am I going to do with a kid? How am I supposed to be a father to him? What does this do to all that freedom I just acquired?”
Slowly, Max grinned, then slid a look at his little boy. “You know what I love about the guy, Peyt? You don’t have to say a thing. He’ll just spill his guts all over the sidewalk and I don’t even have to ask.”
Dan held in his curse in deference to innocent ears.
“Let’s go inside,” he said instead, heading toward the door, Max chuckling behind him.
In the cool marble foyer, he dumped the bags and stabbed his fingers through his hair, turning to Max.
“I had no idea,” he said. “If I’d known she was pregnant . . .” He’d what? Sent money? Called on Christmas? Tried to talk her out of keeping the child at all? “Anyway, I didn’t, and now I have to deal with this. So I’d appreciate a little less humor and a little more sympathy.”
Max looked at Peyton. “See? Guts. Everywhere.” He set him down carefully, giving him a hand until he was completely steady on his two-year-old feet. Then Peyton shot off like a rocket.
Max led them deeper into the house, past a towering curved staircase and formal living area and into the much less ostentatious family room. Toys and trucks and a playpen vied for floor space, and Dan had to scoop up a few stuffed animals to drop onto the leather sofa.
“I’d ask if you’re sure, but he’s a clone,” Max said.
Dan spread his hands along the back of the sofa, exhaling. “I don’t know when and how or even if Maggie’s going to tell him.”
“Then I better keep our old high school yearbook under lock and key. Because one look at Danny Gallagher, class of ‘85, and he’s going to see which way the DNA twirls.”
“Yeah, I got your drift on that.”
“Don’t let him find out the wrong way,” Max said quietly. “It’s going to be hard enough as it is.”
Cori’s laughter preceded the group into the room through an arched opening from the patio. Quinn led the way, letting himself be pulled by Peyton.
“He’s strong for a little thing,” he said, pretending he was about to fall.
Peyton looked up and beamed a two-toothed grin. “Kin.” He pointed at the boy and stomped his feet with excitement. “Kin.”
“He likes you,” Dan said. “I can never get him to say my name. C’mere, Peyton. Give Uncle Dan a hug.” Dan reached his arms out and Peyton toddled over, drool sliding down his chin.
He threw himself into Dan’s arms, then climbed up on his lap.
“What d’you say, monster?”
Peyton slapped a damp palm on Dan’s face and gave him a loopy smile. “Kin.”
Son of a bitch, could everyone see the resemblance?
On his belt, his cell phone rang with the first few notes of “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.” He saw Cori and Max share a look as he set Peyton on the floor and stood up.
“Can I take this in your office?” he asked.
“Of course,” Max said, lifting a knowing brow. “You need privacy.”
“No, I need to put this on speaker.” He cocked his head toward Maggie, waving her toward him. “C’mon. You should hear everything firsthand.”
Cori swooped in to gather the baby in her arms. “We’ll finish the tour with Quinn, then.”
In the plush jungle-themed office, Dan put his cell phone on the coffee table and did the audio introductions as Maggie settled onto the zebra-striped sofa across from him.
Lucy, being Lucy, asked no questions about Maggie. But then Lucy, being Lucy, probably had a full top-secret FBI file in front of her, had memorized every detail about their former relationship, and had deduced the rest between the lines.
Dan pictured the woman he’d called boss for the past seven or eight years, seated at her massive antique table, no doubt dressed in a cream or white silk designer suit, six-hundred-dollar shoes hanging from her perfectly manicured toes as she crossed her mile-long legs, her black hair loose and long.
The image usually pulled at something basic in his gut, but today he felt nothing but the urge to look at Maggie, her jean-clad legs tucked under her, flip-flops on the floor, a thin T-shirt clinging to her narrow frame. She nibbled on her thumbnail, listening, then looked up and caught his gaze.
She couldn’t be more different from Lucy if she tried.
She held his eye contact, her expression dragging at something even more basic and raw in his