Matter of Time (19 page)

Brianna shrugged, obviously not thrilled, but willing to go along, possibly to escape the strange undercurrent that started flowing through the room with Maggie’s bizarre apology.

Maggie was more enthusiastic than Brianna but less so than Luke.

“Wait,” Lizbeth said, grabbing the stack of extra keycards from the desk. “I got each of you a key so you can come and go from the room whenever you want. If you want to stay up here and watch TV rather than swim, it’s fine with me.” Glancing at Logan, she said, “If it’s all right with your dad.”

They all glanced from her to the cards in her hand to Logan and back to her. Their expressions lightened and each one thanked her as they stepped forward for their key. She couldn’t be sure, since she had zero experience with kids, but she had the feeling she’d just gained a favorable tick mark in the pro-vs.-con column.

“You guys go ahead,” Logan said. “Lizbeth and I will be down in a minute.”

He obviously wanted a minute alone with her, so after the door shut behind the kids, Lizbeth sat on the sofa and waited for Logan to fill her in on what happened at home with the kids. Now that they were alone, he seemed more agitated than before and appeared to be collecting his thoughts as he drew back the curtain and stared out the window.

After a moment, he said, “I don’t think I’ll ever be able to lay eyes on Bobbi Jo again. And I’m certain I can never be in the same room with her.”

Oh no.
Lizbeth’s breathing grew choppy and her heartbeat erratic as she asked, “You’re sure she did it?”

He made a sound she thought was meant to be a laugh, but it sounded more like a growl. “Yeah, I’m sure.” He turned, and the anguish on his face nearly broke Lizbeth’s heart. “But there’s more.”

More?
“What do you mean?”

His anguish flashed to fury, and the tight clench of his jaw as well as the trembling in his hands had her rising from the sofa and going to him. “Logan. What happened?”

“While finding out Brianna is on birth control pills,”—something he was struggling with, judging by the tone of his voice and tightly clenched teeth—“I also found out Bobbi Jo quit taking hers to intentionally get pregnant and trap me into marrying her all those years ago.”

Oh my God.
Lizbeth’s mouth fell open in shock, and she felt like someone punched her in the face, heart, and gut all at the same time. She stumbled backward, and when the backs of her legs hit the coffee table, she collapsed onto it and stared at Logan in shocked silence.

A maelstrom of emotions roared through her all at once, causing black dots to flash before her eyes and her head to spin. She dropped her head into her hands and took several deep breaths, waiting for the storm to pass, but it only continued to grow.

Anger unlike anything she’d ever experienced before tore through her gut as she thought about all the years she and Logan lost because of a selfish scheme. How could someone do something like that to a person they supposedly loved? The anger quickly gave way to sadness—for herself, for him, for his children—and uncontrollable tears burst to the surface.

“Hey,” Logan said from directly in front of her. “Are you okay?”

She couldn’t speak. She couldn’t do anything but fall forward and press her forehead to his chest as he wrapped his arms around her and cooed soothing words into her ear. After several moments, when she finally had herself under control, she cleared her throat to make sure it would work and lowered her hands to search his face. “That’s why Maggie apologized.”

He closed his eyes and nodded. “Yeah.”

“That poor, sweet child. She needs to understand there’s not a need for her to apologize for her mother’s actions. None of them need to do that.” She closed her eyes and drew in a shuddering breath. “Are you sure about this? I mean, how did you make this discovery without talking to Bobbi Jo? And why did she go the entire pregnancy and not tell you if that was her intent?”

“Brianna’s actually the one who figured it out. Bobbi Jo told her to never quit taking her pills to intentionally get pregnant. She said she knew someone who did it once and it didn’t turn out the way she planned. And I think she did try to tell me. Remember, she called me a hundred times after you and I started dating, but I wouldn’t take her calls. I eventually blocked her number, so I guess she finally gave up and decided to raise the kid on her own. But then I ran into her at the grocery store, and…” He shrugged. “I’m not sure. Hell, at this point, I’m not sure about anything.”

Lizbeth’s heart ached for Logan. For herself. For the pain and suffering they’d both experienced, and for all the years they’d lost. For the children they never had together. But he had three beautiful children—children who needed him more than ever—and he needed to focus on them.

“It sucks that we lost so much time because of her selfish cruelty, but you have three children because of her.”

He nodded and tried to smile but fell short of the mark. “That’s what I’ve been telling myself for the past hour.” He worked his head from side to side to loosen his neck muscles. “This is going to make things even more difficult for us.”

“Yeah, I know. But we’ll work it out. You said yourself there’s nothing we can’t handle if we stick together.”

*

The rest of the evening passed without any major life-altering events. Thank God. Lizbeth didn’t think any of them could handle so much as a crumb of additional grief. The kids swam for a while. Then everyone went back to her room and ordered pizza. Luke and Maggie watched a movie in the bedroom. Brianna did what all teenagers do—wore her thumbs out on her phone. And Logan and Lizbeth tried to watch a movie in the living room, but they were so preoccupied with their own thoughts, neither of them had any idea what the show was even about.

Around midnight, Logan packed up the kids and headed home. He invited Lizbeth to come with him but after brief discussion, grudgingly agreed it would be best to give the kids time to gradually adjust to her being around. She promised to be there bright and early, although they didn’t discuss a specific time.

Apparently, bright and early to Logan meant six o’clock, because that’s what time he called wanting to know how long it would take her to get there. She crawled out of bed, took a quick shower and dressed, then headed off to find a grocery store. After getting the necessary ingredients to prepare pancakes from scratch, along with bacon, she plugged his address into her GPS, and less than an hour after getting his wake-up call, she pulled up to his house.

