Loving Adam Scott

Spiral 1

Adam's P.O.V.

Addison had said it so easily.

My daughter.

But it was the girl’s eyes that got me. She has Adelson's eyes, but there was something familiar about the spark in her eyes. Curious. Sharp. A little too wise for her age.

"She’s four."

"Five," the girl had corrected, without even looking up.

Five.

Five years.

I clenched my jaw.

I wasn’t stupid. I could do the math. And that realisation clawed at my chest like something feral. She hadn’t told me. Not once. She had disappeared all those years ago and built a life without me, without even giving me a chance to know. To be there. To be a father.

I left the office and drove to the only place that will give me peace.

As soon as I stepped into my new home, I called the one person who should’ve already had answers.

"Did you find it?" I asked sharply.

"I did," my private investigator responded, calm as ever.

"Then why the hell hasn't it been sent over to me? Were you waiting for me to start bugging you before sending what I paid you for?"

My anger flared without restraint.

This was who I was now—short-fused, unpredictable, a walking trigger. But who could blame me? Living with a woman like Elara would frustrate any man.

"Sorry, Sir. I'll send it now."

I ended the call before he could say anything else.

I wasn’t home, and I wasn’t at the office either. I was in a place no one knew about, a temporary escape. A house hidden in the middle of nowhere. Not in Elara's name. Not in mine either. No digital footprints. No paper trail.

It was five hours away from the city, surrounded by nature. Elara hated nature. She would loathe this kind of silence. I had ensured that her minions did not follow me.

I tapped my foot impatiently while waiting for the information, pouring myself a glass of bourbon, downing it in one swallow, and lighting a cigar with shaking fingers.

My phone buzzed.

The message was in.

Birth records.

I sat down, hands suddenly cold despite the heat from the fireplace.

If Mia was mine, and there was even a slim chance, I could enter their lives with more than just questions. I could enter with purpose.

I opened the attachment.

But as I swipe through the information, I realise that wishes don't come true.

Name: Mia Adaline Storm Rowland. Date of Birth: ...

My heart sank.

Eleven months.

Not nine.

Eleven.

And under the father’s name: Nathaniel Rowland.

I stared.

Mia should have been born nine months after Addison and I made love, but she was born eleven months from my calculation... Meaning she wasn't mine.

According to the record, Nathaniel Rowland is Mia's father.

The investor.

The man pouring money into my new business.

Addison's partner.

My vision blurred with rage.

I hurled my phone across the room. It hit the concrete wall and shattered. Sparks blinked as it died.

What the f**k?

Was that it?

Did I mean nothing to her? Just another page in her past? Another warm body? Did she really jump into someone else’s bed in less than three months?

My throat burnt. Not from the cigar. From the betrayal, I didn’t even know I still had room left to feel.

I paced around the unfinished living room, picked up my backup phone and sent a single message:

Go deeper.

One Week Later

The boardroom smelt of money and expensive mistakes. Every man at the table wore ambition like a cologne, but just a few were making actual decisions.

I leaned back in my chair, elbows resting on the expensive wood while someone projected the quarterly figures onto the screen.

"She’s making you look good," Dennis, one of the senior partners, muttered beside me.

I didn’t respond.

She was. Addison had unknowingly fixed three major gaps in the proposal my team had worked on for weeks. She didn’t do it for me, of course. She was thinking of the company. The work. The numbers.

And probably that damn investor of hers.

"Nathaniel Rowland will be in town for the pitch next week," someone at the end of the table announced. "We need to lock in the prep schedule."

I didn’t flinch. I didn’t even blink. But something inside me coiled tight, hot and ready to snap.

After the meeting, I didn’t go back to my office. I wandered into the general office. Addison wasn’t there, as usual. She’d done an excellent job by avoiding me for the past week.

She got her work done on time and flawlessly, so there was no professional reason to confront her. But God, the temptation to pull her personnel file, find her address, and just show up…

And Elara?

Elara had noticed, of course. But she didn’t argue anymore. Who would she argue with? I haven’t been home in days. I’d been staying in a presidential loft outside the city. Elara made sure one of her minions was keeping track of my movements. She responded the way she always did, with theatrics.

Two days ago, she sent my assistant a spa appointment receipt and asked if the company could reimburse her since she was "managing the stress of a neglected wife."

Yesterday, she hosted a lunch with her influencer friends in our backyard and tagged me in pictures I wasn’t even in. The captions were sugary. Fake.

When your husband is not home because he is too busy building a shopping mall for the community as a way of giving back.

A knock on the lounge door broke my thoughts.

"Come in."

Martha, my personal assistant, peeked inside. "Mr Scott, there’s a package from Ms Vermont. Personal."

She knew better than to call her Mrs Scott or my wife.

My jaw tightened. "Just drop it on the table."

"Yes, sir."

I stood and exhaled heavily. I didn’t have the patience for Elara’s games today. If she was sending gifts now, she was escalating.

I unwrapped the box without interest.

A watch. Limited edition. My favourite brand. One that had sold out before I could get it, but of course, Elara had managed to get one.

Inside the box, a note: "In case you forgot who has your best interest at heart."

I dropped the note in the trash and set the box aside for the cleaner.

If Elara Vermont thought a luxury watch could fix what was broken between us, then she never truly knew me.