Chapter 18: Mr. Walking Cliché

Friday October 21
My mom was of two minds. The first had me going to the vet with Duke and us both getting fixed. I was sure Duke wasn’t onboard with that idea. The second was reveling in the possibility that she had a little granddaughter in her arms. I figured the little girl couldn’t be mine. Dawsons only had boys. The only reason we had a little girl in the family was that Greg had adopted Mac.

I spotted Ashley Kincaid and Scarlet White, the two girls I suspected were the mothers of these children. These two very beautiful and elegantly dressed Southern belles, one blonde and one with silky black hair, were walking towards me with sober, expectant looks on their faces. I also felt Brook’s presence at my side as she somehow knew she needed to find me.

Every teenaged male’s worst nightmare had tripled with the three little ones. Then I thought of Brook standing next to me. Make that quadrupled.

I think every guy on the face of this earth probably has had two or three ‘oh, shit!’ moments in his life where he can’t help but think, ‘What did I do?’

I was having one of those moments.

Both Ashley and Scarlet hesitated when they saw my mom holding the little girl and me holding the two boys. Two young men behind them bumped into them when they stopped. Another woman, whom from her looks I assumed was Ashley’s mom, managed to skirt the four without mishap.

Scarlet’s nervousness was plain to see, but she gulped and came up to me with a look of determination.

“I see you’ve met my little girl, Carol,” she said, finally looking at her child. Then she indicated the two boys. “Dawson and Allen are Ashley’s boys.”

They were named after my mom and me. It was a clever move because something like that pulled at your heartstrings. My dad cast an obviously troubled look at Scarlet.

“I hate to ask...” Dad started.

“David is listed as the father on the birth certificates,” Scarlet answered.

“And you are?” Mom asked, clearly not knowing what to think.

“Scarlet White,” she replied and took the little girl from my mom.

You could see by the little girl’s fine black hair that she was Scarlet’s daughter, just as you knew Ashley was the mother of the two blond-haired little boys.

“Ashley Kincaid,” she answered as she took one of the little boys from me.

My teammates, their families, Cassidy, and Fritz all stood behind my parents, obviously listening intently.

I looked over at a small commotion to see two men my dad’s age slowly and deliberately step around the rest of their party. Each one of them wore the ‘righteously pissed-off daddy’ look as if it had been tailored for them.

“Is this the boy that knocked up my little girl?” asked the dark-haired man whom I guessed was Scarlet’s dad.

Ashley and her parents cringed at what looked to be heading toward a nasty public confrontation. Scarlet, however, took it in stride.

“Yes, he is.”

“We need to have a talk, boy.”

I bristled at the ‘boy’ reference. I only kept from snapping back because I was holding what I suspected was my son.

“Sir, right now I need to sit down with your daughter and find out exactly what is going on. Once we’ve sorted that out, we’ll have all the parents involved. This is something I had no idea about.”

One of the two younger guys tried to step between us.

“Oh, I think we all need to be involved in this,” he said, trying to insert himself into the center ring of this circus.

I took the measure of the guy who appeared to be Ashley’s boyfriend. He was a good-looking guy who looked to be a few years older than she was. Something about him put my teeth on edge, so I took a closer look. He seemed to be too well put-together. It was like he had donned a costume to go out and hook up with girls at a bar. I’d seen plenty of his type when I was in LA.

Then it struck me: Ashley’s boyfriend was made up because he was nervous about meeting me. The Alpha Male in me took an interest in his obvious challenge.

“That’s really interesting. Who the hell are you?” I asked to make sure I hadn’t assumed incorrectly.

I could feel my mom’s eyes boring a hole in the back of my head because of my language, but my Alpha Male was marking his territory. Sometimes he was as bad as Mr. Happy at making me do stuff.

“I’m Brett Lyons, Ashley’s fiancé.”

Ashley rolled her eyes at this, and I wanted to ask more, but this wasn’t the time or place. My Alpha Male chuckled because he was satisfied that Brett was no real challenge, if Ashley’s look was any indication.

