Life's Next Chapter (22 page)

I see her fear when I look at her. Fear she will lose the one person in her life. I can relate. I think that is why my mother never fell in love with another man because of my fear. Still holding her hands, “Dani, please trust me when I say you’ll never lose your father. Your father is capable of loving so much. You’ll always be his baby girl, even if he has another daughter. He has enough love in his heart for you and the baby. And once the baby comes, if you feel your father has brushed you off, then come to me. I’ll make certain you get your time with your father. I’m not here to tear apart families, or to be selfish and create a new one just for me. I want both of our families to merge into one happy family. That’s all I want: for everyone to be happy. No titles, no status, no comparison. Just love and happiness, together.”

She lets go of my hand to wipe away the tears falling down her face. “I can see why my father is head over heels in love with you. You have a heart the size of Texas, and I’m sorry for not giving you a chance.”

“You’re giving me a chance now, that’s all that matters. Now, let’s eat, because your brother or sister is starving.” She gives me her big beautiful smile, just like Luke’s, and we eat in silence for a few minutes as I inhale my cheeseburger.

At the end of our day together, I dropped her off at home. Since Luke still wasn’t home, I helped her unpack before I left to get the girls from Keith’s.

Keith was fired from the police department after the accusations and complaints against him. So, he was not too pleased. He constantly sends me texts with verbal threats, but he hasn’t done anything more to freak me out. We go back to court in a month. I plan to fight him for sole custody. He’s looking into going to New York to help his father’s business. I want nothing more than for him to go. Hell, I’d be happy to help him pack.

I get chills walking up to his condo, remembering what he did to me in the hallway. Luckily, the social worker stays until I pick them up. I hear the girls laughing as I knock on the door.

Ms. Vicki opens the door, greeting me, “Hi, Ms. Caldwell, how are you?”

Stepping into the foyer I reply, “Good, Vicki, how are you? How were my girls?”

The words aren’t even out of my mouth before I hear Keith drawl, “Our girls are great, we had fun. Didn’t we, girls?” He practically drags the girls to me.

“Daddy took us to see gators, Momma, and we saw this man jiggle chicken in front of the gator and the gator ate it,” Julia says in excitement.

“But, Momma, it was dead chicken, like the chicken you cook, not like the chicken with feathers,” Nicole chimes in.

“Then we come back to Daddy’s house and we watched
Gator Boys
and these boys swim in the water and tie up gators,” Julia tells me, elated.

“Seriously? Thanks, Keith,” I grit out. That’s all I need, an infatuation with gators, especially when we have a small pond on the property. “No, problem, sugar,” he replies. I shiver at the new pet name he’s given me. I tell the girls to get their things and kiss Daddy goodbye. Ms. Vicki walks out the door and we follow. I hold each little hand in mine and we move toward the stairwell. “Oh, sugar, I hear congrats are in order for you. Your cunt trapped another poor bastard,” he says snidely while leaning against the door. I heard Ms. Vicki gasp at his vulgar comment. I stood still, listening to what he said, but I didn’t let him see my eyes or the expression on my face. Once he stopped spewing shit out of his mouth, I pulled the girls and walked briskly for the stairs.

The girls were buckled in their seats when Ms. Vicki came around and asked me if he says these things in front of the girls. I told her every now and then it happens. I try to make a point of it not affecting me because if I do they will draw more from it. She pulls out her pen and writes in her folder. “I’m putting what he just said into my notes. I also have notes from his discussion with the girls about your pregnancy. I have to say, you need to talk to the girls about this, that the baby has nothing to do with their daddy, and that this baby has a different daddy.”

Christ, just hearing her say all that makes me feel like such a trashy mom. “Will do, Ms. Vicki, thank you. We’ll see you next time.”

I GRAB MCDONALDS for the girls and me on our way home. I don’t feel like cooking, and I’m in the mood for another burger. When we’re home and sitting at the kitchen table, I call Luke to see what he’s doing, since I haven’t heard from him all day.

Our conversation is quick and to the point, and I feel like he’d rather not talk to me. Since Thanksgiving, I’ve only seen him a handful of times. I keep telling myself this will change once he moves in, but I have a nagging feeling something is up with him. He tells me he’ll stop by tonight. I don’t question what time; I say good-bye and hope he comes.

The girls are playing with their new toy when I tell them we need to talk. “Nicole. Julia. Girls, eyes on me, we need to have a big talk.” The girls put their toys down and look at me with their big brown eyes. “Did you tell Daddy that mommy is going to have a baby?” They look at each other as if I am asking them a trick question.

“Nini said it, Momma. She told Daddy you have a baby in your belly.”

Nicole looks to me and I can see her lower lip quiver. “Aw, Nini, you aren’t in trouble, lovey. I just wanted to know. There are some things Daddy doesn’t need to know, especially things that go on between Luke and Mommy. This is Luke’s baby, not Daddy’s. Daddy has you two, and Luke will have this one.”

“Just like Luke has Dani, each Daddy gets two kids.” Nicole smiles up to me. I smile and laugh to myself at the logic that goes through her brain.

“Yes, love. So, you see, Daddy really doesn’t need to know stuff about Luke or this baby. Once the baby comes, he or she won’t get to know your daddy, because your daddy belongs just to you two.” They nod their head in unison.

“Momma, how did Luke’s baby get in your belly?” my ever so inquisitive daughter Nicole asks. I look into those beautiful puppy dog brown eyes and scramble to think of an appropriate answer for a four year old. Just as I open my mouth, the house phone rings.
Thank you…saved by the phone.

