When I storm through the heavy steel door of Hartley Construction the next morning, the receptionist leaps to her feet. “C-can I help you, sir?”

“No, you cannot fucking help me.”

I march down the hallway toward Charlie’s office and she takes off behind me. Hearing the commotion, my friend looks up from the papers spread about on his desk.

“Archie!” He leans forward in his ratty, little swiveling chair.

I glance into the corner and see Leo sitting on the tattered sofa with his boot-covered feet propped up on a wooden chair. He flips through a magazine. “Hey man! What’s up?”

What’s up?

“You. Fucking. Assholes!” I roar as I slam the door shut in the receptionist’s face. “You didn’t tell me she has a kid!”

I hear the woman’s frantic voice from behind the door. “Charlie, should I be calling the cops? Cough twice if you want me to call the cops!”

He rolls his chair back and glares at the side of my head as he trudges by me. He sticks his head out the door. “No, Sharon. I can take this knucklehead and he knows it.”

From over in the corner, Leo snorts a laugh. “You wish.” Then he shouts in the direction of the door. “Don’t worry, Sharon. I got this situation under control.”

I roll my eyes. With the degree of rage I’m feeling now, I’m about to Hulk-out on these assholes.

Charlie walks back around his desk and sinks into his chair. “So, what’s your problem, fucker?” He smirks and I want to punch him in the throat.

“Sophia has a child and neither of you bothered to tell me.” A bitter vitriol boils in my blood.

Charlie shrugs a shoulder. “We told you to get to know her, on your own. We didn’t want you jumping to any conclusions about her just because she’s a single mom.”

Leo pipes in. “Yeah—the fact that she has a kid doesn’t take away from the fact that she’s a great girl. Hell, if Reese had refused to take a chance on me just because I was a father, I would have missed out on the great love of my fucking life.” He turns to Charlie and points a finger in my direction. “Oh, by the way, when he found out I was messing around with your sister, he totally egged me on.” He cackles to himself.

I watch Charlie’s face collapse into a scowl as he pounds a fist into his table. “You fucking sons of bitches. Ever heard of the damn bro code?!”

Okay, now we’re getting off the point. “Don’t tell me you bastards knew that River is my child. Don’t tell me you kept that from me.”

Leo’s head snaps over at me. His magazine falls from his hands. “What did you just say?”

Charlie shoves all his papers to the side of his desk. His eyes bore holes into my forehead. “What the hell are you talking about, Jones?”

I pinch the bridge of my nose and suck in a breath. “River is my daughter, man.”

My friends share a skeptical look. “You’re losing it,” Leo mumbles as he scratches the side of his head. “You’re losing your fucking mind.”

The fact that my friends are in the dark about this actually makes me feel better. “Look—there's more going on between me and Sophia than you assholes realize, okay?"

Charlie's bushy brow inches up his forehead. "Meaning?"

"Meaning, we met each other before I showed up here in Copper Heights." I shove my fingers into my hair and pull on my roots.

My friends snap to look at each other before their gazes snap back to me.

Charlie leans forward on his elbows. “You’re making zero sense, bro.”

"I met her in Vegas,” I explain. “Right before I deployed."

"When you came down to Vegas to meet up with me?" Charlie asks.

"Yes, when I came down to meet you, meathead."

Leo's eyes are wide with shock. "How the fuck did that happen?"

“I had a shitload of time to kill before I was supposed to be back at the base so I called Charlie. Sort of to say goodbye. At the time, I was cruising around southern California and when he told me he was at a bachelor party in Vegas, it didn’t take much convincing to get me to go down there.” I say it like it’s self-explanatory. “We were supposed to meet at some bar. Just to grab a few beers before I had to head over to the base. But when I walked in, he was off in the corner, arguing with a woman.”

“That was Nova,” Charlie says. “Before she and I got together. She had some crazy theory that it was my fault Josh didn’t show up to the wedding. Because I didn’t keep him on a leash at the bachelor party the night before.”

I shrug a shoulder and continue. “All I know is that it wasn’t pretty. And I didn’t want to get involved. So, I went over to the bar to get a drink. But as I was walking up, I saw this girl there. She was wearing a wedding dress and she was crying. So, I sat down.”

Leo shakes his head and mutters under his breath. “Fucking christ, Archie.”

I glare at his face. “She needed somebody to talk to. It’s like she was invisible. Everybody around her was just pretending she wasn’t there.”

“And it had to be you,” Charlie spits out on a laugh. “You had to come to the rescue, Sergeant Good Times.”

“It wasn’t just sex.” I snarl in my friend’s direction. “Some fucking magic happened that night.”

The words sound crazy as I say them. My friends know that I’ve never passed up an opportunity to start some trouble. It’s a reputation I’ve never shied away from.

But a girl in a wedding dress crosses the line. Even for me. I didn’t approach Sophia just to have a good time. From the minute I saw her, I knew there was something more beneath the surface, something I felt compelled to explore.

She was hurt. I was scared. We needed each other.

Leo straightens in his seat. “Wait—so the girl you wrote all those postcards about, the girl you wouldn’t stop talking about while you were overseas? That was Sophia?”

I nod my head slowly. I know how insane this sounds.

He scrubs a hand down his face. "Well, that's some romantic shit if I ever heard it."

“Fuck, I never read the postcards,” Charlie mumbles to himself and I shoot him a deadly glare.

“This is wild.” Leo scratches his chin.

Charlie brings the conversation full-circle. “So basically, she got pregnant that night. And she had River. And you’re the father.”

I shove Leo’s feet off of the wooden chair and drop down in it. “I’m the father.” The words sound surreal to me.

Charlie leans forward, his elbows on the table. “So, tell me—what do you want to do? And you’d better not say you plan on leaving her alone with that baby because I swear I will kick your ass all over this office.”

“First off, you can’t even beat me in your dreams.” I snarl.

Charlie looks to Leo for back-up. Leo shrugs. “You know he’s right, man.”

I bury my face in my hands. “She didn’t even tell me.” I want to scream right now. “I was in her house, helping her with those kids and she didn’t tell me the truth about my child. And I think the worst part is, I just felt a connection to River. I couldn’t figure out why she was my favorite, why I was drawn to her…It turns out, I’m her father.”

Leo pushes a hard exhale. “Sophia has been through a lot over the past few years,” he tells me in his wise, knowing, fatherly way. “I don't blame her for having her guard up. She was just trying to protect her kid.”

“But this isn’t some little, inconsequential secret,” I argue. “This is huge.”

The office door pops open so fast it shoots my heart into my throat. The receptionist’s attention goes to Charlie. “That brickwork contractor you’re meeting with, he’s in the waiting room.”

“Gimme five minutes,” he tells her. She nods.

When the door closes, Leo’s attention comes back to me. “She fucked up, Archie. Let’s all agree on that. But she’s a good woman. A good woman who’s taken an emotional beating. You weren’t here for all of it. You didn’t see her lying on my couch for months while Reese and Nova took care of her. You didn’t see her struggling with a newborn. She went through a lot of shit. And she’s still standing. She deserves credit for that.”

Charlie pushes away from his desk and stands. “I get it—you’re pissed at her for keeping this secret.” He comes around the table and puts a hand on my shoulder. “But beyond all that, what are you going to do about it? Are you gonna sit in here and whine about how unfair it is or are you gonna step up and be a man?" He heads for the door without waiting for my answer. “Let me know. I’ve got a meeting to get to.”