by V Vee
“Well, he wanted to meet you. What do think of that?”
I watched as both girls looked at each other, having a quiet twin conversation, before returning their gazes back to me.
“Okay, Mommy,” Holly said.
I nodded then rose to my feet and stepped behind my daughters in order to present them to their father.
“Holly, Noelle, this is your father, Logan. Logan, your daughters: Holly and Noelle.”
Logan stepped forward and crouched down in front of them. “It’s nice to meet you both.” He swallowed and guilt tumbled through my belly at the sight of tears filling his eyes. “You’re both so beautiful.”
“Thank you,” they said simultaneously.
We all stood in silence for a minute before Noelle spoke up.
“Daddy?”
Logan cleared his throat and nodded. “Yes, love?”
“Why didn’t you want us?”
Chapter Four
Stacey, Gregory, and The Truth
Logan Steele
2019
I stared at my daughters in awe and wonder.
They were little mixtures of both Parker and me. With skin the color of birchwood, light brown curls that fell down their backs, big hazel eyes, and identical expressions of hesitation and fear on their faces, I couldn’t believe I’d helped to create them. I wish I’d had the opportunity to be there with them from the moment they’d been born, but I’d been denied the opportunity.
Because you chose to stay away, my subconscious reminded me.
Man, the truth could be a bitch sometimes.
Parker and I had attempted to explain to Noelle and Holly why I was just meeting them. That I didn’t know they existed. Because I was off fighting bad guys in another country. That I loved them already. But I wasn’t so sure if they understood or accepted our explanation.
And that just pissed me off even more than I already was.
I punched the hanging punching bag in front of me repeatedly, getting lost in the rhythm of my gloved fists hitting the weighted material over and over again. I was venting my frustration over the entire situation.
Parker saying she was single.
The fact that I was a father.
Parker’s co-worker, Steven, thinking he had a fucking chance with my woman.
The fact that I was a father.
How my daughters didn’t know me, and I didn’t know them.
The fact that I was a father.
The motherfucking fact that I was a father.
“Whoa! Loge, what the fuck man? Are you trying to break my shit?” My best friend, Gregory Richmond, asked as he walked up to me on the other side of his home gym. I didn’t usually come over to Greg’s house to workout. The two of us most often met at another gym, Gold’s Gym™, but ever since Greg and his wife—and his best friend—Stacey, had gotten married and had children, my best friend who was a man who’d formerly loved to do anything that kept him away from his place of residence, barely wanted to go more than fifteen feet from his front door.
He said it had to do with his “gut” telling him that he needed to be close, but we all knew it was because he was so fucking happy, he never wanted to leave them. Which made his personal security business very hard to run. Though he ran it with his wife, which made it just slightly easier.
“My bad, man,” I apologized, stopping the bag and walking over to grab my towel to wipe away the sweat on my forehead.
“What the fuck is up with you, Loge?” Greg asked me.
I shrugged and went to walk past him to the refrigerator where he kept the bottles of water. I stopped when he reached out to grab my bicep. There were few people in my life who could match my size. Kynan was one, and Gregory was the other. We were all big men and when the three of us used to go out to bars all of the women in the building flocked to us.
Gregory and I never entertained them, Kynan would take two or more home with him. Though I suspected he wouldn’t be doing that anymore.
That should be me. I should be just as fucking happy as these two jackasses.
“I take it things didn’t go so well with Parker?” Greg asked.
I snorted and shook my head.
“Oh, it went about as well as I expected,” I told him. “She saw me, got angry, cried, then got angry again. That’s not what’s got me so fucked up in the head.”
Greg frowned. “Then what the fuck is your deal, dude?”
I sighed and flopped down on the weight bench that rested against the wall.
“I’m a dad.”
It was the first time I’d said the words to anyone other than myself, and the silence that greeted my statement let me know it was just as crazy, fucked up, and amazing as I suspected.
“What the hell do you mean you’re a dad?” Greg asked.
“Exactly what the fuck I just said man. While I was overseas, Parker had my daughters. Two of them. Girls. Twins,” I revealed, shaking my head.
“Holy. Fucking. Hell.”
“You can say that again.”
“Holy. Fucking. Hell.”
“Greg!” Stacey’s shocked gasped made the both of us jump up from where we sat, apologizing not only to her, but also to the two little boys who stood in front of her, big grins on their faces.
“Mommy! Daddy said bad words!” One of them said with glee. I couldn’t tell Greg and Stacey’s boys apart, but my own little girls? I knew exactly which one was Holly and which was Noelle.
Holly had a little beauty mark next to her right eye and Noelle had one next to her mouth. My daughters were identical to everyone but her mother and me.
“Yes, he did,” Stacey replied, her hands on her hips.
I chuckled when Greg’s face flushed red.
“Sorry boys. Daddy won’t say that again,” Greg responded.
Stacey stepped into the room, following behind the boys: Shawn and George, as they headed over to a corner filled with tiny weights for kids. I shook my head as they both began to “workout” just like their father had been.
“So, what’s going on that you felt you just had to use profanity in front of our children, Greg?” Stacey asked.
