Connor laughed in spite of himself.
“She’s a girl. Kids need a mommy. Sue me. Give her a chance. You might like her.
“Con, I didn’t want you to think you had to support them. Or had to do a damn thing. You’d already done enough. You gave us our family and we’re grateful. We gave you your freedom because we thought it was best.
“But never doubt that we thought of you every day. Every time we looked into the triplets’ faces, there you were. So forgive me if you can—and if you can’t, I understand. I still love you—Jackie.”
Pain swamped the anger and for the first time in days, Con felt calm. She was wrong to do it, but he understood. He didn’t want to forgive her, but how could he not?
Holding the letter, he smoothed his fingertip across the boldly slanted writing and murmured, “I love you, too, Jacks.”
“Jackie made it clear in her letter that they wanted Dina to have custody,” Colt said quietly when he’d finished reading it. He handed the paper over to Con, who stared at it for a long minute.
“They’re my kids, Colt. My blood.”
Con couldn’t get past that one truth, which kept repeating over and over in his mind, and honestly, he didn’t want to. After reading Jackie’s letter the night before, his thoughts hadn’t been able to settle. He hadn’t slept and he was just killing time here at work. God knew there were details of new contracts to work out, but how the hell could he concentrate on that when the bulk of his life was up in the air?
He hadn’t forgiven Jackie for what she’d done. Did he understand why she did it? A part of him did. The cool, rational, logical voice in his mind could even agree with her. But the reality was, emotion was running the show right now. And he couldn’t get past the fact that he’d lost more than a year of his children’s lives. He’d never get it back. He was a visitor in that house near the beach. A stranger. And that just burned him.
Behind him, there was a wide window, offering a spectacular view of the beach and the ocean, but it might as well have been a blank wall for all the attention he’d paid it that morning. Sunlight streamed through the tinted glass, painting the office a soft gold that glittered in his twin’s eyes as Colt stared at Connor, waiting.
Finally, Con spoke again. “You know that Sage hates taking a bath?”
“What?” Colt frowned at him.
“Sage. He hates the water. Why? I should know that, but I don’t.” He pushed out of his desk chair and stalked around the perimeter of his office. It was a plush room with thick carpeting, framed photographs of their many adventure sites dotting the walls and comfortable furniture for clients. “Sadie loves taking a bath. She splashes and squeals.” He smiled to himself, remembering. “Sam couldn’t care less either way, but Sage...” He shook his head, then whipped a look at Colt. “Did something happen to him? Did he get scared? Of what? By who?”
“You’re overreacting, Con,” his twin said. “Kids are wildly unpredictable. Who the hell knows what they’re thinking or why they react to things the way they do? Trust me on this. Like, for instance, right now, Reid won’t wear shoes.” He laughed to himself. “Takes ’em off the minute you put them on him. It’s driving Penny nuts. But maybe it’s because last week he walked through a deep puddle and his sneakers were squishing. I think he hated the sound so much, it creeped him out.”
“See?” Con jabbed a finger toward his twin as fresh fury erupted inside him. “That’s what I’m saying. Reid has an issue and you know why! Sage hates water, I don’t have a clue.” He threw his hands up in frustration. “I’ve known my own kids for three lousy days. I’m a damn stranger to them, Colt. They’re nuts about Dina and they don’t even know me.”
“That’ll change,” Colt told him.
“Damn straight it will.” Con jammed his hands into his pockets and rocked back on his heels. The wheels were in motion now and things should start happening.
After reading Jackie’s letter, he’d been up all night. And this morning, he’d made his decision. He’d called his lawyers, telling them to put together whatever it was they had to do to get him custody of the triplets. But his lawyer had told him that Dina had good ground to stand on, too. She was the legal guardian. The kids’ aunt. They were settled with her. But it didn’t have to stay that way.
“You’ve already called Murdoch and Sons in on this, haven’t you?”
Con shot his brother a sly smile. “Best team of lawyers in the state.”
“Yeah, I know,” Colt said, standing up to face his brother. “But think about it for a minute. Remember how mad you were when Dina went through a lawyer and sued you instead of just talking to you?”
“Yeah, I remember.” His scowl deepened. “This is different.”
“Always is,” Colt muttered, then said more loudly, “You can’t cut Dina Cortez out of this, Con.”
He shot his twin a hard look. “What makes you think I’m considering it?”
Colt laughed shortly. “Because I know you? Because when I found out about Penny and the twins, that was my first thought?”
“Okay.” Con rubbed the back of his neck. Maybe he had thought of it, but he was willing to be reasonable about all this. If she fought him on custody, though, he wouldn’t make any promises.This would all be a lot easier if he didn’t want Dina so much. Every time he saw her it was harder to keep his hands off her—but this was about the kids and he had to keep focused.
“You think you can pull it off.” Colt shook his head. “Delusional. That usually doesn’t happen until you start losing sleep because of the kids invading your life. But kudos for managing on your own.”
“Funny.”
“Seriously, Con, she’s not just their guardian, she’s their aunt. You really think she’s going to just walk away because it would be easier on you?”
“No.” He sat back and shook his head. “The last thing she wants to do is make anything easy on me.”
“There you go. This means you’re going to have to find a way to work with her—or around her.”
Con slanted him a look. “As in...”
Colt shrugged, “As in, you could try buying her off.”
Frowning, Connor thought about that for a minute or two.
He’d seen her house. It was too small and gave every indication that money was tight. According to his lawyer, her catering business was barely above water. He knew she couldn’t afford to take care of the babies on her own, and he wasn’t about to settle for being nothing more than a monthly check in the lives of his kids.
According to the King family lawyer, the best thing for him to do, as far as a custody hearing went, was to become an everyday part of the children’s lives. To stake a claim, basically. Well, that worked for Con. He just had to figure out the best way to go about it.
The easiest way, of course, would be to bring the triplets to his place. He already had his housekeeper setting up a temporary nursery in one of the guest rooms. A more permanent room was in the works, too. Their cousins Rafe, Nick and Gavin owned King Construction and Con was going to have them build a full nursery suite for the triplets as soon as possible. Meanwhile, the rest of Con’s house was being babyproofed as well. He’d seen what Colt and Penny had gone through at their house, making sure everything was safe for a set of curious twins, so he had a good idea of what was needed.
The obstacle to overcome would be Dina. But he had an idea on