Page 94 of Inheriting Miss Fortune

My daughter was the most important human in my life, and I could not, would not, lose her.

“Tully?” I croaked, trying to blink away the shadows at the edges of my vision.

He murmured something to Susanna before squatting in front of my chair and grabbing my hand. “Yeah, baby?”

“Tell her we’ll go down there and take the test again. It has to be a mistake. I’m not giving Lellie up, so we have to… we have to…” I suddenly realized I couldn’t risk it. Returning to Texas meant putting custody of my daughter in jeopardy. Without proof I was Lellie’s biological father, Katie’s wish to leave her with me was barely worth the paper it was printed on. Not up against a man as powerful as Franklin Scott and the lawyers he had behind him.

I glanced past Tully to my friends, the brotherhood. Silas and Bash both shook their heads frantically behind Tully’s back. I glanced over to Kenji, who was frantically tapping on his phone. He looked up when I went silent and also shook his head at me with a meaningful glance at Lellie.

They were right. I couldn’t take her back to Texas. At least without serious thought and legal consultation. But I also couldn’t ask Tully to be a party to anything that might be illegal or that could get him fired from his job at the firm.

I cleared my throat. Suddenly, my path was clear. “Tully. I need you to go back to Texas and see what you can find out about our options.”

This was a lie. I didn’t need him to figure out my legal situation—I had Susanna and a huge team of attorneys back in New York for that. What I needed was for him to leave so I could speak freely and make a plan to protect and keep my daughter without creating a conflict of interest that might jeopardize the job he loved.

Tully’s eyes, so full of kindness and affection and trust, met mine. “Of course. I’ll figure this out, Dev. You know I will.”

He reached up and stroked my cheek with his hand before leaning forward to press a kiss to the corner of my lips. Then he stood up, all business, and began to arrange a meeting with Susanna for the following morning in Dallas.

I glanced over at Kenji, who nodded and began arranging for the plane to be ready.

And then I got up and crossed the room to take Lellie out of Jo’s arms. I held her to my chest and pressed my lips to her wispy curls. “I love you, sweet girl,” I murmured. “Daddy’s got this.”

Becoming a parent was a steep and unforgiving learning curve. I finally understood that lying played a critical role in protecting your children.

I did not, in fact,got this.

But I would figure it out.

No matter what.

TWENTY-FIVE

TULLY

There was something I hadn’t told Dev, something that made this situation a thousand times worse.

When the Scotts’ attorney had insisted on using their lab to run the paternity test, Susanna and I had arranged for a second set of samples to be sent to a separate lab for processing.

And those hadalsocome back showing Lellie was not biologically related to Dev.

I didn’t know how it was possible, but I also knew that two different labs wouldn’t have made the same mistake.

When I boarded the jet to return home Sunday, after a blur of desperate hugs and promises to fix everything that felt hollow as hell, all I could think about was how I was going to tell Dev that he wasn’t actually Lellie’s father if it turned out it was true.

It shouldn’t matter whether Dev was Lellie’s biological father since Katie had named Dev in her will… but it did. A biological parent had a prima facie status that a non-biological parent didn’t. It meant he would be the legal default parent, to a certain extent, which would make it more difficult to challenge his right to custody. Without that, it would be much easier for the Scotts to challenge him and win, especially when I happened to know the judge assigned to the case was likely to be favorable to atrusted, long-term Texas resident and well-known Dallas pastor over an unknown single gay man from rural Wyoming.

The Scotts’ attorney would dig up every sordid detail of Dev’s sexual past, any break in his employment history despite his wealth, and his provable lack of interest in Katie or Lellie for the past two years.

It wouldn’t look good.

My palms began to sweat as I tried not to think about the moment a judge would proclaim the sudden end of Dev’s short fatherhood. I felt sick, but succumbing to my fear wouldn’t help the man I loved.

So I pulled out my laptop and began to strategize. I’d gotten where I was in my career because I had a sharp legal mind.

And I planned to use every bit of it to save Lellie from being taken away from her father.

The following morning, I decided to stop by Katie’s house to do one last walkthrough before letting the real estate agent take over. Renata and her parents had done a good job cleaning it and staging it to sell, and seeing it so devoid of Katie’s personal touches was heartbreaking.

---