Relief! “That would be amazing. I love you.”
“Love you, too, babe. See you soon.”
I hang up and call out to Katie. “Uncle Arlo says we’ll do Chinese for dinner.”
“Yay!” She runs in. “Can we get the dumplings?”
I smile. “Anything you want. Give your order to Uncle Arlo when he gets home.”
“Yay!” She runs back to her room.
I trudge down the hall. “I’ll be out in a minute, sweetheart. I need to change clothes.”
“Okay.”
I lock the bedroom door behind me and slump onto the bed. I guess I’d better get used to this, because no telling how long she’ll be with us.
I know that’s the headache talking, because normally I’d be happy to have Katie here. Except…
Exhausted.
That’s what I am—exhausted after a day of battling pain and nausea and disappointment that I would be letting my men down tonight.
I change clothes, scrub off my makeup, and pull my hair back into a ponytail. Then I head to the living room and stretch out on the couch with a cold, wet rag over my eyes while Katie does her homework at the coffee table, and with the TV on but the volume turned low.
At least if Lucas was home I could ask him to keep an eye on her and go try to take a nap. Fortunately, Arlo’s on his way.
Thank god.
This is only a minor annoyance, because I am glad she’s home with us. It leaves me feeling settled in a deeper way, knowing she’s here.
Because she’s ours.
Chapter Twelve
Arlo
I hurry home, feeling only a little aggravated about our borked plans because I’m more concerned about getting there to take care of Zoey and Katie.
I’m still not sure what’s going on, or why the sudden change in schedule. Sure, there have been a few times in the past where Jerilyn had a last-minute schedule change. Hell, half the time she’s texting Nolan to pick Katie up from school without warning, but the changes are never this long or ambiguous in duration. Especially for work.
I can’t help but wonder if it’s really for work, or if she’s jetted off on some last-minute vacation with a boyfriend.
Yeah, I’m jaded and cynical when it comes to that woman.
Not that it matters what the reason is. Katie’s our daughter.
The only thing that disappoints me in a minor way is that this changes something I’d planned to do tonight. On my way to work, I made a quick stop I didn’t tell Zoey or Nolan about.
I mean, I can still do what I wanted to do, but I need to work it in a little differently than I’d planned.
I arrive home only to be tackled by the munchkin when I walk through the front door. I immediately spot Zoey on the sofa, with a damp washcloth on her forehead.
Yikes.
I untangle myself from Katie after giving her a hello hug and walk over to Zoey, where I lean in for a kiss. “Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
“Can I get you anything? Do anything for you?”
She lifts one end of the wash cloth so she can peek at me with one eye. “Take over. Please?”
“You’ve got it.” I turn to Katie. “Let me go change clothes and I’ll help you with your schoolwork.”
“Are we doing Chinese for dinner?”
“Absolutely. Too soon to order it yet, though. We’ll wait until Daddy tells us he’s closer. You can even go with me to pick it up.”
“Yay!”
I retreat to our bedroom, where the first thing I do is tuck the surprise, which I’d had in my pocket, into my top dresser drawer. Then I change into shorts and a T-shirt. I sit on the floor next to Katie at the coffee table and we work through her assignment. It’s not difficult, even for her. Then I read with her. Once Nolan lets me know he’s less than thirty minutes from home, I put in our dinner order, and Katie and I head out to get it.
She chatters at me nonstop from the backseat, leaving me smiling and contented. I miss the days when Lucas was this age. Maybe this weekend the weather will be good and we can go out fishing. We were going to last weekend, but thunderstorms spoiled our plans, and we ended up bowling. Still fun, and a family activity, but not what we’d had our hearts set on doing together.
By the time we return, Nolan’s home and has already changed clothes. Katie runs to him and he scoops her into his arms for a hug.
My guy’s a fantastic dad. I remember when Katie was born, how he held her, crying as he showed her to us.
Jerilyn had been knocked out, because for some reason that’s still not clear to me, she demanded a C-section months before the actual birth. She’d had it in her mind she was not going through labor and delivery.
Zoey and I had been there for Nolan. I remember standing there with him, our arms around him as he held the swaddled bundle and wept tears of joy. How I kissed his forehead and lingered there, missing him, struggling against my own tears because it wasn’t fair he was married to that bitch and not with us.
Maybe I’m selfish in some ways, I don’t know.
Now he’s ours, and no one’s taking him away from us.
If I had my way, I’d figure out a way to challenge Jerilyn for full custody and then life would be perfect.
Yes, I admit that does make me petty and selfish, because Katie loves her mother.
Although now knowing what I do about narcissists, I’m pretty sure Katie’s feelings aren’t reciprocated.
* * * *
Zoey manages to eat a little before she heads to the bedroom, leaving me and Nolan with Katie. After Katie gets her bath, and we help her get everything ready for in the morning, we settle on the couch with her between us to watch TV before her bedtime. I’m planning on taking her to school, because Nolan’s got a meeting, and I don’t know if Zoey’s headache will be better. I can be a little late in the morning.
“Do you think Mommy’s mad at me?” she asks out of the clear blue.
Nolan and I exchange a look, because before I respond to that, I want to confirm I heard what I think I heard.
