One Heir...or Two?

by Yvonne Lindsay

  “Mr. Murphy,” Imelda replied with a fiery look in her eye.

  “Oh, no, but we’re not... He’s not... It’s not like that between us.”

  Imelda merely raised her brows.

  “It’s not,” Kayla repeated adamantly. “Well, I guess I’ll find out soon enough what she wants. Are you sure you’ll be okay with Sienna tomorrow? I know Belle is on a rostered day off but I’m sure she wouldn’t mind having her for a couple of hours. She told me she had no plans for tomorrow but lazing around the pool and reading a book.”

  “Shush now—you know I love to have Sienna to myself. But just you be careful around that woman. I don’t trust her. It’s not natural for a woman to be so—” She broke off and searched for the right word. “So soulless.”

  “Soulless?” Kayla asked with a frown. “I only met her the once and she struck me as very...” she tried to think of a nice word for cold and settled on “...self-possessed, but she can’t be all that bad. She and Van were going to get married, weren’t they?”

  “Believe me, that woman never does or says anything that isn’t in her personal interests. She has a calculator where her heart should be. It was a good thing when Mr. Murphy broke their engagement and confined their relationship to business only.”

  “You didn’t think they suited one another?” Kayla knew she shouldn’t be prompting Imelda to gossip, but she couldn’t resist.

  “On the surface, maybe, but she could never give him what he needs. Not like you can.”

  Kayla shook her head. “Oh, no. He doesn’t want anything from me.”

  “Like a lot of men, he doesn’t know what he needs. He’s too busy looking out for everyone else to ever think about looking out for himself. You say he doesn’t want anything from you—what’s more to the point is that he doesn’t want to want anything from anybody. And wanting is one thing, but needing is entirely another. He needs you. You should think on that,” Imelda said.

  Kayla found herself watching Imelda’s back as she left the room and turned over the other woman’s words in her mind. Imelda couldn’t have been serious. Kayla had nothing to offer Van. Nothing he would admit to needing, anyway. As much as she hoped it could be possible for them to forge a new beginning together, he’d made it blatantly clear that it would never happen. Which left her wondering what the heck Dani wanted to talk to her about.

  * * *

  The next day, Dani was already waiting at the table when Kayla arrived at the restaurant. She stood and shook Kayla’s hand when she approached. The nerves that had skittered and danced in the pit of her stomach tightened into an uncomfortable knot. She’d been feeling queasy again all morning. There was no doubt that a lot of her discomfort came from nerves right now. She’d considered canceling but believed if she put Dani off, she’d only have to reschedule, because she had a feeling that Dani was persistent once she wanted something.

  “Please, sit,” Dani directed. “What would you like to drink?”

  “Just filtered iced water for me, please.”

  “Of course.” Dani smiled in return and gestured for one of the waiters to take their drinks order.

  Once he was gone, Dani turned her full attention on Kayla. Kayla studied her. She hadn’t changed at all from the first time Kayla had seen her—still impeccably groomed and with her hair a perfect glossy swing about the china-doll perfection of her face. It made Kayla want to reach for her more tousled locks and try to tame them into some semblance of order but she forced herself to keep her hands still.

  “I imagine that you’re wondering why I called you.”

  Kayla could only nod.

  “I want Donovan back, and you’re going to help me get him,” she said in a tone that, while perfectly pleasant, held undertones that made Kayla uncomfortable.

  “I don’t see how I have any influence in the matter. Van very much does as he pleases,” Kayla replied as evenly as she could.

  Dani smiled at her condescendingly, much as one would to a particularly dense person. “I thought you’d say as much. Let’s be honest here. You and I both know that Donovan is miserable with the current state of affairs.”

  “I wouldn’t say miserable, exactly,” Kayla defended, but she knew he wasn’t happy. There’d been a cloud hanging over him since their night together that made him more distant than ever.

  “There’s no point in lying to yourself,” Dani continued. She waved her slender ringless hands extravagantly. “He made a commitment based on an emotional reaction to a situation that took him completely by surprise and he’s too honorable to step away from it, even though he knows it’s a huge mistake. It’s up to you and me to make it right.”

  Dani reached into an impossibly elegant narrow leather briefcase and pulled out a thin sheaf of papers, which she then slid across the table to Kayla.

  “I’d like you to look over this. I think you’ll find the terms quite agreeable.”

  Kayla picked up the papers and read through the document. It was pretty clear, despite the legal jargon contained inside. Dani was offering her money, a great deal of money, to move out of Van’s home and away to another city. In return, all she had to do was promise not to contact Van again. On paper, it all looked quite simple and straightforward but everything in Kayla revolted at the idea. Even though she knew she had no future with Van, what about the children? What about his relationship with them?

  An all-too-familiar sick feeling bloomed in her stomach. She reached for her iced water and took a sip to try to settle her nerves but it was no use.

  “Excuse me,” she blurted and rose to her feet.

  Kayla let the papers fall to the table and rushed toward where she’d seen the restrooms. Once there, her stomach convulsed, forcing her to lose the light breakfast she’d eaten a couple of hours ago and leaving her feeling weak and wrung out. With shaking hands, she flushed the toilet and went to the basin and washed her hands, running cold water over her wrists for some time before grabbing a paper towel, moistening it, and wiping her face and the back of her neck before the nausea could swell again.

