Page 64 of Daddy's Unexpected Gift

I barked out a sardonic laugh. “That hasn’t been the goal for a while. I don’t want her father to be found. I want to keep her.”

“She is not some puppy who followed you home, and now the rightful owner has shown up?—”

“No, she’s not. She is Argene’s daughter.” I clenched my teeth and felt the muscle in my jaw tense and pulse. I wasn’t going to explain it to him. I tried to explain it to the next case worker who was sent my way after I refused to let Peggy Stanholt into my home—she had violated a trust. She wasn’t welcome. I told them to send someone else. They did. I had almost hoped they sent Cecelia back.

Fuck!

The only person who seemed to understand my need to protect Georgie when I failed her mother was Cecelia. She hadn’t returned a single call all week. I knew she had relocated to Amarillo for a short-term transfer. But hadn’t she taken the phone I bought with her?

I took the phone from Wayne. I stared at it. What should I do next? Who should I call first? I wasn’t used to being in a position of uncertainty. I made executive decisions that made people, especially myself, lots of money. Georgie wasn’t a fluctuating market or an old tech process that needed to be disrupted.

I hit the number for the guy I had looking for Georgie’s father.

He answered on the first ring.

“That’s bullshit,” he said when I reported that the other group claimed to have located him. “If this guy exists, I would have found him by now. I’ve combed through your sister’s contacts. I've chased down everyone in every picture she posted to her social media in a four-month window around what would have been time of conception. Half of those people she called friends don’t even remember her. And the ones who did had no idea she had gotten pregnant. I can tell you she was bouncing between Miami and the islands. Your sister partied. I’m good, but not even I can track down every single person who was at the same parties she went to during that time.”

Why the hell had Argene made that request? Why not just grant me custody? Why play this game that there was a father out there who might want his child?

“Tell you what I’m gonna do. I’ll put a trace request on the kid’s genetic records. That way, I’ll get a ping if anyone with any kind of close match comes up.”

“What if they aren’t using the same database?” I grumbled.

The PI barked out a laugh. “It’s all the same database. If they get a match, I’ll know about it. In the meantime, make sure they aren’t trying to play you somehow.”

“Play me?”

“Yeah, you know, like tell you they got the dad and have you sign over custody papers. The kid then gets adopted out for big bucks. Especially one as cute as what you got.”

A chill like ice cubes ran down my spine. “Keep me posted.”

I ended the call and immediately called my lawyer. It took several minutes of being put on hold and being transferred, and on hold again, before I got to my lawyer, Paul Chavez.

“Can you get a subpoena or a warrant or whatever so that the agency has to disclose who their investigators are and what they have found?”

“You want me to go in front of a judge to request their records be disclosed?”

“Yes, that’s exactly what I want,” I said.

“It’s not going to be cheap,” Chavez said.

“I can afford it. Look, they said they might have a lead on Georgie’s father. They won’t share their findings with my guy, and when I checked in with him, he told me it sounds fishy.” As I proceeded to share with Chavez what the PI said, I sounded paranoid. But this was Georgie I was talking about. I wasn’t going to stop being suspicious until I was awarded full custody.

“Normally, I would say he’s making shit up, but there have been similar cases in the past. Kids get ‘lost’ in the system, only to find out someone in DCS pocketed a lot of adoption fees. And you mentioned last week, they were snooping through your laundry and belongings. Do you trust your nanny? She’s not going to hand over the kid if these people show up saying they have her father some time when you aren’t around?”

I didn't like the sound of that. “Yeah, I think so. She’s not one of theirs.”

“Huh?”

“They tried to get me to hire from a nanny place they recommended. I didn’t like their recommendations. I found my own,” I admitted.

“I would sit down with your nanny and lay it out. Tell her your concerns and that under no circumstances is she to hand that baby over to anyone not yourself, even if the kid's father miraculously turns up on your doorstep crying about how he’s been looking for her for months.”

None of this would be a concern if they had just let Cecelia stay as my case worker. There was no way she would have ever been involved in a plot to take Georgie away from me.

The baby monitor sounded with Georgie’s babbles as she woke up from a nap. She wasn’t crying or distressed, so I let her be while I finished my call with Chavez.

I didn’t feel relaxed or confident after either call. I punched Cecelia’s number. It went straight to voicemail. “You’ve got your reasons. I’m trying to understand. Something concerning has come up with your employers and Georgie. I think they got you out of the way. Give me your address. I want to come see you.”

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