Georgia, next to Austin, was adjusting her silverware. Belle dropped her napkin and bent to pick it up. Savannah was practically bruising his leg.
Avoiding the disappointment he knew he’d see in his mother’s eyes, Nolan addressed the man he’d looked up to and adored his entire life. That moment included.
“Wait just a minute,” Sarah said, her hand on Miles’s arm when he took a breath, obviously preparing to fire at Nolan again. She looked down the table at him, her eyes wide. “Am I to understand that you fathered a child?” Her voice rose higher with each word.
Five of his six siblings stared at him. Nothing like putting a guy on the spot. On second thought, he realized, he probably should have opted for his first plan—the after-dinner talk alone with his father.
Except...they were a family. His family.
“Yes, Mom, I did,” he said, reaching for his phone. There was no way anyone could resist pictures of that sweet little girl in her Christmas garb sitting on Santa’s lap.
“You don’t know that,” Austin butted in. “You have no proof the child is yours.”
That made him angry. Bone-deep, punch-his-brother-in-the-face pissed. The other five Fortune heirs had swung their gazes back to him, all wisely silent.
“I know she’s mine,” he said, letting the phone go. Ignoring his siblings for the moment, he looked between his mother and his father. “To be honest with you, even if Stella wasn’t mine—and I know for certain she is—I’d still love her every bit as much. Just as I am helplessly in love with Lizzie, her mother.”
Oh, God, that felt so good. Weights flew off his chest, up to the ether, where he hoped they’d get lost from him forever. Never did he want to live as he had for the past year, carrying around so much...wrong.
No one said a word. Miraculously no one even seemed to move.
“I have a grandchild?” Sarah suddenly blurted. “I’m a grandma?”
With a glance in her direction, Miles turned his attention to Nolan. “Are you telling me that you want to keep this woman and child in your life?” he asked.
“Yes,” Nolan said. “As a matter of fact, I’ve already promised her that I will do so.”
“You’re bringing them here to New Orleans?” Sarah asked. And then she looked toward the door. “Are they here now?”
He knew that if his mother gave Lizzie a chance, she’d love her. If she ever got that chance.
“You’ve asked her to marry you?” Miles was more to the point.
Nolan shook his head. “She doesn’t want to be with me,” he told everyone. “She’s not wealthy and doesn’t want to be. I’m buying a house in Austin and will be flying back and forth to see them whenever I can.”
“You can’t do that,” Sarah said. His brothers Draper and Beau agreed. In fact, they were all talking to him at the same time.
“Hold on!” Miles quieted everyone. Instantly.
His father looked at him and said, “You are a Fortune, son. I didn’t raise you to be a quitter, did I?”
“Excuse me?” He shook his head as he leaned forward, meeting the man eye to eye. “I can’t force a woman to
marry me,” he said. “Nor would I even want to. She wouldn’t be happy. I wouldn’t be happy. And that would guarantee that Stella wouldn’t be happy.”
“Stella. How old is she?” Sarah asked.
Grabbing his phone, Nolan scrolled to one of the two photos Lizzie had taken of him holding his daughter for the first time and passed it down to his mother. He’d have liked to stand over her shoulder and gush with her, or watch her reaction even, but he had his father to deal with.
“This isn’t one of your business deals, Dad. We’re talking about a woman here. And an innocent child. Lizzie’s life changed when her parents befriended a wealthy couple. Their priorities changed and she was left alone a lot. She’s really intent on living a modest lifestyle, and believes happiness comes from being able to do what you need to do, not what you’re expected to do. Beyond that, I screwed up. When I left her last year, I didn’t tell her who I really was. I was thinking about Molly and how wrong that went and... I just wanted it to end as a great memory. Instead, I left her to give birth to my child all alone.”
“All the more reason for you to fight like hell for what’s yours,” Miles said, intimidating in spite of the decorated Christmas tie. “We’re talking about family here, Nolan, and I will not have history repeat itself. I can’t allow it. Not in my home. Not in my family.”
It was Nolan’s turn to stare, openmouthed. What on earth...?
Miles seemed to change right before his eyes. To deflate. And then, with a long look at Sarah, who nodded, he straightened his shoulders.
“Perhaps it’s time,” he said.