the pill. Maybe the promise of love and life hadn’t been uppermost in his mind when his mother had been dying, but he had an inkling how helpless and hopeless she must have felt.
He couldn’t judge her for using procreation as a coping strategy, either, could he? Not when he’d employed it with her—in a rather shortsighted manner—when he’d been under the duress of Adara’s confession about Nic.
And where was the point in being angry about what she should have done? It couldn’t be undone. The child was here.
Still, he couldn’t face this, couldn’t face fatherhood. What kind of an example had been set for him? Look at his back.
Not that the children had any idea how useless he was. Once they’d scattered their new toys across the blanket Jaya had spread on the floor of the lounge, Evie brought him a book.
“Jaya’s the reader. I’m the sentry,” he said, motioning to his sprawled body acting as a fence between the corner of a chair and the length of the sofa to keep them corralled.
“Peas,” she implored with a heart-stealing smile, reeling him in an inch. Until today he hadn’t spent much time with her, but she was the most gentle, tender thing he’d ever seen, enchanted with Baby Zepper, chattering like old friends to Androu, missing her parents and thus taking to Jaya with impulsive hugs and embraces.
“Sure, I’ll read,” Jaya said breezily. “If Uncle takes the next dirty bottom.”
“Never mind. I got this.” Theo sat up so his back was against the edge of the sofa.
Evie wormed herself into his side, making him lift his elbow in surprise. The weight of her head felt surprisingly endearing as she let it droop against his rib cage.
He imagined she was just getting sleepy, but it still felt like a very trusting gesture, one that gave him a funny sensation of fullness around his heart.
As he started to read, Androu toddled over with a car clutched in his fist, drool glossing his chin. As he plopped down on Theo’s other side, a drip fell to slide down Theo’s wrist.
“Seriously, dude, I’m going to talk to your parents about your manners.”
“He can’t help teething,” Jaya scolded, coming across with a tissue to dry the boy’s face.
As she bent, Theo raised his hand so she could wipe the spit off his arm. Zephyr, balanced on her hip, read some kind of invitation from their body language and tilted out of her grip, reaching out with his short arms for Theo.
Jaya gasped, so caught by surprise she almost dropped the boy.
Theo had no choice but to catch him one-handed, guiding the boy into a safe landing against his chest. The tot flipped and slid into his lap like an otter down a log.
Distant base instincts cautioned him about the tiny feet kicking near his jewels, but a stronger, less easy to define reaction took over. He was shaken by the natural way Zephyr relaxed into him. It was passive aggression at its best, clashing into his protective inner walls with unseen yet gong-like reverberations. He’d been avoiding touching the boy, thinking he’d decide later whether he’d take an active part in the boy’s life, after he’d figured out what to make of the situation and how many options he had.
He didn’t want this puppy warmth sitting in his center, thawing the tight frozen pillars he used to brace himself against the world.
But when he looked up at Jaya, thinking to ask her to take him, her expression was so vulnerable, so fearful of rejection on the boy’s behalf, he couldn’t do that to her. Hell, he couldn’t do it to a child. To his son.
This situation was the most perplexing, dumbfounding circumstance of his life, but these little creatures were incredibly defenseless. Like her, he couldn’t understand how anyone could hurt a child. He certainly couldn’t do it himself.
Which didn’t make him father material, he reminded himself, ignoring the clenched sensation around his heart. Kids needed a lot more than the basics of food and shelter and a soft place to sit. Nascent things like love were beyond him so she was setting him up for failure with Zephyr. That was not something he could easily forgive, but he couldn’t hurt the boy out of anger with her.
Aware of Jaya standing over him, arms hugged across her middle, he refused to look up to see how she reacted to his playing human recliner.
“There was a farm up the road from my mother’s house in Chatham,” he said, trying for dismissive when he could hear the rattled edge in his tone. “I saw a sow there once, knocked over by her own piglets because they wanted to nurse. Now I know how she felt.” He wasn’t doing this because he wanted to, he implied. He had no choice.
He began to read aloud, silently willing her to go away. It was one thing to have his emotions hanging by a thread while children listened to him struggle through a story. They wouldn’t know the difference, but Jaya was perceptive. He hated knowing she could tell how confused and defenseless this made him.
After a few seconds, she drew a hitched breath.
“Do you know if Androu has a bottle before bed? I’m going to make one for Zeph.” Her voice was blessedly lacking in inflection.
“Text Adara and ask.”
“Okay, but—” She started across to her phone. “What have you told her? Does she know I’m here?”
“I told Gideon I’d recruited you, but that was when we first got here. They don’t know about...” He looked down at the dark head turning against his breastbone, more interested in the older babies and chewing his fist than the picture book.
Jaya didn’t answer. He thought she was texting until he heard the familiar shutter-click of the camera app. He glanced up in dismay.
She shrugged. “This might never happen again.” Her trim figure, encased in three-quarter length jeans and a lime-green shirt, disappeared toward the kitchenette.
He drew in a breath that burned his lungs, suddenly wondering whether he had any choice when it came to involvement in his son’s life. Jaya might have made up her mind that this might never happen again.
“I CAN HONESTLY say this has been the most grueling day of my life,” Theo said, flopping onto the sofa when he and Jaya came back to the lounge after settling all the babies.
“Try nineteen hours of labor,” she chirped, picking up toys rather than sitting.
Guilt assailed him. He’d put his sister’s pregnancy ahead of Jaya’s. Unknowingly, sure, but at the time he’d convinced himself he was putting both women’s best interests ahead of his own. Somehow he didn’t think saying so would be an easy sell to the woman who’d struggled through childbirth alone.
“Was it bad?” he asked, bracing inwardly while leaning to gather the toys within reach.
“It wasn’t a picnic, but it was fairly typical. He was worth it.”
“That’s what my sister says. I don’t know how women do it.” He searched