“We obviously need a more private place to talk and sort this out, but I want to start by talking with just Ashley and Scarlet. At this point, I really don’t see you being a part of that conversation, Brett.”

I could see Brett starting to puff up, and the other young guy, who looked a bit like a good ol’ boy dressed up to come to town, started moving up beside him. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught Cassidy beginning to move forward. It looked like she wasn’t sure whether she should pull out her cell phone to record this for posterity or kick Brett’s ass for me.

I needed to nip this in the bud before my Alpha Male decided that he wanted to come out and play again. I knew I wasn’t quite ready for that, physically.

“Everybody, stop!”

My voice cracked like a whip, and I brought my hand up abruptly to reinforce my words. What good is reputation as a doer and a leader if you can’t use it to do and lead every so often? Surprisingly, everyone actually stopped. Now that I had that side of the room under control, I turned to my entourage.

“I need to sort this out. For now, let’s keep this between us until I can confirm what’s what. That includes letting Tami know,” I said, directing the last part to Tim and my mom.

I got a collective nod to confirm they wouldn’t send out any texts or make calls before I knew what was going on. I felt a sense of relief and happiness that I could count on my friends even when there was juicy gossip to share. The Tami comment was made to remind them that once it was out, we couldn’t count on anyone we shared this with not to repeat it. My being ambushed with three children certainly qualified as juicy gossip.

Uncle John was right when he told me I needed to surround myself with people I could trust. They may not all be perfect, but they tried. I’d had to remind Cassidy not to share things she learned, even with her best friend, but she seemed to have taken that lesson to heart. I knew that if I asked, they would keep my trust.

I turned back to the girls’ families.

“This will get sorted out, and I promise that you’ll be involved, but right now your daughters and I need to have a discussion before anything else can happen. In the meantime, I also believe that it would not be in your families’ best interests to talk about this in the hallways of a hotel housing weekend football guests of the University of Alabama, do you?” I asked.

Remarkably, everybody seemed to settle down. I noticed that Ashley and Scarlet’s fathers looked at each other and nodded. I took that to mean they would let this play out, at least for now.

We were able to commandeer a small conference room, and I showed Scarlet and Ashley into it. When my mom tried to enter, I gently held up my hand.

“Please, Mom, I know you want to be in here, but the best way for me to get to the bottom of this is going to be to talk to the girls alone and without parental involvement. If you come in, all the other parents will insist on coming in, and it will turn into a zoo.

“Believe me, you will be involved, probably more than you want to be, but not quite yet. I promise I’m not going to say or do anything to make this situation even more complicated than it already seems to be.”

Mom looked at me. I wasn’t sure what she was thinking, but she nodded her head in mute reply.

I touched my chest and leaned in closer so only she could hear.

“I have my bodycam on me, and I’ll give it to Fritz as soon as I’m out,” I reassured her.

Once I closed the door to give us some privacy, I turned and looked at the girls sitting at the conference table. Scarlet looked down at her hands. She began to shake, and the tears started. Ashley got up from her seat, got to her knees beside Scarlet and pulled her into a hug. I was glad Ashley was here to comfort her friend.

I took a deep breath and tried to decide how to begin. If I hadn’t had the nightmare with Cal and Pam, I would have been lost. I knew for a fact I didn’t want a repeat of that. My goal was to make this as painless as possible if these did, indeed, turn out to be my babies. From what I remembered, both girls had assured me they were on birth control when we’d gotten together. Somehow, I didn’t think that starting our conversation by mentioning that would be very productive.

I looked at the two girls, and my instincts told me that I needed to get Scarlet talking or she might pull back and let Ashley speak for both of them. I didn’t want that because I felt they each had to have a chance to tell me their story on their own.

“Scarlet,” I said gently, “could you tell me what’s going on? What led to our meeting like this in a hotel lobby with your family all around you, with me not even knowing about your beautiful little girl until now? I can tell things have been difficult for you, and I don’t want to make it any more trying, but I’ve been blindsided by all this and need to understand.”

