Risking Fate (11 page)

Ty and I did everything we could to make him comfortable, we even kept the worst of it from the family. Conner was trying so hard and he didn’t need extra eyes
judging
him. Besides, Ty wanted to do it for Conner. He wanted him to be able to trust us.

I grabbed my brother’s hand. “Conner, everything will be okay. The family doesn’t know the bad stuff.”

“What if my friends want to go out?”

I squeezed his hand. “It’s probably better if you don’t. Just hang out with us for the weekend. If it gets too bad then we can come home early. I can make up an excuse that I’m not feelin’ well. Ty will be cool about it.”

He leaned over and kissed my head. “I couldn’t do this without you, I hope you know that.”

Conner got up and headed back to his room. I heard him and Ty talking to each other in the hallway as they passed. I hadn’t thought about how hard things were going t
o be for Conner on our visit
. I knew
he missed his friends, but seeing them again, could test his sobriety. He and I both knew that he didn’t want to go down that road again.

It made me very nervous.

That night I told Ty about Conner and how worried I was. He told me that Conner had talked
to
him about it in the car and that he suggested the same thing. The two of them may have joked a lot and even gotten into heated arguments, but they acted like brothers. If something was wrong, they were the first ones to stand up for each other. Like always, Ty had Conner’s back and I knew we would be able to make it through the weekend if we just stuck together.

The next week flew by and we found ourselves packing up the cars again. This time Ty’s parents were coming. We still had to take two separate cars and of course Bella wanted to ride with her grandparents. I had to admit that I was a bit relieved.
My ride was going to be annoying enough with Conner and Ty.

Ty’s parents wanted us to all ride in their new SUV, but thankfully, Ty insisted we drive
separately
. It would have been too packed for us to be comfortable.

After four stops for pee breaks, we pulled into the ranch. Conner was the only one staying somewhere other than the main house, so we dropped him off at my
mom’s
first before unpacking our car.

While Ty carried everything up, Bella and I went into the living room to see Lucy and my aunt. Ty met us downstairs at the same time his parents walked into the room. The older adults began a full blown conversation, while Bella was itching to get to Noah. We saw ourselves out and headed toward Colt and Van’s house.

Chapter 8

Ty

Being in Kentucky was one of my favorite places.
I loved being with
my family.
When
the three of us
walked in the door, Iz went flying past us and headed up the steps to find Noah. We hear
d
him call her name and then a bunch of chattering upstairs.

Van’s mother was holding Christian when I went over to say hello. She gave Miranda a quick wave before giving her
grandchild
all of her attention.

We sat around the
house
for the rest of the evening catching up with everyone. It was nice being around the whole family and not having one single argument. My parents as well as my mother in law and John stayed up at the main house for dinner, while the rest of us ate at Colt’s place.

Van was so busy appeasing
her parents that she had little time to sit down and relax. Colt was sitting around talking about hunting with her father. I think he really missed doing that with my uncle. He’d been hunting with his dad since we were too small to even hold a gun.
It was always a tradition that, w
hile the women hung around the
house
, all the men got up before daylight and went out into the woods. Miranda was
kind of jeal
ous this year. She was the only girl in the family who loved to hunt
and since she had a big ole belly, I wouldn’t even let her think about going.

Izzy was still too little, but Colt planned on taking Noah, at least for a little while over the weekend.
Once she heard about it, she
started giving her mother and me
a fit to let her go.

The next morning, the
women got up and started making food for the celebration
.
The smell of home cooking
filled my
aunt’s
giant house. I reached around the bed before opening my eyes and realizing Miranda was already downstairs. I could hear female voices laughing and carrying on.

I sat up in bed and started wiping my eyes. After checking my phone, and realizing it was only eight in the morning, I
wanted
to go back to sleep. My daughter came running in the room and jumped on the bed. “Daddy, Mommy t
old me to wake you up. Come on
,”

She started pulling me out of bed. “Honey, Daddy is in his underwear. Let me get dressed and I will be down.”

She let go of my hand but stood there with her hands on her hips. She looked so much like
her
mother. I loved her big blue eyes and
that beautiful blonde hair. When she refused to take her eyes off of me, I pointed to my jeans. “Hand me those, Iz.”

She reached down and grabbed my jeans. I slid my legs around the bed, making sure nothing was hanging out of my boxers, then pulled the jeans up.
“
Do you need me to get your shirt?”

“No. Daddy can get it himself. Did your mother tell you to stalk me until I came down?”

She giggled. “Yes.”

I laughed. “Did you brush your teeth yet?”

She ran into the bathroom in front of me. I opened our zip lock bag and pulled out each of our toothbrushes. She held hers out and let me apply the toothpaste. We started brushing right away and I couldn’t help but laugh at her copying me. “Do you remember Daddy teaching you to brush your teeth?”

She wasn’t even two when I showed her, but it still was something that was special to me. She shrugged her shoulders and shook her head. She waited for me to spit first and then spit out her toothpaste. As I rinsed off my toothbrush, she stuck hers under the
water. I pushed hers out of the way and started smiling. “Daddy, no fair. Share the water.”

I leaned down and kissed the top of her head. “I couldn’t help it. You
’
r
e
too pretty not to tease. You ready to go downstairs?”

