Page 4 of Fearless

Sean opened the file but couldn’t comprehend what any of the words before him meant. Feeling desperate again, he looked up at Barclay. “What am I reading here?”

“I’m sorry to be the one to tell you, Sean, but Emma is not your biological child.”

He could only stare at the man across from him, barely able to grasp what he was saying. When the words finally hit him, bile rushed up Sean’s throat. With his free hand, he grabbed the garbage can beside the table and emptied the contents of his stomach. The whole time he was retching, he heard the voice in his head, Not mine…not mine. Emma is not mine.

As soon as he finished, he wiped his mouth on his sleeve and glared at Barclay. “That’s a bald-faced lie. My name is on Emma’s birth certificate. No one can say she’s not mine.”

Pity on his face, Barclay nodded at the folder. “These are the DNA results showing that Joe Stewart is Emma’s biological father. Stewart made up an insane story that you kidnapped his daughter and showed his proof of parentage. That’s why you were arrested.”

His mind could not wrap around this insanity…it just couldn’t. Seconds after her birth, he had held his baby girl in his arms and sworn that nothing and no one would ever hurt her. He had vowed to be her protector and defender for her entire life.

Tears filled his eyes, blurring the image of the man in front of him. Blinking them back, he asked hoarsely, “Can I fight it?”

“You can try, but you won’t win.”

“I’m the only father she’s ever known,” he whispered.

“Not anymore, Sean.”

And he guessed that was the gist of it. With shaking hands, exhaustion and heartbreak weighing him down, Sean opened the file and read the report. The words scrambled and blurred, but he saw the ones that mattered most. The father of two-year-old Emma Claire Donavan was Joseph Raymond Stewart. It was there in black and white and could not be denied.

A business card appeared in front of him. “This is a firm that specializes in family law. I went to school with one of their junior partners. Give them a call. They might be able to get you visitation rights or something.”

In a matter of hours, he had gone from being a devoted father to some random person who might be able to pay his daughter a visit. This was insane and wrong in so many ways. There was no one on this earth who would love and care for Emma more than he did. The thought of her being raised by the likes of Joe Stewart was beyond his comprehension.

“Thank you.” Sean managed only a hoarse whisper.

Barkley stood and reached into his pocket, producing a key. Surprising Sean, he unlocked the cuffs that had him bound to the table.

“You’re free to go, Sean, but there’s something else you need to know.”

Already deciding that there was no news that could make him hurt more, he said wearily, “What?”

“After you were taken away by the police, your stepmother suffered a massive stroke. She’s in intensive care at St. Michaels.”

He stared at Barclay a full thirty seconds before he turned and, for the third time today, took off running.

Three months later

Sean closed the last box and taped it shut. He lugged it to the front door and then turned, taking in the empty room. He would miss this house. When his dad had married Brenda, they’d given up the apartment the two of them had been living in and moved into her house. This had been Brenda’s first marriage, and though Sean had never seen any great passion between them, he knew she and his father had loved each other in their own way.

His dad had dropped dead of a heart attack when Sean was fifteen. Even though Brenda had been his stepmother for only a few years, she had never once made him feel like he didn’t belong with her. He owed her so much.

Thankfully, the stroke she’d suffered after Emma had been taken hadn’t killed Brenda, as he had at first feared. She had suffered some paralysis, especially on her left side, requiring intensive physical therapy. After two months in a rehabilitation facility, she had been released. She wasn’t one hundred percent, though, and still needed specialized care. The insurance funds had run out quickly, and there was little money left to hire someone to help her at home. Brenda had made the difficult decision to sell her home and move to Naples, Florida, to live with her sister.

Sean had wanted to follow her—she was the only family he had left. But leaving the area without Emma was out of the question. He could not and would not give up fighting for her.

There was a huge part of him that knew it was a losing proposition. He had no legal claim to her. The law didn’t care about what was in a person’s heart. Didn’t care that he felt like her father and believed she would be better off with him. As his attorney had told him, the law was the law. Often bloodless and cold, without a heart.

He hadn’t been able to afford the family law firm Barclay had recommended. The retainer alone would have taken all his savings. Plus, after barely reviewing his case for five minutes, a lawyer there had given him no hope that he could win. After visiting a dozen different attorneys with similar results, he’d found one who had agreed to take his case. The man, Marsh Bixby, was fresh out of law school, had just passed the bar, and had zero courtroom experience. But he did have one thing, and that was what Sean clung to with all his might. He believed he could win.

Yes, they both knew it was a long shot, and yes, Sean knew he might be deluding himself, but he had no choice. Emma was depending on him, and he could do nothing less than everything.

He had not been able to see her. Any effort to arrange even one visit had been denied. He had made so many calls to the Stewart home and to Bridget that a restraining order had been issued, preventing him from even finding out how his daughter was doing.

He’d found a small apartment between his two job sites. When he wasn’t loading packages at the shipping company, he worked night security at a shopping mall. In his spare time, he studied family law. It wasn’t much of a life, but he refused to give up. He had promised to care for his daughter till his last breath. He didn’t break promises, especially not one this important.

The phone in his pocket buzzed, and he was on it in a second. Getting a cellphone had been a necessity. “Donavan,” he answered.