“She’s the mother Theo…”
“What is a mother Lilly?” I ask bluntly. She shrugs, dropping her eyes and hands to her lap. “Sugar look at me.” She does, and there’s an uncertainty about her that I’ve rarely seen.
“I wouldn’t know.” Her voice is sad.
“You do though, because you know what a mother shouldn’t be.” I prompt.
“Someone who makes you feel safe.” She says quietly. “Someone who would defend you with their own life, and love you as no other can or ever will.” I smile, because she has such a pure heart for someone who has endured so much.
“Cassie can barely defend herself. She’ll be lucky if social services don’t take that baby away the second it’s born.” The rehab centre will have reported her as a high-risk mother the second she walked through the door. “I can let that kid go into their custody or I can take custody.”
The silence in the small space of the car could be cut with a knife. “You want me to be a mother to your child.” Her small voice sounds lost.
I shake my head. “No, I would never put that responsibility on you, but it would make me so happy if you could accept the child.”
“Theo, do you have any idea about babies?” She asks.
I shrug. “I’ll just hire a nanny.”
She leans back in her seat and presses her palm to her forehead. “When I agreed to stand by you, I accepted that you would have a child. I accepted that it would be part of our lives. I think cutting Cassie out is a big mistake.”
“You will make a better mother than she ever will.” I blurt. Lilly’s face freezes, her features losing colour.
“But I won’t ever be that baby’s mother.” She says.
“I just asked you, what is a mother? At what point did a genetic contribution come into anything?” I ask. “Mike has been more of a parent to me and Cat than our mother ever was. And you are a better, stronger, more loving person than Cassie can ever be.”
“Theo, you don’t know Cassie. You can’t possibly say that.”
“She took fucking drugs while she was pregnant Lilly!” I snap. Shit, I need to get a handle on my temper. I can’t force Lilly into this, I just need to make her see. Make her see what though? That she could raise another woman’s child? Fuck. She did not sign up for this. Hell, I didn’t fucking sign up for this! I have no idea what I’m asking of her. I guess in this sick and twisted situation, I’m looking for the best possible outcome. I want this unconventional little family to be just that, a family. Holy shit, it’s like someone cut off my balls. I, Theodore Ellis am talking about kids and family. Who would ever have fucking thought?!
Lilly watches me for a long while, her expression blank. “She made a mistake…”
“She made a choice. She made a choice to keep that baby, and she made a choice to take those drugs, thus endangering the child whose life she made a commitment to.”
“She is alone, Theo. She has no-one. People do desperate things when they feel desperate. She needs you to support her.” She purses her lips. “She thought you would support her.”
“Why the fuck would she think that? She’s lucky I’m not an arsehole. There are plenty of guys in my position who would have just told her to fuck off…”
“She is in love with you!” She shouts.
“She’s fucking deluded!” I dig my heals in. No fucking way am I feeling sorry for her.
She rolls her eyes. “She may be deluded, but she thinks she is in love with you. When you rejected her, it sent her over the edge, and she turned to the only thing she can rely on to make her feel better, drugs.”
“Do not pretend for a second that you think that’s justified. I know you. I know you were probably chewing her out for it.”
She scowls at me. “Yes, I did, and no, there is no justification for it. What I am saying is that if you supported her, it may not have come to that.” She snaps.
“So now it’s my fault she’s a druggie whore?”
“Of course not. Oh my god, you are fucking exasperating!”
“So, can we agree to disagree?” I say smugly.
“I’m going to have to bring up that bloody kid at this rate. You are clearly not adult enough to do it.” She grates. I take that statement as a positive.
I start the car, feeling like a winner, even if she did insinuate that I’m a child.
I have to stop at Hugo’s on the way home and drop off the key for the apartment in Monaco. He gave it to me in case we wanted to stay there, but well, I wouldn’t want Lilly to have to sleep on his come sponge mattresses. I’m hoping he hasn’t got any naked women there at this time on a Sunday.