Scarlet looked at her hands as Ashley took the seat beside her. From her continued tears, it didn’t look like she could talk just yet. I glanced at the clock on the wall; it helped me decide that I needed to sleep sometime tonight, so I switched gears.

“Would it be better if Ashley tried to explain?”

Scarlet nodded, so I looked at Ashley. Ashley took a moment to compose herself before beginning.

Ashley talked for several minutes, and a coherent story began to emerge. The gist of what turned out to be a very long conversation was that what had started out as a lark for the two girls had wound up going south in a hurry.

The two had met their freshman year at Alabama when they’d both pledged the same sorority. Each of them came from well-established, moneyed Alabama families. Ashley’s family was based in Mobile, where they had owned substantial dockside interests since before the Civil War. They’d managed, somehow, to retain them during Reconstruction, and then later they’d grown their holdings, to the point where the family had its fingers in most of the transportation-related industries in Alabama.

Scarlet’s family was based more in western and northern Alabama. Their interests were in real estate, and they were probably one of the largest private landowners in the state. The vast majority of the family’s real-estate interests had been held on her mother’s side of the family. Her father’s family had substantial holdings of its own, but her daddy was a good ol’ boy at heart. He and his father had spent a lot of time and money creating a sportsman’s ranch, with a huge lodge, a big lake for fishing, and about 10,000 acres of forested land used primarily for deer and turkey hunting.

The girls had become instant friends, each recognizing a kindred spirit in the other. They had elected to room together off campus at their earliest opportunity. They’d stayed each summer and had taken classes during the first two. From what I’d seen, I didn’t think Scarlet had wanted to spend her summers cooped up living in a more or less rural setting without her college peers. My guess was that it probably would’ve been pretty lonely for her, even with family around.

The girls’ off-campus roommate arrangement had continued up to the time I’d met them, and after. They’d stayed on during the summer after their junior year. Ashley had taken a summer job with the university’s athletic department as a volunteer hostess for high school football recruits.

Scarlet’s family had been headed by her maternal grandfather, the family patriarch, who’d passed on about five years before. He’d apparently ruled his family with a benign, but iron fist, and had arranged Scarlet’s mother’s marriage to her father very shortly after her mother had graduated high school. Scarlet’s dad was similar to her grandfather, in that he believed strongly that the father and the husband ruled the roost. The result was that both Scarlet and her mother had led mostly sheltered lives.

Things had changed a bit for Scarlet, though. Her dad had agreed that she could go to the University of Alabama to land a rich husband and further increase the family’s fortunes. This reminded me of the plight of the Wesleyan daughters and how their mother had tried to set them up. Once she was out from under her parents’ thumbs, however, she’d gone a bit wild.

Ashley had been happy to help Scarlet act out her fantasies; apparently one of them was for her to be tied up and have sex with a stranger. I’d been selected as the unknown stud because I was easy on the eyes, outgoing, seemed to know what I was doing, and, most importantly, was from way out of town. It was okay to have a bit of fun with a good-looking boy. What they didn’t want was to have word get around that they’d had that kind of fun.

With the amount of partying that Scarlet had been doing, she’d apparently woken up hungover several times and hadn’t been taking her birth-control pills as regularly as she should have. She’d also insisted that any guy she went to bed with had to wear a condom, more to protect herself from the risk of disease than anything else.

On the night the three of us had gotten together, Scarlet figured that I was pretty safe on the STI front. Why she would assume that, I wasn’t sure. So, given her desire to have her bondage fantasy play out as realistically as possible, she’d told Ashley to forego her condom rule for the night.

Ashley was a slightly different story. She wasn’t on the pill and hadn’t planned to have sex with me. But then Ashley had gotten into it while watching Scarlet and me. As Ashley had just gotten over her period, she figured she was safe, and had gone with the moment. I thought back to that night, and if I were in her shoes, I would have done the same. What Scarlet and I did with the light bondage was hot.

The net result was that after the start of the fall semester, they’d both realized they were pregnant.