Greg jerked a thumb in my direction. “Loge just found out that his woman, Parker, had twin girls while he was overseas.”
Stacey’s eyes widened before she turned to look at me. I shifted uncomfortably as her gaze traveled up and down my body, taking in my worth. She shook her head.
“Don’t tell me, you’re mad at her?” She asked, crossing her arms.
“I mean… don’t I have the right to be?” I questioned her.
Stacey shrugged. “Disappointed? Absolutely. Feeling as if you have been robbed? Oh yeah. But mad?” She shook her head. “You were the one who stayed away, Logan. When the rest of the guys took time to come home and visit their families over the years, you chose not to. Why?”
“Because…”
Stacey held up a hand. “No. Don’t spout out the same…” she looked over her shoulder, “bull crap that you tell yourself, or Greg, and maybe even Parker, to try and justify your actions. You need to think long and hard about why you stayed away, and if maybe, just maybe, that’s why you’re really angry. Not because she didn’t tell you, but because you know that if you’d come home you would have found out for yourself.”
And for the first time since finding out about Noelle and Holly I stopped thinking about the secret Parker had kept from me and instead considered the reason I’d stayed away from the woman who was the very beat of my heart. And when I realized why it was, guilt and shame flowed like sludge in my veins.
Chapter Five
Logan vs. Noelle & Holly
Parker
2019
I stood with hesitation at the entrance of my living room, dressed in my professional dark blue skirt suit, with a grey button-down shirt, my hair twisted up into a French knot at the back of my head, as I watched Logan play with Noelle and Holly. I wasn’t exactly sure how I felt about leaving my girls with hi
m. I mean, yes, he was their father, but he didn’t exactly know them.
And whose fault is that?
I shoved away the offending voice of my conscience and bit my lower lip as I considered my options.
I had a very important meeting at the school.
When Logan had shown up earlier in the day, we’d had a talk... okay, we’d had a shouting match, and come to the tenuous agreement that he would spend the day—maybe the next few days or weeks, getting to know the girls. But it would start today.
That was before I’d gotten the call.
The call from my assistant who was simply reminding me about the required quarter meeting with the teaching staff, in addition to the PTA meeting. Neither of which I could get out of. Both of which I had to attend. Which meant I had to send Logan home and get a babysitter.
At least, that had been my plan until I said those actual words to Logan. In front of our daughters.
I’d never been the enemy before. I tried to maintain a pleasant personality around everyone so that I was well-liked and universally loved, but the moment I told my girls their father had to leave because I had to go to work? Well...
I’d become the epitome of every villain of every princess in every storybook I’d ever read to them.
Damn Disney Princesses.
So, I’d... compromised, though Logan had said I’d conceded. I was going to allow Logan to watch the twins, but he had to send me a picture every hour, so I knew they were okay and still in my home.
And I didn’t just mean Holly and Noelle.
Though Logan and I obviously had hurt feelings regarding each other, betrayals, misconceptions, lies, etc. to work through, the feelings I had been trying to deny for the man whom I had been in love with for so long, the man who’d given me my babies, began to resurface. I had tried to fight them off for as long as I could, but I felt helpless to stop them.
I was falling in love with Logan again.
Or maybe I’d never really stopped loving him.
“Alright guys! I’m leaving! Anyone going to come give me a hug and kiss goodbye?” I waited to be assaulted by my little girls, to feel their little bodies colliding with my own, to inhale their sweet, innocent scent. However, nothing happened for long moments. I looked around in confusion and repeated myself again.
“Bye Mommy!” The twins called out in tandem, neither of them coming to hug me, just before they burst into giggles over something their Daddy had said.
Didn’t they know he was just going to hurt them? To leave them? To abandon them? That’s what he did to the women he loved and the women he had call him: “Daddy.”
I clicked my tongue in disgust and turned to leave.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Damn his voice. After all this time it still sent shivers down my spine.
Without even answering, I kept walking towards my front door.
“Don’t be stupid, Logan. You know where I’m going,” I tossed over my shoulder.
I gasped as he spun me around, his name on my lips, but he stole the breath from my lungs when he took my mouth in a hard, deep, punishing kiss. When he released me moments later, I blinked in surprise. Every brain cell I possessed had been fried, drowned, blown to smithereens and tossed into the biggest, most tumultuous ocean in the world.
No… the universe.
I heard his chuckle and shame soared through my veins.
C’mon bitch, don’t give in so easily, I chastised myself.
“I knew you still wanted me,” he said. “You can fight with me, argue with me, and deny it all you want to, but your nipples and the way you’re panting give you away every, single, time.” His eyes twinkled with mischief and had I not been trying to lead by example for my daughters, regarding physical violence against others, I would have pulled back my fist and socked him right in the eye.
Not wanting to give him the satisfaction of watching me as I checked the front of my button-down shirt to see if my breasts had also betrayed me, I spun on my heel and left, heading through the open doorway, out to my car, and straight to the school.
Where I finally glanced down at the curve in my button-down shirt where my tits lay.
Where my nipples still protruded against the fabric.