  Her eyes swam with the words printed on the agreement Dani had presented to her. It was painfully clear-cut. Dani wanted her to leave Van, and she was prepared to pay richly for what she wanted. Kayla would have unfettered access to a trust fund established for her and the children and the security of a fully serviced apartment to help her so she could afford to raise the children on her own. All she had to do was cut Van from her life, and the lives of the children, completely. Dani had even offered new identities for them all so she wouldn’t have to worry about Van coming after them to claim custody. That was how far she was prepared to go.

  Kayla had thought things like that were to be found solely in soap operas and the movies, not in everyday people’s lives. It seemed too impossible to contemplate. Besides, she’d already signed a contract with Van. She was still bound by that, wasn’t she? She balled up the paper towel and cast it in the trash bin. Could she do that to him? Disappear without a trace? Wouldn’t that be the utmost cruelty?

  But what about the way he’d just excised himself from their lives when he’d taken that job overseas? she asked herself. Was that really the kind of father she wanted for her children? A man who would come and go at will without any consideration for them?

  Kayla looked at her reflection in the mirror. She was pale but relatively composed. Dani would be waiting at the table and she needed to go back and face up to the other woman’s offer. Even as she left the restroom and walked back to their table, she had no idea what to say. However, once she was settled back in her chair, Dani didn’t waste any time on working to convince her to see things her way.

  “All under control again now, are we?” she said with a saccharine smile.

  “Yes, thank you.”

  “I couldn’t go through what you’re suffering, not to
mention what else it’s doing to your body.” She gave an elegant shudder. “Far too messy and so undignified.”

  Kayla didn’t say anything; she simply couldn’t, because she knew if she opened her mouth, she’d say something she’d probably regret. She was beginning to see what Imelda had warned her of. Dani obviously had no maternal urge at all—no idea of the love a mother bore for her child, no matter what carrying that child did to her. Dignity didn’t even begin to enter into the equation. But it also made her wonder what Dani felt she offered Van. Surely no woman that focused on composure could truly feel passion for anyone. She didn’t love him—she seemed to want to acquire him instead.

  “So, what do you think of my offer?” Dani continued. “It’s more than generous, and with the additional college funds established for the children, you should have no concerns for their future, either. Like I said, I want Donovan back. We’re good together, and since you’ve been back on the scene with your growing brood, he’s been different. Unhappy. Unfocused. He needs me more than he knows, and with you and the children out of the way, he won’t have the distractions that have derailed our plans for our business and for a future together.”

  Unhappy? Maybe he’d been unhappy recently, but certainly not all the time. Kayla thought for a moment of the laughter she’d heard when he’d been playing with Sienna out on the lawn the other day. He certainly hadn’t sounded unhappy then. But then she remembered the expression on his face when he caught her watching them and what an outsider it had made her feel like. “He said he wants the children. It was his choice to be a part of their lives.”

  “Is that what he told you?” Dani shook her head sorrowfully. “Oh, you poor deluded girl. Of course Donovan would want you to believe that, because that would be the right thing to do. But trust me, deep down, he doesn’t want children cluttering up his life. He would do whatever he had to to ensure they were taken care of, of course. But he never, ever, wanted to be involved in raising children himself.

  “With all the pressure this situation has put on him, he’s been distracted at work and I’m sure you will agree that such a thing in his line of business can be dangerous. It’s my desire to rid him of said distractions so he can put his mind where it’s most valuable.”

  “On business, or on you?” Kayla asked bitterly.

  “Both, of course. We are one and the same, after all. Donovan and I are meant to be together, Kayla. Surely you can see that. We’re similar in so many ways—we have the same dreams, the same purpose. We’re perfect for one another and we always will be. I understand he has needs. He is, after all, such a lusty creature, as I’m sure you know.” Dani trilled a little laugh that scraped along Kayla’s nerve endings and made her bristle with anger.

  “Why would I know that?” She kept her voice cool, desperate not to betray the emotions that burned just beneath the surface.

  “Oh, you know what I’m talking about.” Dani gave her a conspiratorial look. “Donovan and I don’t keep secrets from one another.”

  He’d told her about sleeping with Kayla? How could he? More important, why would he? Unless it had meant absolutely nothing to him at all. Unless he’d merely done it to try to work an itch out of his system.

  Kayla stared at the pen. Gold, of course, with some fancy name engraved on it. It probably cost more than her last car did. Could she do this? Could she sign the offer that Dani had presented her and simply vanish from Van’s life with his children? She wondered about the legal ramifications of that, about whether or not he’d pursue her.

  “Questions, Kayla?” Dani pushed into her thoughts.

  “Van threatened me with legal action if he didn’t have access to the children the last time. Who’s to say he won’t do that again if I agree to your terms?”

  “Should such a thing happen, and I assure you it won’t, I will take care of everything for you, I promise. Here, I’ll even write that in.” She took the contract back and wrote in an addendum on the last page, marking her initials beside it. Skimming over it, Kayla noticed that it transferred legal liability for any conflicts to Dani. “He’ll listen to me,” Dani assured her.