Neither of the girls was a dummy, and with the extra summer classes they’d taken, they were able to graduate early after finishing the fall semester. They’d only started to show just before Thanksgiving, and with a lot of loose clothing and sweatshirts, and everybody worrying about the end-of-term finals and papers, they’d managed to make it through the semester—somehow—without starting any kind of scandal for their families.

Ashley and Scarlet had remained close and had hidden their conditions from their respective parents until that became impossible. They made sure as well that by the time their parents found out, it was way too late for abortions. They’d been able to weather the inevitable family storms by supporting and being there for each other.

The problem was that they were from old, moneyed, religious families, and an unmarried daughter with a child was not something either of their daddies was willing to put up with. They were both being pressured to marry. The only reason they hadn’t been pushed to marry before the babies were born was that they were both visibly pregnant, and those kinds of wedding pictures in the society pages were not something their parents wanted.

“Why didn’t you talk to me as soon as you knew?” I asked.

Ashley’s gaze was steady as she looked me in the eye.

“We were talking about it, and then you were in the news for raping a high school girl. We’d gotten up the nerve to call you when your movie came out. We were sure our families would think you were a playboy. And then there were those two women who tried to make you out to be bad news for any woman. Of course, we knew the women were just making trouble. That was quickly pretty clear.

“We kept putting it off, and putting it off, and wouldn’t tell our families who you really were. Even when we had the babies and put your name on the birth certificates, they never made the connection to David Dawson, the movie star, model, and athlete.

“The final reason is you are so much younger than we are. Our dads want us each to marry someone who’s stable and ready to raise our children. To be honest, until last night I was sure they weren’t going to let us come today and tell you,” Ashley said.

That was quite a bit to absorb. Smearing someone in the media really did have an effect on people’s lives, it seemed. I absolutely could not fault the girls for their decisions. Yes, this made my life more complicated, but I was happy they’d decided to tell me. I guessed that there had to be some concern that tilted the decision to let me know.

“So, what changed to make you finally decide to get in touch with me?”

“Two guys named Brett and Clay, and our daddies,” Ashley replied with a bit of a sour expression.

It turned out Brett was a rising star on the management team at one of Mr. Kincaid’s warehousing businesses. He’d shown his ambition, and everyone felt that someday he would work his way into upper management at the company headquarters. According to Ashley, he was a player as well. I’d sort of guessed the player aspect.

“Brett sees me as his ticket to job security and advancement,” she said dryly. “He comes from a decent family, and he’s about 25 years old now, but I don’t think Brett ever did a lick of honest work in his life before he graduated from college. When my father started talking him up and began to make excuses to throw us together, I smelled a rat and checked Brett out. He’s living a bit higher than his paycheck would allow, so I figure he’s getting some money from his family.

“The girlfriend and female-employee networks also don’t have very much positive to say about him. He cut himself a swath through the girls who work for the warehouse company, and some of them are pretty upset with the way he’d wine and dine them and then stop dating them as soon as he got what he wanted.”

Ashley gave me an apologetic look.

“With you, we didn’t use a condom for all the reasons I told you, and because we figured you were safe as far as diseases go. With Brett, I’d make him use a condom even after we’re married.”

That last comment was telling. Ashley knew that Brett would never be faithful.

According to Ashley, her father was looking more at Brett’s family than he was looking at Brett. The family checked out, so Mr. Kincaid just figured everything would be great with Brett, and he’d been pushing Brett on her harder and harder.

I’d noticed that Ashley didn’t wear an engagement ring, even though Brett’s announcement said otherwise. I didn’t think their nuptials were as much of a done deal as her dad and Brett thought they were.

Scarlet’s situation was a lot worse than Ashley’s. She’d dated Clay while she was in high school. His family had a lot of land and were cotton farmers. Clay had been a safe date for her in high school because her father approved of him. At least it got her out of the house. Scarlet and Clay had been friends, but she’d never thought of him as more than that. She’d been a virgin when she went off to college.