Damn.
I was trying to pay attention. I really was. But it was extremely difficult. Not when I knew that man was in my home and watching my children.
Okay, I know, they’re his children also, but they were mine first.
And yes, I know, I sound like a spoiled brat.
I groaned silently and sat back in my leather chair, as Steven continued giving his presentation regarding violence in schools and our school’s plan to combat it. It was the same presentation he’d been giving for the last few years. We all basically knew it by heart. And yet, Steven still insisted on delivering it. Even though the violence in our school had decreased from 60% down to 13%. It wasn’t as low as I would have preferred it, but the school board was impressed. Which meant my job was safe.
My Apple Watch™ vibrated and when I glanced down my eyes widened at the number calling me. I gestured for Steven to continue as I hurried out of the room.
“Hello?”
“Hello? Is this Parker Logan?”
“Yes, this is she. May I ask who’s calling?”
“Yes, ma’am. This is the Arlington Police Department. We were called out to your home due to a small fire that broke out in the home. Now, there’s no need to be alarmed. It was put out quickly and no one was harmed, however…”
I took off running, not even bothering to say goodbye to my colleagues, or to finish listening to the officer on the phone. There had been a fire at my house, and I had to go and check on my family.
When I pulled up in front of my house the fire trucks had apparently already left since they were not in front of my home. There were, however, three police cars sitting outside, and six officers congregated in my yard. Two officers were playing with Noelle. Two were… coloring with Holly. And the other two appeared to be shooting the shit with Logan.
And was that a dog taking a shit in my yard?
I slammed my car door and raced up to the crowd that were clustered in my yard.
“Mommy!” My daughters yelled in unison as they ran towards me. I knelt before them; my arms outstretched. I gathered them closely to me, kissing their precious foreheads and checking them over for bruises, injuries, and burns. I didn’t care what that officer said, a mother knew better than any emergency personnel or first responder if their child was injured.
Mine were not.
But I knew that now.
“Mommy! Daddy’s new puppy knocked over the Christmas tree!” Holly said, her hazel eyes shining with excitement.
Logan bought a puppy?
“And then the puppy was fighting with some of the branches and tossed some of them into the fireplace!” Noelle continued with the story.
I closed my eyes in horror and guilt as soon as Noelle’s words left her lips. I’d been meaning to clean the chimney and fireplace for a while now. Especially the flue. Steven had been warning me for a long time that if I didn’t do it a fire would break out in my house.
I hated it when he was right.
I hated it even more that Logan and my girls had been in the house when it had happened.
“When did your daddy get a puppy?” I asked, returning to a key element of the girl’s retelling.
“When the refused to eat their vegetables,” Logan responded, and I turned towards him.
Though I wouldn’t admit it at the time, my gaze traced over his form, checking for any visible signs of injury, pain, or burns. I didn’t see any, so I returned my focus back to what he’d said. I frowned and shook my head.
“You bought the girls a puppy because they wouldn’t eat their vegetables?” I wondered aloud for clarification.
Logan merely shrugged. “They wouldn’t race against me in push-ups, so I had to find a better way.”
> I gestured to my home.
“And buying a new puppy and letting that dog destroy my home is how you get them to eat vegetables, Loge? Really?” I shook my head at him, feeling completely exasperated and frustrated.
“Hey. Don’t get huffy with me. I didn’t exactly know they turned into little terrors when you tried to get them to eat something green, you know, because you never fucking told me they existed!” He growled.
I pointed up into his face. “Don’t you dare try to turn this around on me, Logan! You left. You never came back. You were planning to stay longer. You didn’t deserve to know they existed! You didn’t deserve them then, and you don’t deserve them now.”
I refused to step back as he bent down until our faces were practically touching.
“Them… or you, Parker?”
I narrowed my eyes at him, then taking the girls’ hands in mine, I turned and marched back towards my smokeless, yet slightly charred home, ignoring their protests and cries for their “Daddy.” Their daddy could rot in hell for all I cared.
And with that thought, I slammed the door shut.
Right in the faces of Logan and his damn vegetable dog.
Chapter Six
Logan and The “Kiss”
Logan Steele
2019
I was taking a huge risk with my life. I knew I was. Parker was no doubt still upset with me about the dog and the tiny little fire from the night before, but I wasn’t going to let that stop me from being with her and my girls. Now that I had them back in my life, nothing was going to keep me from them.
I knocked on the front door and waited, my ears listening intently for the smallest sound coming from inside. I heard Holly and Noelle’s laughter, and Parker’s huskier voice as she responded to them, the sound coming closer to the front door. I knew the minute she came up to the door and looked through the peephole. As always, my skin tingled from her gaze.
I needed her to open the door and let me in before my hard dick bore a hole through the wooden barrier.
Once the locks disengaged, I leaned against the doorway, pushing my dirty blond hair back from my forehead. I hooked leather, motorcycle jacket over my shoulder, making sure my thick biceps were on display and showing beneath my white t-shirt, jeans riding low on my hips, and wrapped snugly around my thick, tree trunk-like thighs, with my favorite motorcycle boots on my feet.