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“Mommy!!”
My little one on Jade’s lap jumps off, tripping on her own two feet as she runs toward me.
I drop to my knees, the weight of the last month taking me down.
But when I open my arms and Lia jumps into them, everything else disappears.
“Mommy, I missed you. I missed you. I missed you, Mommy.”
I smile into her black hair, inhaling her like a drug. She always does that thing of repeating the same sentence in different variations and hearing her do that makes me feel like I’m home.
I instinctively wrap her into one arm, keeping the other one wide open as I hear small steps coming our way. Livie might not show excitement the same way her twin does, but she still runs toward me, falling into my arms in silence. All I need is her sigh of relief to feel whole.
Finally. Finally, I’m reunited with my family.
Finally, my heart is fixed.
Except for that one tiny, fissured spot with Nate’s name on it.
38
KAYLA
Lost - Ollie
I spend the whole day with my daughters. The whole day and then the rest of the week. But then that week turns into two, into four, and into a month.
And then a month turns into six weeks.
The whole time I refuse to participate in any conversation other than ones that include the wellbeing of Lia and Livie. Caden took care of having the bedrooms in our old house redone. When I walk in today, with Livie on my hip and holding Lia by the hand as she walks next to me, I can’t even smell the burn anymore.
“Mommy, it’s so pretty! Do you see, Mommy? It’s so pretty. So pretty.”
I laugh and let her hand go as she runs around the house.
“Cade, you didn’t have to have the floors and everything redone. I thought we agreed on just making the house safe and livable.”
He cocks an eyebrow at me and pulls at my ponytail. “That carpet was not livable, believe me.”
I huff. I try to put Livie down, but she holds on tighter, so I shift her to my other hip. “I don’t know how I’ll pay you back,” I admit. “I have nothing.”
That’s not true. I have the ten thousand I stole from Nate, but I’m saving that for whatever I need for the girls over the next few months while I get back on my feet. And I have the hotels Nate put in my name. I have fifty fucking keys of cocaine coming to them every week. For now, Emma is working with all that. She’s collecting the money, handling the dealers. Sam is letting her because she told him I was out of the game, but behind his back, she promised to give me shares of everything.
I’m surprised he’s letting me live at all, but I can’t focus on that. I have to focus on anything else but the things that remind me of Nate.
Either way, I can’t touch that money. It doesn’t feel right. It doesn’t belong to me. It belongs to my dead husband.
I swallow thickly, running a hand over my forehead.
“Kay, it’s fine. Billie and I can afford it, okay? She’s a UFC fighter, for fuck’s sake.”
“Great,” I bite out. “The kid I beat up and left for dead when I was a teenager just paid for my house to be redone. I’ve officially reached rock bottom.”
He rolls his eyes, but I don’t want to talk anymore. I walk into the living room, nudging Livie’s cheek with my nose. “Do you like it, sweetie? We can live in our old home again.”
“She doesn’t talk, Kayla. Give up.” My mom’s cigarette-broken voice makes my spine stiffen.
She’s still here “helping,” she says. Apparently, she doesn’t trust me with the girls. Not after I had to leave them with her. I think the truth is, she has nothing, especially no money, and she was surviving on me sending her money to take care of the twins. So now she’s here.