Scarlet’s parents, especially her father, were very religious Southern Baptists, and Scarlet’s actions and her pregnancy were troublesome to her dad in particular. His best solution was for her to get married as soon as possible and have the husband adopt her little girl. He’d focused on Clay as the most likely candidate.

Now he was pushing Clay on her, but with Scarlet’s dad, it was more of an ultimatum than a ‘wouldn’t it be nice’ suggestion. He’d recently started talking about stopping all support for her unless she married, if not Clay, then someone else, and soon. The ‘Clay’ arrangement was supposed to be for a quick, quiet wedding, and Scarlet would live with Clay in a trailer on his parents’ farm until a more permanent arrangement could be made.

Scarlet’s maternal grandfather had set up a trust for her, and she thought it might be substantial, but she wouldn’t see any distributions from the trust until she was married or turned twenty-five. Until then, or until Scarlet got a job where she’d make enough to afford decent daycare for little Carol, she was pretty much dependent on her parents for financial support.

I chuckled.

“What’s so funny?” Ashley asked.

“I had a random thought. Last spring, I went to a psychic, and he told me that I had five kids. I thought he was full of it, but he insisted that I did. It seems he had his timing off a little bit, but he nailed it if you include my nanny’s son, Little David, whom I consider mine. I’ll have to call the guy and let him know.”

The girls looked at me expectantly to see how I’d taken their stories.

“I have to ask...”

“They’re yours,” Ashley assured me.

“And you’re both 100% sure they’re mine?” I asked.

“We should probably get a DNA test to be sure,” Scarlet admitted. “But don’t tell my daddy or boyfriend. They think what happened was my first and only time.”

“I’m sure,” Ashley said.

At first, I thought she meant I should get the test, and then I realized she was sure that the boys were mine.

“Are you going to be mad when I insist that we confirm paternity?” I asked Ashley.

“No, I’m fine with that. We did ambush you with this,” Ashley said.

I looked at Scarlet, and she nodded her assent to the test.

“How do you think I can help?” I asked.

The girls looked at each other, and I saw Scarlet get brave.

“I need some money,” Scarlet came right out and said.

“You, too?” I asked Ashley.

“I’m living with my parents, and I can’t see how I can raise the boys and live on my own. I also have a trust that doesn’t kick in for a while. I need some way to keep going until that time,” Ashley confirmed.

I nodded, and then looked at my watch. It was almost three in the morning.

“I need to get some sleep. I’ve got to meet with the Alabama people tomorrow, but I’ll figure out some way for us to sit down and talk about all this. I want you both to think about what’s realistic and how you think I might be able to help. I know right now that I want to be a part of those little kids’ lives if they’re mine. I’ve just been hit with this, and I’m not sure what the best way to handle it is.

“What I am sure of is that this will work itself out. Even if they don’t turn out to be my children, I’ll make sure you get the help you need. I have a charity that helps unwed mothers. Normally it’s for helping girls get an education, but I bet I can make sure you become two of the recipients,” I assured them.

I decided to add something I felt deep down.

“I also want you to know how I feel about your decisions after you found out you were pregnant.”

I looked at the two of them, and they both looked down.

“Eyes on me,” I said, and waited until they looked up. “You made some difficult decisions in trying times, and you decided to keep your babies. You kept it together and managed to graduate.”

“I would rather you’d felt that you could come to me sooner and allowed me to be involved in your decisions, but I understand your reasons why you didn’t. I also want you to know that I think you made all the right decisions. They were good decisions.

“There are a lot of questions that have to be answered and a lot that needs to be sorted out, but I’m glad I’m now part of that process. I’m sure you need to think about all this, and I will need to fill my family in,” I said. The girls were now nodding with me.

I smiled.

“This will all work out. Now, let’s all get some sleep so we can keep making good choices.”

The girls were a bit teary-eyed. I stood, and they each give me a big hug.

We agreed to meet tomorrow evening but left it open as to where and how.

Bodycams are wonderful. Instead of having to explain everything to my mom and Brook, I had Fritz download the video so they could watch it. I left them watching and went to bed, still in some physical pain from my Hollywood accident and now exhausted as well.

