things had gotten pretty strenuous when she and Zoe had struggled together—not to mention the strain of dragging her grandmother’s old wooden dresser across the door to stop Zoe from breaking her way back into the bedroom. Already she could feel aches and pains in every part of her body. She wrapped her arms across her stomach, holding herself tight. She couldn’t lose the babies, not now.
“Kayla?”
Van said her name impatiently, forcing her to drag her thoughts together.
“I’m insured. I’ll call someone after I get a hold of the building manager to report the damage,” she said weakly.
“And how long do you think it’ll take before they can get contractors here? Leave it to me.”
Without waiting for her response, Van pulled up a number on his cell phone and started talking. She dropped her head against the back of the chair and closed her eyes again, opening them only when he finished his call.
“A team will be here in about thirty minutes.”
He could do that? Just how much pull did he have these days? She didn’t want to think about the answer to that question. Van gave her a look, as if he could see exactly what she was thinking.
“You look awful,” he said. “Can I get you anything?”
“Sure, a million dollars would be nice, since you’re asking,” she answered flippantly, then cringed, realizing that probably wasn’t going to help her cause.
She hastened to head him off before he verbalized some cutting comeback. “I’m sorry. It’s just the shock talking. Maybe...” She turned toward the kitchen, staring at the empty cupboards, some doors hanging drunkenly on their hinges. “I’d have said a cup of tea would be good about now, but she’s trashed the kitchen, hasn’t she?”
“Leave it to me,” Van said again, righting Sienna’s high chair on his way through the mess. He picked up her battered electric kettle and held it aloft. “We have progress,” he said, then proceeded to rinse it out before refilling it and plugging it back in to heat. While he waited, he started to put things back in the cupboards—what hadn’t been smashed to pieces, at least.
“You don’t have to do that,” she protested.
“You said you’ll talk when this is all cleaned up. I’m cleaning up.”
The not-so-subtle reminder that he still expected to talk with her tonight did not go unnoticed. While Kayla sipped her tea, Van continued to work through the kitchen, setting it to rights as much as he could. Broken crockery went in a cardboard box. Undamaged food was stacked in the small pantry. Steadily, he restored order. By the time his crew arrived, he was almost done with the kitchen.
Kayla was surprised at the men who came through her front door. One had a prosthetic leg, another severe burn scars down one side of his face and neck, along with several missing fingers. After greeting Van with a camaraderie that obviously went back years, they got to work fast—replacing the shattered pane in her sliding door and putting in new locks. While they worked, Van made and received several calls. Kayla could do nothing but watch and tell them where she wanted the remaining unbroken pieces of furniture set. She thought they were finally all done, but when she saw them begin to install a wireless security system, she started to protest.
“Van, what’s that? I don’t need some fancy security system and I certainly can’t afford it, either.”
“Humor me,” he said darkly. “Security is my business, and, correct me if I’m wrong, it is my daughter in that bedroom, and those are my children you’re carrying, aren’t they?”
If she was still carrying them. “Y-yes,” she managed to say on the swell of emotion that threatened to overwhelm her.
It was the first time she’d heard him actually acknowledge the babies as his. The intimation that he’d take care of them, all of them, was loud and clear. Relief seeped through her whole body. He was going to help her. Hadn’t he just said as much?
It was after midnight when his team finished. Van saw them to the door and locked it behind them. Double locked and chained, Kayla noted. She fought back a yawn as Van walked back toward her, pocketing one set of keys and handing the other set to her.
“You’re keeping a set?” she asked, a little confused.
“Let’s call it protecting my investment,” he said cryptically.
“Investment?”
“Since you seem to be incapable of looking after yourself responsibly, obviously it’s up to me to do so.”
The warm buzz of hope that had filled her only a short while ago faded fast.
“What exactly do you mean by that?”
“It’s too late for me to do anything about the embryo transfer. As much as I vehemently disagree with what you did, I can’t undo it. But I can make sure that my children are brought up safe.”
“That’s what I want, too,” Kayla agreed.
“Really? And yet you were the one who brought a stranger in off the street to live with you and Sienna. A woman whose background you hadn’t investigated, someone with no references. Honestly, Kayla—a drug addict? That’s your idea of safe?”
“She wasn’t on drugs when I invited her to stay here. And she showed me her qualifications. She is a trained child-care worker and she loved Sienna.”
No matter how much she remonstrated, Kayla knew in her heart that Van was right. She trusted people too easily and look where that had left her. Broke and broken.
“Did you know she was suspended from her last place of employment because she failed a drug test—not once but twice?”
Kayla felt sick to her stomach, and not just because she was pregnant. “No, I didn’t know that.”
“Obviously.” Van pushed his fingers through his hair, messing it into a wild tousle that only made him look even more lethal, more attractive, than ever. “I want custody of the children.”
“Shared custody, of course. I think it’s important that the children get to know their father.”
Van cast her a look, his green eyes as deep and unfathomable as a forest lake. “No, Kayla, you misunderstand me. Not shared custody, full custody. It starts with Sienna and will continue with the new babies when they’re born.”
That sick feeling inside her surged. “You can’t mean that. You can’t take her away from the only parent she’s ever known. It would be cruel. Besides, she’s mine. No judge will award you full custody. You signed away your rights already.”
“No judge? Really? And when shown your unstable background, your bad choices and your deadbeat friends, do you really think a judge isn’t going to look more favorably upon me? Let’s see, shall we?” He began to enumerate a few of the escapades she’d gotten caught up in as a teenager, some of which had involved the police.
“Look, everyone makes mistakes when they’re young and foolish. Half the population of this country wouldn’t have children if what you did as a kid was the only measure of how appropriate a parent you’d