  “And you’re certain he doesn’t want the children anymore? He fought me hard to have shared custody of them. You’re absolutely sure he’s changed his mind about that now?”

  “Well, obviously.” Dani looked quite pointedly at the new contract. “As I said, his sense of honor demanded he do something about his children even though he didn’t want them.”

  “And his sense of honor has disappeared now? Why didn’t he talk to me about this? Why leave it to you?”

  “Let’s just say that the reality of being a father has turned into something he didn’t expect. And, let’s be honest, it’s all getting so untidy, isn’t it? Far better I deal with it and present him with a lovely clean slate to move forward with.”

  Dani’s words had a ring of truth to them, but could Kayla trust them—or even trust the woman herself? She looked at the contract and thought hard about it. She’d admitted to herself only yesterday that she wanted out of the situation she’d found herself in. And there was no way she’d leave Sienna behind if she did find a way to leave. Dani was offering her a way out for both of them. A very lucrative way. As much as she hated to admit it, the woman’s offer was tempting.

  Kayla’s biggest concern all along had been that Van would bail on his new family when things became too much for him on an emotional level. And hadn’t he already proved that to be true after the night they’d slept together? He’d shut down completely since, ensuring she understood she had no future with him, nothing at all. And here she had a gold-plated opportunity to get out and stay out. A chance to start her life over.

  “He wouldn’t need to know where I’ve gone, would he?” she asked.

  Dani, obviously sensing she was getting closer to her goal, gave Kayla the most genuine smile Kayla had seen from her so far. “Not at all. I’ll make sure that Donovan is completely unaware of the finer details of our agreement and I’ve promised to ensure you’re protected from him legally. He won’t bother you again, trust me—we’ll be too busy building our future.”

  Everything in Kayla screamed at her not to do it. She wanted Van to bother her—she wanted him in her life and in the lives of their children. But did he want the same thing?

  No, he did not.

  She made her decision, all the while feeling as though she was watching from the outside of some kind of glass prison. Her fingers clasped around the ornate gold pen. She had to do this, didn’t she? It was what was best for Sienna and for Kayla’s unborn son—and, ultimately, no matter how much it hurt, it was what was best for her. Their little family of three would want for nothing under the terms of the agreement. They’d have their own place, not be in forced living conditions under the roof of a man who now barely tolerated her presence.

  “This is costing you a lot of money,” she hedged. “Are you certain you want to do this?”

  Dani made a shooing motion with her hand. “It’s nothing to me financially. Donovan, however, is everything to me and as I said earlier, I’ll do whatever it takes to have him back and make him happy again.”

  The last four words she uttered echoed in Kayla’s mind. Yes, she was doing this not just for herself and for the children; she was doing this for Van, too. He deserved to be happy, didn’t he?

  She picked up the pen and scored her signature on the page.

  Fourteen

  He’d irrationally looked forward to coming home for days now. Normally he had no difficulty staying away, doing his job, losing himself in the work, but this trip had felt different. He’d had plenty of time at night, when he couldn’t sleep, to search his soul for why and it had come as a painful revelation to admit to himself that he missed Kayla and Sienna with an ache that went soul deep.

  Initially he’d dismissed it—putti
ng it down to the fact that he was on the East Coast, a long way from the life he’d carved out for himself, and the fact that he was averaging sixteen-to eighteen-hour days and less than four hours’ sleep each night. It was hard on a body and sleep deprivation could do awful things to a man’s mind. He knew that intimately from his time in the army.

  It only made sense that he’d crave an alternate existence, he’d reasoned, especially when that alternative lived so enticingly under his very roof. But, he’d reminded himself often, even that wouldn’t last. As soon as his son was born and weaned, Kayla would be gone again and they’d share custody of the two children. Live sensible, detached parallel lives just the way he’d dictated all along. The way he wanted it, he reminded himself.

  Somehow, though, he didn’t want to live like that anymore. Somewhere along the line he’d felt a shift in his thinking—sensible and detached wasn’t nearly enough now. And he couldn’t use the argument that Kayla was unreliable—she was not the flighty dreamer she’d been in her younger years. Yes, she still had an impulsive and giving heart and always wanted to help those in worse circumstances than her own—to her detriment, as he’d seen—but that in itself didn’t make her a bad person. She was a really good, loving and consistent mom, and considering the toll her pregnancies had taken on her physically, he had to admire that she hadn’t let her physical complications deter her from her vow to her sister. That took guts no matter which way you looked at it.

  “You need to man up,” he said out loud, thumping the steering wheel beneath his hands. “Be honest with yourself.”

  And maybe, like Kayla had said, stop running scared from his emotions. But could he learn to trust like she wanted him to? Could he open himself up to his fears of inadequacy, rejection and failure? First it had been the parents who’d brought him up who’d scarred his heart. Then it had been the truth about his birth family that had put the seal on it. And he was damaged goods, let’s face it. With a predisposition to alcoholism and a past in which he’d done unspeakable things to unspeakable people in the line of duty, he was no prize. And yet she said she loved him.