Saturday October 22
I woke to find my mom sitting in my hotel room.

I was still sore and moving a bit like an old man, but I definitely didn’t want a pain pill today. I needed my wits about me. Not that it would lighten my mood any.

“Four children with three different mothers. All before you graduate high school. I don’t even know what to do with that.”

“Where’s Dad?” I asked.

“Your father made the wise decision to stay out of this conversation. I thought I’d raised you to have better morals than the rest of the Dawson clan.”

“I don’t think this is helping the situation.”

“You do realize that this probably ruined any chances you have of going into politics. It’s good that you have other skills, or your grandmother would be devastated,” Mom said to pile on the guilt.

I knew my best course was to let her get it all out.

“What were you thinking?” she continued. “Trusting two girls you didn’t even know to be responsible for birth control. I would have thought your brother was enough of an example for you.”

What could I say to that? I knew where babies came from. I knew that condoms weren’t just to prevent pregnancy. I could have picked up something that could have been passed on to others in the form of an STI. After listening to Scarlet last night, I was damn lucky I hadn’t. I’d let myself get caught up in the moment.

I remembered telling them that if something happened, I would do the right thing. How hollow did that sound to two college juniors when it came from a high school kid?

I understood, from our talk last night, why they didn’t want to tell me about it. As a young movie actor who’d also been accused of abusing Pam, it was almost inevitable they’d have second thoughts about me as a good father.

When I’d met Ashley, I’d wondered if she knew who I was because she’d dressed up with her pearls to attract me. I’d ended up dismissing that at the time. Now I questioned whether Scarlet was the one who had targeted me as a possible way out of her family situation. Then again, it could have been exactly what they said it was, an accident.

What most gave me pause was the fact that both of them became pregnant. What were the odds of that? I knew it was possible, but seriously? I decided to push that little line of thought away. It wasn’t like I could do anything about it now.

I think my mom thought I’d just pulled a Dawson on her and gone quiet.

“Sorry, my mind was off exploring possibilities. I’m not sure they’re after my money, at least not in the long run. I think they need to get out of bad situations with their families,” I said.

My mom shook her head.

“You really are a ‘stupid boy.’ There’s a damn good chance they are, and this time it could be expensive.”

“Mom, you saw the bodycam video last night, didn’t you?”

Of course, she had.

“There’s a decent chance Scarlet might only need financial help for two or three years. And knowing what I know of Ashley’s family now, she might be in the same situation. What we really need right now is more information.”

I had another thought.

“Do you think there’s a chance for custody?” I asked.

“You try that, and I’ll kill you in your sleep. I’m too old to handle five kids under the age of two. I had an unmistakable reminder of that watching everyone for the past two weeks. Plus, in a few months, you’ll be off gallivanting all over the world, doing your movies. Peggy’s a saint, but even she would bail on us if we had three more to watch.”

“What if we just got Carol, the little girl? I’m not sure I want Scarlet raising her,” I admitted.

“Hell, I don’t want you raising Coby. You’ve proven you haven’t grown up enough to stop making babies. Why would I want you raising my grandchildren?”

That one was almost over the line. I thought of several witty comebacks, but any of them would have only made the situation worse. Many had to do with my talks with Grandma Felton and her telling me how my mom had felt unprepared to raise Greg when he was born. Somehow, he’d survived.

“I bet you never thought you would have too many grandbabies,” I said; that got me the death stare. “Too soon?”

I saw her lips twitch.

“Come on, Mom. They’re cute.”

“Puppies are cute. That doesn’t mean I want another one,” she shot back.

“I don’t think we have a choice in the matter. It’s not like we can put an ad on Craigslist. Even though I know you can sell anything on that site.”

“So, what are you going to do?” Mom asked.

“I agree that I don’t want three more babies running around the house, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t need to be in their lives. For now, I want to figure out how I can help the mothers while keeping control of what that help might involve. At least for now, that might mean I pony up and pay them.”