Page 32 of The Payback

“Which word? Fucked? Oh, she already heard Max use it. And she’s kind of been saying it on repeat for the last three days.” I groan and drop my face into my hands.

I peek through my fingers at the propped-up phone. “But Bella’s okay?” I ask.

I see Olivia’s ceiling as she walks across her house, searching for my girl after hollering for Roark, who seems to be on kid duty this evening. “Yes, yes, she’s fine. She’s eating her food, biting Zach, and her walk is steadier.”

The phone jumbles, and a blur of colour washes over the screen until I’m looking at my sweet angel’s little face.

“Hi, baby,” I coo.

“Mama! Mama! Mama!” she shouts, her little face twisting into a gummy smile, her cheeks poofing and brightening my entire world. “Fuck!”

I smother my laugh, hiding the reaction she wants and keeping myself from encouraging her more than the five adults on the island are likely doing.

“Oh, baby, I miss you so much,” I say, fighting to keep the tears of longing from my eyes. She doesn’t need to see me cry or think anything is wrong. I just beam at her, studying every inch of her sweet face, rosy cheeks, and the wisps of dark hair coming free from her little space buns on top of her head.

I miss her smell, her snuggles, and her hugs. I miss having her in my arms, smashing my face between her pudgy little palms and planting open-mouthed kisses all over my face because she doesn’t know how to make a proper kissy face yet.

She’s babbling nonsense, as all one-year-olds do, but suddenly, she says, “Mama! Zebra!”

My brow wrinkles in confusion.

“Olivia?” I say a little more loudly. “Please tell me you didn’t...?”

Roark’s bearded face fills the phone. “That was actually all me,” he admits.

“I don’t even know what to say to that, Roark. You’re the reasonable one. Can you just buy zebras? And also, and perhaps more importantly,why?”

His cheeks go pink under his scruff—so bright I see it through the phone.

“We were reading a story, and there was a zebra in it, and she seemed to like it. She didn’t really take to me during our early days, so I did what any responsible uncle would do and abused Olivia’s money to buy her love,” Roark explains.

“My girl will be so spoilt when I pick her up. You know that’s not coming to Lyon with us, right?” I shake my head and breathe a deep sigh.

“We know. We have the zebra set up in a stable right next to John Henry,” Olivia says. It takes a moment, but I remember John Henry is Max’s prized horse, which they also transported to the island when they moved in. “He needed a new friend, anyway.”

Bella is in the background shrieking about “mama” and “zebra” and “fuck,” and I know they’re just going to have a grand old time putting her down for bed tonight, which should be right around now. As if on cue, Olivia takes the phone back.

“She’s already been fed and bathed, she’s in her pyjamas, and it’s Roark’s night to put her to bed.”

“God, it’s great you can split up the time like that,” I admit, thinking about how nice it would have been to have a partner during those late nights, the nonsleeping nights, the sick nights, the fun nights, and just a night when you needed some time off, even just to sit in the closet and rock back and forth for fifteen minutes before dusting your hands off and taking care of business.

“You’ll have that one day,” Olivia says. “You just have to find the right person for you. Speaking of, will youeverlet me hunt down Bella’s father?”

The only thing Olivia knows about my time with Bella’s father is that he was there the night she was conceived, and I had no way of contacting him again. I didn’t even tell her it was my former partner. After the third time she asked, I begged her to respect my choice, and she mostly let it go.

Technically, I didn’t lie. I just... omitted a lot of information.

Nik had disappeared off the face of the earth by the time I realised I was pregnant, and when I got word of where he was and who he worked for, the last thing I wanted was for him to know about Bella.

But lying to Olivia always weighs on me. I can’t tell her everything about my work, and she can’t tell me everything about hers—plausible deniability and all that—and we have those boundaries in place for respect, not withholding. The last thing we want is to be used against each other, so the less we know, the better.

But this? This was something I could have told her from the start. I could have told her that Bella’s father was my partner. I could have told her that this mission involved his organisation, and while I wasn’t sure if he would be here, I have plans to bring him in, and we’re now living under the same goddamn roof.

“Not now. Maybe someday,” I answer when I realise I’ve been staring off into the distance.

Olivia shrugs. “Knowing you and your excellent judge of character—” she motions to herself as proof of said judgement “—if he could have been there for your daughter, I’m sure he would have been.”

The emotion of it all overwhelms me again.

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