From the wide-eyed shock on his face, I’m reasonably certain I did.
“Um,” he says, “I don’t know. I don’t think so. Why would you think that, honey?”
She shrugs and continues staring at the TV.
I’m dying to jump in on this one, but I defer to Nolan.
For now.
I watch him while he’s obviously charting his course before diving into the conversational waters.
“Did something happen?” he finally asks her.
She shrugs again, her focus on the TV. “I think she got mad at me last night.”
My own anger is simmering, but I stay silent.
“Katie, sweetheart, what happened?” he asks.
It takes her a minute. “I asked her if on the days you have to pick me up from school on her weeks if I could just spend the night here instead? Or maybe stay here during the week with you, and with her on the weekend. I like mornings here better.” She looks at me. “No one’s yelling in the morning.”
My nails dig into my palm as I clench my left fist in an attempt to stay silent. I’m dying to call that bitch and ream her out, but I also know kids can be unreliable narrators filtering what they see and hear through their own special prisms.
Thus, I wait.
All due credit to Nolan, though. He doesn’t lose his chill in front of her. “Does Mommy yell at you in the mornings?”
“Not every morning. She doesn’t lay stuff out with me like you do. And she doesn’t make my lunch. She gives me money to buy lunch. But I like the notes you put in my lunch. I asked her to do that and she said she doesn’t have time.”
Fuuuuuuck.
Nolan’s gaze catches mine for the briefest of moments. I can practically hear him mentally chanting at me to stay calm.
Technically, this isn’t my battle.
But abso-fucking-lutely, this is my battle.
Nolan has always loved making lunch f
or her, and he keeps a pad of sticky notes and a pen in a drawer in the kitchen—one of the few kitchen things he wanted to make sure wasn’t packed for storage—so he can leave little hearts and smiley faces and things on her lunch. A little surprise for her when she opens it in school.
He’s an awesome dad, a natural dad.
If Jerilyn was an animal, she’d be a rodent or something that eats its own young rather than rearing them.
“Then what happened?” he finally asked. “When you told her that last night?”
She looks at me, then at Nolan. “She sent me to bed early.”
Yeeaah, this is giving my theory about a last-minute vacay with a boyfriend a lot of weight.
“Mommy told Aunt Zoey this trip was for work,” he finally says. “It’s probably a coincidence.”
She nods, her focus returning to the TV, but now me and Nolan are looking at each other again, and I’m pretty sure we’re thinking the same damn thing.
That bitch.
* * * *
Once Katie’s in bed and safely asleep, we head to bed. Zoey’s asleep with a damp washcloth on her forehead. I know Nolan’s upset about what Katie revealed to us, but neither of us want to wake Zoey up by talking.
He heads into the bathroom to take care of business. He stashed sleeping shorts in here so he’d have them in case he needed to get up during the night for Katie. I open my dresser drawer, get the surprise, and follow him into the bathroom.
Once he’s done, I wait until he’s washed his hands. Before he can reach for his toothbrush, however, I catch his right hand and slip the band on his ring finger. It’s a stainless band with triquetras engraved around it, and he freezes as he stares at it for a moment before looking me in the eyes.
“I’m done waiting,” I whisper. “I’ve waited long enough. I wanted Zoey to be awake for this, but I’m staking claim on what’s ours.” I thread my fingers through his hair and cup the back of his head. “You’re ours.”
Slanting my lips over his, I take my time kissing him. So many times in our lives we’ve had to rush and sneak, scurry to conceal what we were doing from parents or others.
This time is our time now. This man is my husband and I guess it’s safe to say, in my heart, he’s always been my husband.
Nolan’s arms encircle me, holding me as we kiss. He nibbles on my lower lip and I suck on his tongue. Between us, we both harden and start that old familiar grind that’s nearly gotten us into trouble too many times to count. Mostly because the world disappears when we do.
He turns us, pressing me against the counter, then grabbing me behind the thighs and lifting me so I’m sitting on it. Still, we kiss.
He shoves down both our waistbands and fumbles in the drawer for a tube of lube. I wrap my legs around his waist and drape my arms around his neck. He squirts a dollop in his palm and slicks it over both our shafts. With them pressed together, he slowly strokes both of us.
It’s easy for me to lose myself with him. Maybe if it’d ever felt like we had to force this, or like it wasn’t easy, it wouldn’t have lasted so damned long.
Nothing between us has ever felt anything but perfect, and that’s always been the problem. Because we both knew it, and he couldn’t get past his fear, even once he was out from under his family’s thumb and could walk away from them.
Maybe my perspective is different because my parents died a year after I married Zoey. Dad caught the flu and then pneumonia on top of it and died, and Mom died a week later from a heart attack. The doctors said it was a stress-induced coincidence, but no one can convince me she didn’t die of a broken heart.
Life is short. Too damned short to not get what you want from it, and to not show the people you love how much you love them.
Even if it’s the kind of love others want to tear you down over.
Meaning I’m never walking away from this man unless he orders me to go.
Now, it would appear, I don’t have that worry any longer.