As I pick up the phone to answer it, I tell the girls to go play in their room. Jeremy, my stable hand, is on the other end of the line. “Dr. Caldwell, my car broke down and I won’t be able to make it out there tonight to feed the horses.”

“No problem, Jeremy, I’ll take care of it myself. See you tomorrow.”

Walking upstairs to change my clothes, I hear the girls talking, about gators, of course. I would love to release a gator on Keith’s ass for this. I change my shirt and put my boots on. I tell the girls I’m going to the stable to feed the horses and ask if they want to come. They would rather play on their swing set than help with the horses, and I oblige because it’s still light out.

I make my way through the eight stalls and feed each horse. My lower back hurts. I know I shouldn’t be lifting the bags of feed. I’m at the last stall with my favorite horse, Kara. She was the first horse I boarded. Her owner is some old lady who doesn’t even come to see her or ride her. She basically just handed her over to me. She’s a beautiful chocolate brown with eyes that can touch your soul. She’s so gentle and I love riding her; I miss riding her. I need to tell Jeremy and Chad they are going to have to exercise these horses more, since I can’t ride them for a while.

Luke’s truck pulls up and the girls scream for him. Minutes later, with one girl in each arm, he walks into the stable and to the stall I’m in. He sets the girls down and tells them to go play. “What the hell are you doing, Kate?”

Hand on my hips, I look at him with a ‘you’re shitting me look’. “I’m feeding my horses, Luke. Jeremy’s car broke down, and I had to feed them since I didn’t know if you were coming or not. Tell me, what the fuck got stuck up your ass to be such a dickhead to me?”

He walks to me, grabs my wrists, and wraps them around his waist. “Damn, baby, I’m sorry. Finding you in here lifting this crap worries me. You’re pregnant and shouldn’t be doing this. I told you I was coming over.”

I push him back and look up at him. He looks like he’s lost sleep, judging by the dark circles under his eyes. “I didn’t know if you would show or not. We really haven’t been talking lately.”

He pulls me to him for a hug, with one arm around my waist and his other hand at the nape of my neck. He kisses my neck and trails his warm tongue along my jaw line. “I’m sorry, sunshine. I’ve missed you. Missed these beautiful lips of yours,” he softly says as he kisses me. “I love you. I love you so damn much,” he whispers against my neck. I pull away before this moment gets more intense and finish my time with Kara. “She’s a beauty.”

“This is Kara, she was my first horse here and I’ve had her ever since. I’ve kind of adopted her. She’s my favorite. Just don’t tell the other horses.” I wink at Luke, still kind of pissed about how he acted, but I’m trying to blow it off, especially after everything that happened with Keith. I’m not even bringing the subject up to Luke.

He helps me clean up the mess and get the girls inside. I give them a quick shower and get them dressed for bed. I tuck them in and kiss them goodnight. Luke is already in the bedroom, watching TV. “I’m going to take a shower,” I inform him as I walk to the bathroom, not even bothering to look at him. He wants to play these games, so be it. He wants to stay in his black hole and not talk to me, fine. I’m tired!

For a minute I really thought Luke would pull his head out of his ass and come shower with me, but he never came in. And I took a long damn shower, too. He’s no longer sitting in the chair when I get out of the shower. Well, shit he might have just left. I’m trying so hard to be a bad ass at this, and pretend his actions aren’t hurting my feelings, but whom am I kidding. I have hormone grand central station running through me and it takes too much to be strong, so I cry staring at the empty chair. He left and didn’t say goodbye. I slowly get dressed in a pair of boxers and a cami. When I walk to the stairs to go and lock up the house, I see the girls’ bedroom light back on. Walking over, I hear Luke talking to the girls.

“So, will you be our new daddy when momma marries you?” Julia asks.

“Sweetheart, I will never be your real daddy, you already have one, but I’ll be what’s called a step-dad. You can just call me Luke if you want. We wouldn’t want to upset your daddy with you calling me daddy, too. You only have one, and that name is reserved for your daddy.”

“It’s okay, momma says we shouldn’t mention you or the baby to Daddy. Daddy just gets mad anyways, and says mean things to Momma and makes her sad,” Nicole mumbles. I put my hand over my mouth to hold back the sobs. As much as I pray they’ll never hear the rancid things Keith says, they do; they hear every damn ugly word out of his mouth.

“Did Daddy upset Momma today?” Luke asks quietly.

“Yep, he called Momma bad names. Something about trap and bastard,” Julia barks out.

I hear Luke hiss. “Girls, we don’t repeat bad words, it’s not nice and it wasn’t nice of your daddy.”

“Daddy needs a big time out,” Julia declares. I sense Luke is tucking them back into bed as I hear him walking around the room.

“Girls, no more talk. It’s time to have sweet dreams.” I listen as he blows kisses and switches the lights off. I run down to the hallway and back into the bathroom. I need to clean my face again before he sees me crying.

I wait a while. Then I can see by the bottom of the door he turned out the bedroom lights. I open the door to see him lying in bed with the TV on. “Come here we need to talk.” Pulling the covers back, I crawl into bed. I slide in and roll onto my side facing him. “How much did you hear?” He couldn’t possibly know I was outside the room.

“Huh?”

Pulling me closer into his warm chest. “You heard me, how much did you hear?”

“How did you know?” I ask as I glide my hand over his chest and shoulder, feeling the softness of his new skin compared to the skin that was never burned.

“Honey, I was trained to listen to everything. I slept with one eye open for many years, too. So I know you were in the hallway, and I heard you run back into the bathroom. So, how much?”