Page 105 of No Greater Love
Ms. Hayes smiled slightly. "Mr. McKenzie was very persuasive about the urgency of the situation. And very generous about my fee."
Sophia shrugged. “Besides, he told me he ‘owed you’, Nate. Apparently, you gave him good advice once?”
I stared between them, trying to process that people I barely knew had moved heaven and earth to save my family. "I don't know how to thank you. Any of you."
"You don't need to," Sophia said. "We protect our own."
Ms. Hayes gathered her papers efficiently. "Mr. Crawford, the sealed proceedings mean this can never come up again legally. Ms. Davis has no recourse. But I'd strongly recommend beingverycareful about your social media presence and sharing any public information about your daughter going forward."
After she left, it was just the three of us- me, Tasha, and Sophia- in the emptying courtroom. The weight of what had almost happened was starting to hit me… how close I'd come to losing everything.
"Nate," Tasha said softly, and something in her voice made me look at her more carefully. She looked nervous, excited, scared, all at once. "There's something I need to tell you."
"What is it?"
She took a deep breath, her hands fidgeting with the hem of her jacket. "I'm pregnant."
The words hung in the air for a moment while my brain tried to process them. Pregnant. Tasha was pregnant.
We were going to have a baby.
"You're..." I stared at her, then at her still-flat stomach, then back at her face, then did it all over twice again. "Really?"
"Really." She bit her lip. "I found out a few days ago, but with everything happening, I didn't know how to tell you. I was terrified we might lose Paige and then have to tell her she was getting a sibling she might never see?—"
I didn't let her finish. The joy that exploded in my chest was so intense I thought I might burst from it. I swept her up in my arms, spinning her around right there in the courthouse, both of us laughing and crying at the same time.
"We're having a baby!" I yelled, setting her down but keeping my hands on her face. "We're having a baby, and Paige is safe, and we're a family!"
"We're a family," she agreed, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Sophia cleared her throat delicately. "Should I assume this means you two have some news to share with Paige when we get home?"
"Home," I repeated, and the word had never sounded so perfect. "Yeah. Let's go home."
As we walked out of that courthouse together, I thought about how much had changed in a single morning. I'd walked in as a desperate single father about to lose everything. I was walking out as a man with a family—a real family, chosen and fought for and precious beyond measure.
Sarah could have her startup. I had my daughter, my partner, my child on the way.
And nothing would ever take them from me again.
thirty-nine
tasha
The house feltdifferent when we walked through the front door—lighter somehow, as if the weight of Sarah's threat had been physically lifted from the walls. Nate set his keys down with the same careful precision he brought to everything, but his hands were shaking slightly.
"I can't believe it's over," he said, leaning against the kitchen counter like he needed the support. "I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop."
"It's over," I said firmly, moving to stand in front of him. "Sarah's gone. The legal papers are sealed. She can't touch us."
He nodded, but I could see the shell shock in his eyes. The morning had been a whirlwind of terror and triumph, and now, in the quiet of our home, the reality was finally sinking in.
"A Navy Cross," I said softly, reaching up to touch his face. "You never told me."
His cheeks flushed, and he looked away. "It wasn't important."
"Not important?" I laughed, but there was no humor in it. "Nate, you're a genuine war hero. You saved lives under enemy fire. You?—"
