.”
“No.”
“Ava—”
“NO.”
Lily flinched.
I immediately lowered my voice.
“Sorry, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart.
The word came naturally.
Roman noticed.
I hated that he noticed.
“How did she become yours?”
“I asked questions. Nobody gave me straight answers.”
“So you stole her?”
Roman’s expression sharpened.
“I did not steal a child.”
“Then explain it.”
“My attorney located paperwork showing the mother was deceased and the father unidentified. I was told child services would take her.”
“And you just decided to adopt her?”
“No.”
He looked at Lily.
“I decided she wasn't spending her first night alone.”
That silenced me.
“What happened after that?”
“I searched for her family. The records led nowhere. Eventually, I became her legal guardian. Later, her father.”
“Her father.”
“Yes.”
I looked at Lily.
She had climbed back into her chair and was hugging the rabbit.
“Why did she stop speaking?”
Roman's face became harder.
“She spoke as an infant and began forming words normally. At around eleven months, something happened.”
“What?”
“I don’t know.”
“She just stopped?”
“Completely.”
“And you said her mother died.”
“That was what the doctors believed she had been told repeatedly by someone caring for her.”
A chill moved through me.
“Someone taught her that?”
Roman nodded.
“Possibly.”
I pushed away from the table.
“We need a DNA test.”
“Already arranged.”
I stared at him.
“You arranged it when?”
“The moment you said your name.”
“You knew my name?”
“I knew the name on the hospital records.”
My anger returned.
“So when I said Ava Reyes, you suspected?”
“Yes.”
“And instead of telling me, you locked a restaurant?”
“I needed to know who else was here.”
“What does that mean?”
Roman looked toward one of his men.
“Mateo.”
The man approached.
“Boss.”
“Get Dr. Keller here.”
“Already coming.”
“And find Dennis.”
My manager appeared from behind the bar.
He looked terrified.
Roman studied him.
“How did Ava get this job?”
Dennis swallowed.
“She applied.”
“When?”
“Nineteen days ago.”
Roman looked at me.
“Where did you work before this?”
“Why?”
“Answer.”
“A hotel restaurant.”
“Why did you leave?”
“They closed.”
“What hotel?”
“The Calder.”
Mateo immediately pulled out his phone.
Roman's eyes stayed on mine.
“Nineteen days.”
“What?”
“After two years, you happen to start working at the one restaurant where I bring Lily every Thursday.”
I felt cold.
“You think I planned this?”
“No.”
“Then what are you saying?”
Roman leaned closer.
“I’m saying somebody else might have.”
The restaurant doors opened.
A gray-haired woman carrying a medical case entered with two security men.
Roman stood.
“Dr. Keller.”
She looked at Lily.
Then at me.
Her expression changed.
“My God.”
“What?” I demanded.
Dr. Keller approached slowly.
“You're Ava Reyes?”
“Yes.”
She looked at Roman.
“You were right.”
“About what?”
Roman answered.
“The resemblance.”
Dr. Keller placed her case on the table.
“A DNA test can establish maternity.”
“How fast?”
“Preliminary results tonight.”
I held out my hand.
“Do it.”
Roman nodded.
“Me too.”
I looked at him.
“Why?”
His eyes met mine.
“Because there’s one more thing you don’t know.”
“What?”
Roman glanced at Lily.
Then he said quietly:
“The adoption paperwork says I’m not just her guardian.”
My stomach tightened.
“What does it say?”
May you like
“That I’m her biological father.”
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