I press my forehead against his and stare into his eyes as he strokes us. His brown gaze stares back at me, deep and intense and caught up in our mutual need. “Love you forever, man,” I whisper. “Never letting you go.”
I love the way the outer edges of his gaze soften as he sheds his inhibitions with me. “Love you, too. You’re stuck with me now.”
His lips crash onto mine, bruising and needy and desperate as his hand strokes us harder, faster. I come first with him not far behind me, both of us spilling all over each other and his hand and even our stomachs. We stand there, him leaning into me now, as our breathing slows and evens out again.
He kisses me again, gentle and tender now. “When’s our official anniversary?” he teases.
I kiss him back. “The day your divorce to her became final.”
We clean up and head to bed. Zoey’s got the far side tonight, which puts me in the middle in case Nolan needs to jump out in the middle of the night for Katie. We don’t have a ready excuse yet if she catches him coming out of our bedroom in the middle of the night, and we hope we don’t need one. We can always say we were talking, or watching TV, and fell asleep. I don’t know.
But as I lie there curled around him, I shove back my anger over Katie’s earlier revelation.
I’m hoping Jerilyn isn’t in our lives for another twelve years. But if she tries some bullshit with Katie, I’ll mortgage everything I’ve got and take out a bunch of credit cards, if I have to. to fund the war chest to destroy that woman.
Without hesitation.
And I know Zoey will be right there with me one hundred percent.
Chapter Thirteen
Nolan
Katie ends up staying through to the end of her next regularly scheduled visit. I won’t deny I’m feeling a little emotional when I drop her off at school that Friday morning, which will start the beginning of her week with Jerilyn. It’s been nice having both kids home with us, and we’ve definitely formed new daily routines. I end up picking Katie up from school only one day that week, and I count the days until I get her the next Friday and she’s home with us again.
Caine has become a regular fixture around our house. He still hasn’t come out to his parents, but he knows he can rely on us for backup when he finally decides to.
The boys have become co-conspirators with us in helping keep our secret from Katie. Luckily for us, she goes to bed before we do and we have to wake her up every morning for school, so it’s not a problem.
And we’re extremely vigilant about locking our bedroom door.
I try not to grill Katie about Jerilyn, but I have noticed the number of last-minute pick-up requests on Jer’s weeks dramatically dropped ever since that night Katie told me and Arlo about what she’d said to her mom.
Today is Monday, we’re six weeks into our new living arrangement, and I’m still kicking myself I didn’t do this sooner. Katie is happier than I can ever remember her being. Lucas is once again the smiling, happy kid we all know and love.
I guess I was lulled into a false sense of security. It’s a Katie week this week, and I take today off from work. Lucas has the day off from school because it’s a teacher planning day, and I want to go walk the Nokomis property again before we meet with the builder next week to start discussing what we need to do. Caine has a dentist appointment and can’t go with us. Katie, however, has school today, because her school has a different schedule than the high school. So after Lucas and I drop her off, we head to Nokomis, do our thing, and return to the house after grabbing lunch.
We’re home maybe twenty minutes when the doorbell rings, and I look to see it’s Jerilyn standing there.
Fuck.
I open the door. “Yeah?”
“I called your office and they said you took the day off.” Her gaze travels up and down me in a dismissive way that also makes me vaguely uncomfortable. Like she’s evaluating me.
I step outside and pull the door shut behind me. “Yeah? So? I had things to do. What do you want? Katie’s at scho
ol today.”
“We need to talk.”
I know that tone of voice. What does it say that my stomach sinks because of the trained response I have to it? How many times did one of our fights start just like this?
I step away from the front door, leading her into the shade of the large oak tree on that side of the yard. I don’t want Lucas to hear this conversation. He’s been through enough with his father. “Talk about what?”
She examines what looks like a fresh manicure. “I’m giving you an FYI that I’m moving. So if you want to keep Katie over the weekend and next week, you can, before we leave.”
I’m still not sure what she’s saying. “What do you mean, you’re moving?”
“Just what I said, Nolan. I’m transferring to California. An opening became available out there, so I’m taking it.” She finally looks at me and I recognize that evil gleam in her eyes.
Look at that. I think I’ve just hit my fuck-it point with her. “Katie’s not going to California with you.”
She actually scoffs. “You can’t stop me. This is too big an opportunity for me to pass up. Whole new set of clients.”
“Oh, actually, I can stop you. We have a divorce decree in place that states Katie won’t be moved from her school district if one parent’s living here.”
“And we can change it. That’s what people do, Nolan.”
I struggle to hold back my rage. “I’m not changing it. I’m not letting you take Katie to California. She’ll move in with me full-time, and you can have visitations during the summer and over school holidays.”
Jerilyn gets in my face. “If you don’t agree to her moving, I’ll make your life a living fucking hell, Nolan. I’ll file a police report saying you molested her.”
Rage fills me. I know I shouldn’t let her bait me but I’ve had it with her. “I’ve never touched her and you damn well know it!”
She smiles, but it looks cold, reptilian.
Now I get why Arlo and Zoey hate her guts. Why didn’t I see this aspect of her before I got her pregnant?
Even more importantly, why didn’t I listen to Arlo and Zoey about her way back then?
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