“Damn,” he whispers.
“She left her here.”
I reach for my phone again and call the number listed on the letter. It rings twice before connecting.
“Macy?” I ask, voice tight.
A beat.
Then her voice comes through, fast and panicked. “I’m sorry. I had to. I don’t have a job that lets me have a baby. I’m about to fly to Milan. Please don’t call the cops.”
“You left a baby at our front door. What the hell were you thinking?”
“I thought one of you would take care of her. You make enough money. She deserves more than I can give. Please. I’m sorry.”
“You don’t just leave a kid—” I try to reason with her.
“I have no other option,” she says.
“Macy!” I growl, putting the call on speaker.
Hunter curses. “We need to know—are you sure one of us is the father?”
“It was one of you,” she says, voice shaking. “I haven’t slept with anyone else since you guys, I swear. I didn’t even know I was pregnant until months later. And by then, I didn’t want to—look, please don’t call the police. They’ll say I abandoned her. Please.”
Hunter’s jaw flexes. “You can’t just dump her and walk away.”
“I left everything. Her papers. Her things. She has a routine. I love her, okay? But I can’t do it. Not with this contract. I’m sorry.”
“You need to come back here right now,” I tell her.
“I have to go,” she says, and the line goes dead.
I stare at the screen.
Hunter stands up, still holding Chloe’s birth certificate. “She really just did that,” he says.
“We need to get her checked out. Pediatrician, hospital, something.”
“Yeah,” he agrees, voice low. “But first, we need to figure out if one of us is her dad.”
I glance down at the baby. She’s blinking slowly now, her tiny hand wrapped around a corner of her blanket.
Her name is Chloe. And she might be mine.
Or his.
Either way, she’s ours now.
I step back inside and start moving, mind racing, heart still somewhere between shock and disbelief. The groceries are still on the counter, the curry bubbling gently on the stove.
But everything else?
Everything else has changed.
“We need to pick her up,” Hunter tells me.
Chloe gurgles in her seat. Kicks one socked foot and starts to fuss.
