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Five minutes had passed.
I laid down on the nasty rooftop and stared at the sky. Why? Why had he lied to me? Why wasn’t I enough? I was never enough. As I watched the twinkling stars, I realized something very important. Hell, it might even be the world’s best-kept secret. I was fucking worth it. I didn’t know who the fuck this Ari was, but he wasn’t one goddamn bit better than me. Landon was worth fighting for.
I sat up. Whoever Ari was, he was about to have a fight on his hands. I’d never had to want for any material things in my life. I guess it was time for me to realize that anything worth having was worth fighting for.
My phone was going wild. Good. Let him come find me. I might have started out being nothing more than a job to Landon, but it hadn’t ended up that way. Nobody could fake the passion we’d shared. I popped my neck and whispered, “May the best man win.”
When I turned around, I was shocked to see I was no longer alone. Frowning, I asked, “How did you find me?”
“Does it really matter?”
I guessed it didn’t.*****Landon“Goddammit, Samantha! Put Arizona back on the phone right fucking now!” I roared. “I can’t believe you’d allow this clusterfuck to go on. These are the same fuckers that tried to kidnap him, Sam! They. Tried. To. Kidnap. Him. Am I getting through to you?”
“I rushed a DNA test, Landon. The boy is Ari’s twin brother. DNA doesn’t lie.” I could tell that she was both stressed and pissed. Who gave a fuck? So was I. My son had just accused me of keeping a brother from him and one of my best friends seemed to be supporting the bullshit story.
“Neither do I,” I hissed in fury. “I don’t care what’s been said or what your fucking DNA tests conclude, I’ve never lied about Ari having a twin brother. Fuck, Sam, you’ve known me forever. You can’t believe this about me.”
To be perfectly honest, I didn’t give two fucks about what Sam believed but she was my friend and, more importantly, Micah’s godmother, so I was attempting to go the extra mile with her. As far as I was concerned, there was nothing left to discuss regarding this bullshit. I’d never in my life lied to Ari about the facts surrounding his birth, even if it would have been prettier than the truth at times. His mother had deserted him and me, end of story. It was ugly but, it was the facts. Was it my fault she’d left us? Probably. Would I have given her the world to keep her from leaving a baby who needed his mother? Fuck, yeah; I would have.
She hadn’t given me the opportunity, though. She’d simply vanished. Given birth to our child—the baby I would have sworn she’d loved by the way she’d cradled her over-sized belly and smiled in a beautiful way I’d never seen her bless another person with.
She’d been so large and uncomfortable, yet she’d always been smiling…up until the end. Near the end, as she gained an excessive amount of weight and been put on bed rest, the smiles had become fewer and further in between. A sadness would creep across her face when she hadn’t known I was watching. Being a blind fool, I’d simply blamed it on nervousness with the upcoming delivery. Little had I known she was probably planning her own disappearance. Had she caressed her belly, spoken to the child she would never hold?
“Are you still there, Landon?” Samantha asked quietly. “Finished screaming at me? If so, then let me tell you what I’ve been able to find out so far. Your son, who I might add is as stubborn and headstrong as you are, maybe even more so, won’t stop ranting and raving long enough to listen to anything I have to say. It’s taking everything my brother has on his personal menu to keep him occupied enough to stop him from boarding a plane to Russia.”
“Russia? What the fuck? Why Russia?” This conversation got more and more confusing with each passing word. So much confusion that I couldn’t begin to keep up.
“Apparently, from what I’ve been able to gather, Russia is where your beloved ex-wife went after giving birth.” I heard her take a deep breath. “After giving birth to two babies, Landon. Twins.”
“Wh-what?” I whispered.
“It gets worse. Apparently, her lover, a Russian billionaire, bankrolled a deal with the hospital staff. They waited until you were on assignment out of the country so there would be no way you could get back and interfere with their plans. They also chose a night when they knew the hospital would be short-staffed due to several of the nightshift employees winning a free cruise to the Bahamas. Yeah, he paid for that, as well. After that, they paid off the four employees that were involved with the birth. Paperwork was doctored to make it look like she’d only given birth to one child and then walked away from the hospital. She refused to look at either child—made her lover make the decision. Ari was left behind while his twin, Montana, went with them.”
