Page 74 of The Dating Charade

But—and here was the big one—he had no other choice.

So, if children were her archenemies, if that was her authentic opinion, far be it from him to chain her down just for his sake.

He swung into his parking spot and went up the stairs, his featherlight tennis shoes feeling more like tactical boots trudging through swampy waters. By the time he reached the top stair, he might as well have fought a mile against a river’s waist-deep current. The string lights framing his neighbor’s door looked dull to him. The large red bow on the wreath drooped as if it, too, wanted to give up on the holiday.

All right, he thought, not give up. But still.

He shuffled through his keys, trying to muster the energy to see the kids again. Because once that door opened, if any of them were awake, there would be no time for private thoughts, no moments to brood, no seconds to pity himself or complain. It was just 170-mile winds of twins; the only thing he’d be doing was hanging on tight and trying not to get tossed into the hurricane.

He waited, but a sudden burst of energy didn’t come. Home hours early with nowhere to go, he had no choice but to turn the doorknob.

And walk straight into Trina.

“Trina?” He stepped back and looked down to the plastic bag at her feet. “How . . . how long have you been here?”

Thoughts whooshed in on him. Trina had returned. She’d come back. She was standing here. She was sorry for dumping the kids on him, of course, and was about to jump in with apologies. Admit her life was out of control—there was no way she could deny it now. She’d have to ’fess up to it, and then, then they could have a realistic talk about rehab. It wouldn’t take that long, maybe a few months, but eventually she’d get out, get a job, take the kids . . .

Take the kids.

Freedom. He would be the fun uncle he was meant to be—

She put up her hand.

“Don’t say anything, Jett. Don’t. I’m just here to get them.”

But whatever she had expected his response to be, he was certain it wasn’t for him to kick the door shut behind him. “Over my dead body you are.”

They stared each other down. Him with hands on hips, chest starting to pant, the same stance he tried on his own mother when he was fifteen. (It didn’t work then, either.) Her with skinny jeans hanging loosely off her hips. Her dyed hair stripped at the roots, a thick coat of malnourished gray aging her beyond her mere twenty-eight years. She sucked in a deep breath, her collarbones rising from the thin layer of pale skin like a wishbone ready to be snapped.

It wasn’t she who was snapping, though, but him.

“Where the heck have you been?” He was tired, so tired, of tiptoeing around her. “You scared your kids to death.”

“I knew you were coming back.” She said it as if concluding the conversation, moving past him and toward the hall.

He reached out and grabbed her wrist. “Trina. That is no excuse and you know it.”

His last words emphasized the truth, the shared memories of an unsupervised childhood—particularly the fresh-colored scar along her jawline serving as the daily reminder of the two-story fall out the window when she was five years old. Guilt found him every time he looked at it, always aware that though only six, he had been there, had gotten her to sit on the sill with him, had experienced the horror of seeing her suddenly explode through a screen that, to his child eyes, looked like a concrete wall only moments before. He’d never forget the horror of thinking she’d died that day, seeing her body laid out on the grass below.

But instead of stilling her, of making her remember, she shook off his hand as though he’d tried to capture her instead. Her face grew indignant, her neck red. “Get out of my way, Jett. I can take my kids if I want.”

“Take them where, exactly? Last time you were here you had no place to go.”

“I found an apartment.”

“Where?”

She lifted her chin. “Beaver Run.”

Jett shook his head, knowing exactly the shoddy complex she was referring to. The very thought of Dakota skipping down the cracked sidewalk littered with cut glass, curls flying, made his stomach ball up. “If that’s really where you want to go, fine. But you’d better go ahead and lease a one-bedroom.”

Her eyes were starting to bulge, the explosion imminent.

“Well, what did you think was going to happen after you left them here, Trina?” He held out his hands. “That I was just going to turn them over to you as if nothing happened? Help you load up them up in their car seats? You aren’t in a position to keep them safe right now. For their sakes, and your own, you need to take a good look at yourself and get clean.”

Trina put a shaky hand behind her ear. Her voice was tense, tight. “I’m fine, Jett. I’ve taken care of them just fine for three years.”

No. She wasn’t fine. Nothing was.