Baby Daddy Roulette

Chapter 20

I wake up to my phone having a seizure.

Not a cute buzz-buzz. Full-on electronic meltdown. Seventeen missed calls, forty-three texts, social media notifications breeding like rabbits on steroids.

My first thought: someone died.

My second: oh God, what if it's worse?

I grab my phone. Instagram loads, and my stomach plummets straight to molten core.

Photos. Everywhere.

Pine Street Market shots—through windows, because privacy is dead. The parking lot is worse: crystal clear, professional quality, someone who knew exactly what they were doing.

Headlines scroll past:

"Sirens Stars' Secret Family?"

"Who's the Mystery Woman with Nielsen and Velasco?"

"Basketball's Hottest New Scandal?"

The comments are a cesspool. Is she dating both of them? Whose kids? Someone dug up that I'm the team psychologist, and now there are ethics questions, power dynamics, think pieces about boundaries.

They asked me to come. Public grocery store. Sunday afternoon. So visible with the babies—Mateo holding Aria, Axel pushing the cart.

Did they want this? Want to be seen as a family? Force me into something I'm not ready for?

My work phone rings. "Team PR" on the display.

I don't answer. It rings again. My boss.

Still don't answer.

Texts from Mateo pile up:

M. Velasco: Selene call me

M. Velasco: We need to talk

M. Velasco: This wasn't supposed to happen

Wasn't supposed to happen. Which means they thought about it happening.

Then Axel's text:

A. Nielsen: Don't respond to anyone until we talk.

Too late. I'm already spiraling into anger and fear and betrayal.

They showed up in my life. Pushed their way in with coffee and dinners and helping with my babies. Made me feel safe. And now this—my career on the line, my reputation scattered across social media, my life exposed.

Both keep calling. My phone won't stop vibrating.

I don't answer.

The front door opens, and Naomi appears in scrubs, phone in hand.

"I saw the photos," she says. "Everyone's seen them."

"I know. What if they did this on purpose?"

"Do you really believe that? That Axel and Mateo would deliberately—"

"I don't know what I believe anymore. They asked me to come grocery shopping. In public. On a Sunday. With the babies. And now someone had cameras—"

"Selene, breathe. You're spiraling."

"Of course I'm spiraling! Have you seen the comments? People are calling me a homewrecker. They're speculating about whose kids these are like it's a game show. Someone started a betting pool, Naomi. A betting pool about my children's paternity!"

"Okay, that's objectively horrible. But you really think those two men orchestrated this?"

"I don't know! Maybe they thought it would be romantic? Some grand gesture to show they're serious? Instead it's a nightmare."

"That's not how they operate and you know it."

"Do I? Because I thought I knew them before and they still left me with a note that said 'yeah.'"

"That was two years ago."

"And now it's happening again! Except this time there are cameras and my career is imploding and my kids' faces are all over the internet!"

In the living room, Elio starts his "I'm about to cause problems" sound. Sören joins in. Aria adds her voice.

I move on autopilot—changing diapers, bottles, settling three tiny humans who don't know their existence just became internet content.

Naomi follows me, helping. Together we get everyone fed and contained.

My phone rings. My boss's boss this time.

I answer because ignoring the food chain doesn't make problems disappear.

"Dr. Marlowe. We need you in the office tomorrow at nine AM. Management wants to discuss the situation."

"The situation? Is that what we're calling my life imploding?"

"Nine AM, Dr. Marlowe."

"I'll be there." I hang up.

Naomi's watching me with that expression.

"Management wants a meeting," I tell her. "Tomorrow morning. To discuss my professional future, though they used the word 'situation' like it makes this less terrifying."

"What are you going to tell them?"

"That I have no idea what's happening? That I went grocery shopping and now I'm internet famous for all the wrong reasons?"

"You could tell them the truth. That you didn't know there'd be photographers. That this wasn't your idea."

"What if this was their idea all along? What if they wanted people to see us together? Force my hand? Make this public so I couldn't back out?"

"Selene—"

"They're athletes, Naomi. Used to media attention. Maybe they thought this was normal. Maybe they didn't think about how this would affect me—my job, my reputation, my kids' privacy—"

"Stop. Do you actually believe that? Do you really think those two men who've been tiptoeing around you for weeks, who ask permission before touching your babies, who leave you coffee every morning like lovesick teenagers—do you honestly believe they'd deliberately expose you and the kids?"

I don't answer. I don't know, and not knowing is the worst part.

My phone vibrates. More texts from Mateo, desperate. Two from Axel, brief and urgent. Three missed calls from unknown numbers—probably press.

"I have a meeting tomorrow," I say quietly. "With management. To discuss whether I still have a career after this."

"Listen. The truth is you went grocery shopping with two guys you're seeing. That's it. That's the whole story."

"Except I'm not seeing them. Not officially. Not publicly. Not—I don't know what we are."

"Then maybe it's time to figure that out. Because right now you're running on panic and worst-case scenarios."

"My worst-case scenarios are currently playing out in real time on social media."

"Are they? Or are you catastrophizing because it's easier than admitting you're terrified of getting hurt again?"

I open my mouth. Close it. Naomi's annoyingly right and I hate it.

Aria crawls over, pulls herself up using my leg. I pick her up, and she pats my face with sticky hands.

My phone sits on the coffee table, messages piling up unread.

"You should answer them," Naomi says softly.

"And say what? That I don't know if I can trust them?"

"Or that you're scared. That you need time. That you're angry even if it wasn't their fault."

"What if it was their fault?"

"Was it?"

I don't answer. Can't answer.

Because I don't know if I can trust them. Because maybe I never should have let them in. Because once they left me with a note that said "yeah," and history might be repeating itself.

Outside, Seattle wakes up to a normal Sunday. Inside, three babies play while their mother wonders how everything went so wrong so fast.

Tomorrow I'll have answers. Tomorrow I'll face management and lawyers and probably my own professional execution.

Tonight I just hold my daughter and try not to think about the fact that the past I invited back might have destroyed everything I built in its absence.