The sight of him standing at the front door, wearing unbuttoned low-slung jeans and a faded gray T-shirt, shot a thrill through her system while also tugging at her heartstrings. How long would she have to wait to see him like this every day?

She grabbed the groceries from the backseat of her SUV and made her way to the front door. His mischievous grin as he held a finger to his mouth—the universal sign for shh—had her smiling and wondering what he was up to.

Without saying a word, he took the bags from her hand and turned to silently walk down the hallway toward his kitchen. She scanned his house, taking in as many details as possible as she tiptoed along behind. He didn’t speak, so neither did she as he put the cold items into the refrigerator, then grabbed her hand and practically dragged her down a short hallway to his bedroom. Once inside, he shut and locked the door behind them and pulled her into his arms to kiss her silly.

When he finally pulled back to look at her, she whispered, “Is it okay to speak now?”

His grin widened, and in a mostly normal voice, he said, “That depends on what you have to say.”

The sexy, teasing glint in his eyes had her laughing while also cutting her gaze to his bed. “What’s going on here?”

His eyes darkened as his expression heated. “It’s Saturday. That means the kids will sleep until noon. Maybe even later.”

“Mmm…” She leaned in and kissed the side of his neck and enjoyed the moan that rose from his chest as she moved up to nibble on his ear. “I assume you have plans for the next couple hours?”

“Absolutely.” He stepped behind her and helped her remove her coat, and after laying it over the back of a chair, he took her hand and pulled her to the bed.

“I’ve never had sex with a father while his children were asleep in the house.”

His eyebrows rose, and he seemed pleased at her confession. Then his face fell and the corners of his mouth turned down in a frown. “I hope that’s not a problem for you, because that’s your new norm.” She caught the flicker of fear in his eyes as he studied her and said, “Right?”

After toeing off her shoes, she crawled into the center of the bed and patted the mattress next to her. “Come. Sit next to me.” When his shoulders tensed and his fear escalated, she quickly added, “If you’re concerned I changed my mind about us overnight… I haven’t. But we do have a lot to talk about.”

He flopped onto the edge of the bed and ran his hand over his face, showing how tired he was—emotionally and physically.

She crawled over next to him, wrapped her hand around his cheek, and turned his head so he was forced to look at her. “I love you. I’m not going anywhere.”

At hearing his own words repeated back to him, a small smile touched his lips, but worry still filled his eyes.

“Our plan for this weekend was to figure out a definitive game plan, so let’s do that. Right now. And then…” She ran her finger down the side of his neck to his chest. “We can get on with your planned events.”

“I love you, Lizbeth. More than you’ll ever know.” After a moment, he said, “I don’t think I’ve ever hated anyone before, but I can say with absolute sincerity I
hate
Bobbi Jo.” He shook his head and sighed with disgust. “I still can’t believe she intentionally got pregnant and stole all those years from us. Not to mention burned down her house while our daughter was inside.”

“You can’t believe it because you’re a good, honest person who would never do something like that. Your idea of loving someone is to make sure they’re safe and protected. Her actions are truly beyond your realm of comprehension. But it appears that’s what happened, and either way, we lost those years.
But…
we have a second chance, so let’s figure out how to make the most of it while also dealing with the new circumstances of you being a full-time dad.”

He turned so his back was to the headboard, stretched out his legs, and reached for her hand. Stroking his thumb back and forth across her palm, he said, “That development is causing my brain to work overtime. I’m afraid it might burn up before I sort through everything that’s going to entail.”

She stroked her free hand down his leg in a soothing, non-sexual way. “Two heads are better than one, so let me help.”

His eyes filled with love and gratitude, and he swallowed a couple times but didn’t speak, simply nodded and kept up that rhythmic stroke of his thumb.

“Is there any way to modify your travel schedule, or do you need to be at all the races?”

He shook his head. “Someone from our company needs to be at all of them, but it doesn’t have to be me. I emailed the management staff overnight and told them we needed to meet first thing Monday morning. I didn’t go into details, but I did tell them we would need to restructure so someone else could take over as point person at the races. I also emailed Steve Vex and told him I needed to step away from the camp for a while and asked if we could meet Monday afternoon.”

“That’s great. It sounds like you’ve already gotten a big jump on things.” Narrowing her eyes, she took in the dark circles under his as well as the stress lines at the corners. “Did you sleep at all last night?”

He scratched his forehead. “Yeah, a little.” Smiling sheepishly, he added, “Just don’t ask how much.”

Going from part-time to full-time dad in less than twenty-four hours would cause anyone’s mind to melt down, but Logan was handling it like he did everything else in his life: head on and without hesitation.

Biting down on the corner of her lip, she took a deep breath and prepared to dive into the next issue. “It sounds like you don’t need help sorting through anything work related.”

“Work isn’t my biggest concern.” He shifted wary eyes to her. “I need to know this doesn’t change things with us.” The depth of the emotion shimmering in his eyes—fear, worry, love—nearly knocked the breath out of her.

“I told you last night I would move to Charlotte, and nothing has changed. Your life—your business, the kids, everything—is here. My family’s in Riverside, but I can go back and visit anytime, and they can come here. Mother and Miranda would love to come shopping in Charlotte, I’m sure. My business is there, but I can grow it more here than there. But most importantly,
you’re
here. That means my life is here too.”

His eyes slid closed and he drew in a deep, shuddering breath.

“It’ll take a while for the kids to warm up to having me around, but I can help with them as much as they’ll let me. And I can help you adjust to being a full-time dad.” She tilted her head to the side and studied him. “Do you know how to cook?”

He laughed and shook his head. “Not a lick.”