Chapter Sixteen

~Nicole~

I sat awkwardly in the high back chair provided to me, rubbing my stomach to comfort the bubbling within. I didn’t know if my baby was old enough to kick, but it certainly felt like he was tossing about every so often.

“Trevor will be in in just a few more minutes,” a woman said, walking in to hand both of us a sparkling water. What was with rich people and their sparkling water? If I wanted some good ol’ H20, I’d drink some. If I wanted something bubbly, I’d get a damn soda. “Can I get you anything else?”

“No, we’re fine,” James answered, looking much more calm than I felt.

We were sitting in some sort of very expensive looking office, in a building that looked to be filled with offices. There wasn’t a set company name out front, so I guessed that it was some sort of rental space that had conference rooms and offices that business folk could rent month by month as they needed. The cost of some of these places was more than double of my own rent budget, so I couldn’t help but wonder what we were here for.

James had said that this was for protecting me, but what could being here have to do with protecting me? I was terrible with riddles as it were, so it wasn’t like I was going to figure it out any time soon.

Thankfully I didn’t have to wait long. Less than a few minutes later, a man in a button up shirt and a pastel vest came striding in, a cup of coffee in one hand and a briefcase in the other.

“Thank you for meeting with us on the weekend,” James said, standing to offer his hand.

The man just looked at him, raising both of his full hands, before crossing to his desk. “To be honest, I’m not doing this for you, I’m doing this for our mutual friend. He sponsored me through a touch semester of law school, so I figured I owed him.”

He set his things down before finally offering his hand to James. “Trevor Nelan, at your service. To my understanding, we’re here for a child custody agreement outside of court?”

My stomach dropped through the floor and my eyes went wide. Child custody agreement?”

“I managed to draw up a few different agreements, all with different stipulations, and we can mix and match whatever you find important. The one thing is all of them cover until the child is eighteen years old, so once these are signed by both parties, it will take a court case and a judge to change the terms.”

I looked to James, feeling the corner of my eyes water. “Are you sure about this?” I asked, voice week. “You want to take care of this kid for eighteen years?”

James nodded, looking as cool as a cucumber. “Yes. I figured it’s my responsibility as much as yours, and since you’ll be dealing with the day to day troubles, I can at least do my part to relieve your burden.”

I couldn’t believe it. Despite everything I had thought, this strange man and millionaire was willing to take care of the beautiful life inside of me. How was that possible? I wasn’t the type of girl that these things happened to. I was the kind of girl who worked hard but still always came out on the bottom.

And yet… this seemed very much not bottom.

“Oh, and Tevor,” James continued, looking to the lawyer. “I need you to add a housing stipend to whatever we choose, unless you have it already.”

“Do we have an amount?” The lawyer asked, sitting behind his desk and looking quite professional despite the fact that he had obviously been surprise-dragged here on the weekend.

“That I might need your help on. I’m not aware of the cost of living around here and I want to make sure the child is secure.”

“Fair enough. So, let’s get into it, shall we?” He handed one packet to me and then the other to James, looking at us expectantly. “Reading is fundamental, after all.”

***

I had never been much for terms and conditions or other legalese, so when we finally finished reading, re-reading and rewording everything we wanted, it was well into the evening and time for dinner. I didn’t even want to guess at how much money this meeting was costing James, but like with everything else, money didn’t seem to be an object with him.

In fact, I didn’t want to think at all. My mind was chock full of insurance responsibilities, education clauses, standards of care of judiciary revision. I never knew there was so much involved in a custody agreement, but apparently it was a lot more than ‘you watch the kid for x amount of time and I’ll watch them for y’.

In the end, I felt like we had a solid arrangement drafted. And by solid, I meant absolutely phenomenal. To think I had been so stressed for so many months thinking about how I was going to survive and provide for my baby how I wanted, when in reality it just took a lawyer with a great knowledge of family court.

We decided I would have full time custody, but James would have unlimited visitation. If he wanted to take our child out of the state, he needed to give me twenty-four-hour notice, and if he wanted to take them out of the country, I required a week’s notice as well as a proof of return ticket. That last part had seemed absolutely silly to me, but the lawyer said that it was a standard clause to insure no child napping considering that 8 times out of 10 a missing child was taken by one of their parents.

If either of us was suspicious of the other not providing the care level that the child deserved, or otherwise abusing them, there was a mandatory procedure for what to do with a family psychologist and someone would come do interview with both parents. Hopefully that would never be an issue, but I was glad it was there nonetheless.

Then there was all the money. It was a lot of money. I had never once thought to look at James as a meal ticket, but I was sure that most of the people that he knew would.