She grabbed my hand and led the way.

I headed right to the coffee pot, trying to avoid contact with the gabbing group of women at the table. Van’
s mother and my mother were
sandwiching Christian between them, talking to her in baby talk. I sat my cup down in front of Miranda and kissed her on the head. “Morning, Baby.”

She looked up at me as I reached over and took the baby out of her seat. The two women threw me a dirty look. “What? She’s my God child. Get in line.”

Christian loved getting attention, in fact I was pretty sure she got held way too much, but who was I to talk? If I could have held Izzy constantly when she was a baby I would have. I love
d
holding her and spending time with her.

Van’s mother caught my attention. “Ty, I think you’re in the wrong line of work. It looks like you should have your own Daddy daycare center.”

All of the women in the room turned to look at me rocking Christian in my arms. “Little girls love me, I can’t help that.”

Colt came up behind me. “You sound like a
pedophile
. Give me my child before you get all creepy.”

I pulled away from him, not letting him take her from me. “Christian, tell your daddy he is wrong. Tell him uncle Ty would never hurt you.” She smiled at me talking to her.

I looked up at the room full of people. “Just because I love kids, doesn’t make me a
pedophile
.” I stuck out my bottom lip like they all hurt my feeling
s
. After sitting Christian back down in her seat, I took my coffee and pouted my way out of the room.

Colt came in and sat next to me. He had Christian in his arms. She was cooing and drooling everywhere. “I was just kiddin’, Cuz.”

I threw the remote in the air and caught it, trying not to look him in the eye. “I’d never hurt a child.”

Maybe I was being defensive, but that wasn’t right.

“Man, you can dish out the jokes, but you can’t take em. Ty, you are the best father I have ever seen. The way you love your daughter is beautiful. After seeing you, it’s how I wanted to feel too. I envy you being a parent. Don’t get mad about my joke. Nobody in this house thinks that.”

He handed me Christian as a peace offering. Of course my mood changed immediately. Izzy came in the room with u
s and sat down so she could hold the
baby. She was fascinated by her and I could
n’t
wait for her to meet her two little brothers.

“You’re going to have two of those soon.”

She got a big smile on her face. “Can I help change their diapers?”

“You can change as many diapers as you want.” That wasn’t going to last long. I needed to get that in writing.

“Are you excited about being a big sister?” Colt asked.

She shook her head. “Uncle Colt, Noah says that when he gets big we are going to get married too.”

Colt let out a gasp, while I just sat there, not having any idea whether to laugh or cry. “Is that right?”

I patted her on the head. “Iz, you and Noah can’t get married to each other. You’re related.”

“Like cousins?” She asked.

“That’s right. You’re cousins.” I agreed.

“You and Mommy are cousins.”

Colt started laughing. I left him and Izzy sitting in the living room. “Miranda, I need you in here for a sec.”

She met me at the doorway and came walking in the room with me. We crouch
ed
down in front of Izzy, who was busy holding the baby. “Our daughter claims that her and Noah are going to get married when they grow up because they are cousins like we are.”

She looked from Iz to me. “Oh!” Miranda looked to Colt who was beside himself with laughter. She smacked him in the leg before turning her attention back to our daughter. “Honey, Daddy and I aren’t really cousins.
We're not blood related.
We just have the same cousin, which is your uncle Colt. Mommy and Daddy aren’t related at all. You and Noah are first cousins and you share the same blood. First cousins can’t get married, Baby.”

“That’s not fair. Other boys are stupid.”

Us adults laughed. I put my hand on her little knee. “One day you won’t feel that way. I hope it is when you are thirty or older, but I promise you will find someone else to love.”

“What about Noah?”

Colt step
ped into the conversation. “Noah will meet someone too. Then you can let your kids play together like you and Noah play. You and Noah don’t need to get married to be family, Bella, because you already are.”

I wasn’t sure she understood any of what we were saying, but I surely didn’t want her telling people that Miranda and I were cousins.
Obviously
,
we
needed to do a better job about cracking jokes around her.

Shortly after breakfast, we took the kids outside and let them ride the golf carts around. We were standing outside watching them when a strange car pulled up at the
house
. A man approached the house and Colt walked toward him.

“Can I help you?”

He held
up a paper and looked at it. “Can you tell me where to find a Miranda Healy Mitchell?”

Miranda stood up and started walking toward the guy. Just out of habit, I followed her.

“I’m Miranda.”

He handed her an envelope. “You’ve been served.”

I started to go after the guy for having the ne
rve to come here on today
of all days, but Colt grabbed my arm and held it until the guy took off down the road. As soon as he let me go
,
I walked over to Miranda. She had pulled the paperwork out
of
the envelope and sank down to the ground, crying. I rushed to her side and reached my arms around her as I grabbed the papers and read them for myself.

My worst fears were confirmed as I read them.

“What is it?” Colt asked.

My
heart
was beating so fast, I felt like I couldn’t breathe. I reached my arms around Miranda tighter and held her as she cried, trying to hold my own tears in.

“Dammit Ty, start talkin’.”

I handed him the papers. “Tucker’s mom
is petitioning for visitation
of Izzy.”