Page 10 of Grumpy Ex's Secret Baby

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When the plane landed at a small airport outside Richmond Valley, I was exhausted and eager to get to the house I would rent while in town. I walked outside the airport to see Corey Maxwell standing beside a sheriff’s truck.

“Well, would you look what the wind blew in,” Corey said, walking over and slapping my back. “Long time no see. I’ve got that house ready for you.”

“Awesome,” I said as he helped load my bags into the truck. “Thanks for hooking me up with a place.”

“No problem,” he said as we got into the truck. “So, Haley’s back in town too. I heard you two were getting friendly at the diner a few weeks ago. Are you and her going to be a thing again? I’d be careful there. She’s got a daughter now.”

I’m torn between cussing him out for how he’s talking about Haley and wanting to know more about the child she never mentioned. When I thought back on our conversation, I hadn’t pried too far into her personal life, and she hadn’t offered anything else.

“Don’t talk about her like that,” I said before running my hand through my hair. “I don’t have any plans to date anybody when I’m here. I have a business I need to rebuild.”

“If you say so.”

“How old is her daughter?” I asked, pulling out my phone and sending a quick message to Crestwood Capital’s private investigator.

“Four. She goes to daycare with my son.”

“You have a son?” I asked, trying to hide my interest as I sent the information along to the private investigator. Panic was starting to rise in my chest. When Haley and I hooked up four years ago, I couldn’t remember using any protection. “That’s great!”

“It is. He’s a little shit, but he’s such a cute kid. Four is when they really learn to start talking back. There are days where I’m sure I’m the boss, and then I tell Shane to do something, and the next thing I know, I’m being told off by my mini-me.”

I laughed and shook my head as the truck turned down a dirt road just outside of town. Corey rambled about his child until he parked the truck in front of a small blue house. After he gave me the keys, he took off.

Once the truck’s taillights disappeared from sight, I hauled my bags into the house and slammed the door behind me. It felt like the walls were closing in as another message came through from the private investigator.

I looked down at my phone to see a picture of a young girl who looked just like Haley and a birthdate that was just shy of nine months after Haley and I had seen each other at the conference.

I dialed the private investigator’s number, my heart pounding in my chest.

“Hello, boss.”

“How did you get this picture and her birthday?” I asked, trying to sound like I wasn’t panicking. There was a possibility that the child wasn’t mine. Haley would have told me if I had a daughter.

Would she? Four years ago, I was an ass to her, and teenage me wasn’t much better.

“Hacked theLil’ Sunshine Daycaresystem and pulled the information from there.”

“Great. Thank you. I’ll send payment along shortly.”

The call ended as I sank to the ground and stared at the picture on my phone. Even though the little girl looked like Haley, she had hazel brown eyes. The dimple on her left cheek was the same one I got when I smiled.

If she was my daughter, Haley had a lot of explaining to do.

5

HALEY

“I’llgetthat,”Bretsaid when the doorbell rang one afternoon. He was up from the couch before I could protest, although I doubted I would have complained.

I looked up from my bowl of ice cream and shrugged. My dad and stepmom were out of town, and I couldn’t imagine anyone else who would want to come see me. If it was my stalker, I didn’t want to be the one to open the door anyway. Bret was the better option. He would see who was there and send them away if they didn’t need to be here. If it was the stalker, he’d deal with it.

It had been weeks since the last letter, though. I was hoping it was just a fluke, and the situation had resolved itself, even though I knew that wasn’t likely. I hoped that it was done, though. Most nights, I only went to bed after checking all the windows and doors twice. Even then, I had taken to sleeping in Trinity’s room with her, worrying about what might happen.

I had installed a few cheap cameras around the property, but they hadn’t noticed any movement in the past few weeks. For that, I was grateful. I didn’t want to spend my days worrying about who was lurking around on my property and what they might be leaving in my mailbox. The nights were still a different story.

And then there was work. Going into the clinic when I barely had any sleep meant I was drinking more than my share of coffee. In fact, I was sure that coffee was running through my veins.

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