There was a two thousand a month college payment that was going into a trust that neither the child or I could touch until they were eighteen. There was a hundred dollar a month food stipend, a hundred-dollar clothing stipend, a five hundred dollar back-to-school stipend in September, a thousand dollar birthday and Christmas stipend, complete insurance coverage, and -perhaps most importantly- a clause stating that James would cover all of my rent while I was living in a place of his choosing, and half rent if I moved into somewhere I liked.

No rent! No rent! Did he have any idea how much having five to seven hundred dollars more a month would do for me? I could save. Make sure that my child never wanted. They could get into after school activities and other extra curriculars, they could go on class trips. They would never know what it was like to have to duct tape the bottom of their shoes -unless that grew trendy in the next fifteen years or so. One could never know with fashion.

“Does these seem satisfactory to you?” James asked, looking at me with a soft expression on his face.

For someone who could be so intensely intimidating, he certainly didn’t make me feel frightened. In fact, he made me feel safer than I had in ages and I was pretty sure I was at the highest level of gratitude that a human could possibly be.

“Yes. Definitely,” I said, nearly breathless from the excitement in my chest. Could this really be happening? I kept waiting for the sky to fall or the ceiling to drop and end all of my good fortune.

“Great,” Trevor said. “So how about we get to signing?”

He handed each of us a pen and James signed right away. But all I could do is stare at the paper, wondering if either of these guys knew how much this was going to completely change my life.

They couldn’t know. Could they? It didn’t seem likely.

“Are you alright?” James asked, sensing my hesitancy.

“Yeah,” I murmured. “Just thinking.” I took a deep breath, signing my name underneath his, and the next thing I knew, I was legally set up to have an amazing life.

“There we are,” Trevor said, collecting the papers. I’ll have this copied in triplicate and authenticated then I’ll send a packet to each of you and keep one on file.”

With a sort of finality that I could explain, he got up, put the papers in his briefcase, then walked to the door.

“After the two of you, of course.”

Oh, I guessed that was our cue to go and stood, heading out right after James. I didn’t know what to say, hell, I hardly knew what to think but I was intrinsically aware at how amazing this all had turned out for me.

We headed out to his car and I really tried to think of what to say that could possibly convey everything I meant to say. How happy, grateful and guilty I was.

“Sorry,” I said finally as we clambered into the car.

“Sorry for what?” He sounded genuinely surprised and I could have smacked myself for my lame lead in.

“For running. I should have tried to find you. I was just so sure that you were a needle in a haystack and even if I did find you, that you would definitely be against me having this child.”

“I wish you hadn’t too, but I understand your reasons. What’s done is done, and the important thing is that we move forward. You’re having this child, and I don’t want to be an absentee dad. And I also don’t want to have tension between us, even if we are getting divorced.”

“I… thank you. Really. You don’t know what this means to me.”

“Well, I have a bit of an idea. But I get what you mean.” We both let out a long breath at the same time and that made us both laugh, breaking the tension between us. It went on for a minute or two, before simmering down. But one question I was left with was…what now?

“Hold on one moment,” James said, ask if he had read my mind. “I need to make a call.”

“By all means,” I said, putting on my seatbelt and settling in. “I’m in no rush. I don’t have any place to go.”

He nodded and was already dialing. I listened, able to hear the voice on the other end much better, and it only took a couple of seconds for me to pick up that it was some sort of real estate agency.

“Hey, Stacy, I have a sort of special request for you.”

“And what’s that Mr. Hines?”

“I need you to find me a modest two-bedroom apartment in St. Louis, preferably by a reputable school district.”

“Of course. Any reason why?”

“Diversifying my portfolio,” he said quickly in a way that very clearly got across that he wasn’t going to discus it further.

“Absolutely, Mr. Hines. I’ll have those to you by next weekend.”

“Try tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow.”

“I… of course Mr. Hines. I appreciate the challenge. If you don’t mind, I’ll get on that right now.”

“Of course, you have a good day Stacy.”

He hung up and I raised one of my eyebrows at him. “Huh, you really were stern with her.”

But he just shrugged, looking pleased as he tucked his phone away. “That’s just how you have to be with Stacy. We’ve worked together for years and she’s always had a… peculiar way of being motivated.” I wanted to ask him exactly what he meant by that, because it was raising all sorts of hmmm bells in my head, but he was already moving on. “I’m starving though. Do you want to go to… I don’t know, the local mall or something and hit up the food court then go shopping for baby supplies.”

I chuckled, before realizing that he was serious. “Wait, have you ever had fast food a day in your life?”

“Of course I have,” he laughed slightly. “Why?”

“Because your abs are telling me another story full of organic foods, egg whites and lean meat.”

“Thank you for noticing,” he said, sending me that smirk that had my cheeks blushing. “But I do indulge occasionally.”

“Well then by all means,” I said, repeating a phrase that was becoming more and more common in my daily lexicon. “Let’s go to the mall.”