Chapter 85

Very long day had been an underestimation of the highest order. Jon pulled up to his driveway to find Dorothea’s SUV waiting in her old parking spot. He’d been trying to do damage control for the better part of four hours.

He’d taken a ride to the Channel 7 studio and bribed an acquaintance into letting him see the tape after he signed a waiver not to sue the station. He couldn’t figure out why he needed to sign a paper against the freedom of speech, but did it anyway.

What he should have done was sign a waiver against doing Charlotte Burke bodily harm. She’d skewed what would have been an innocent interview into a carefully edited piece of trash making Tessa look like a simpering groupie that had won the jackpot.

“Son of a bitch,” he muttered and slammed his car into park. Of course the topper had been the six different calls from his mother demanding information on the mystery woman that had been introduced to the general public before she’d heard about her.

He could own up to cowardice there and had let each call go to voice mail. Listening to the increasingly heated messages had been more than enough. He let his head drop back onto his headrest and blew out a long breath.

He’d known a simple life had been pretty much out of the question around the age of twenty-three. A little over twenty years later and it didn’t seem to be lessening in any way. All he wanted was to keep his kids happy, healthy and safe. Finding Tessa had been a bonus as far as he was concerned. He had tons of things in his life to make up for his crazy life.

He had to remember that, he told himself as he walked inside. He headed to the kitchen where Dot always felt the most comfortable. He sighed when he saw the back door open. Lottie wasn’t back from her holiday yet so the house was empty save for his chain-smoking ex-wife.

She was pacing along the flagstone patio. “Shit,” he muttered and opened the door wider. “Hey, Dot.”

She jammed her cigarette butt into the ever present pail of sand on the patio. “Do not, ‘hey Dot’ me you asshole.”

She brushed by him and he winced as his shoulder blade drove into the doorjamb. Oh yeah, this was going to be an excellent discussion. He rolled his shoulder and closed the door. “I know this isn’t the most ideal situation, but it’s not that bad.”

“Ideal? Nothing about this is as we discussed.”

She came at him and he backed up a step. He hadn’t even seen this level of rage in her even when she’d asked him for the divorce. “We haven’t discussed anything yet.”

She drilled her finger into his chest. “I specifically told you I did not want my children near your new girlfriend.”

“The kids don’t know that Tessa’s my girlfriend. We went for the story hour just like about thirty other families did.”

Her brown eyes darkened dangerously. “That’s just semantics Jon, you brought them there to meet her even after I explicitly forbade it.”

His muscles tensed and his spine straightened. “For one thing you will never forbid me to do something with our children. And I do mean our, this my kids crap is going to stop. We make the decisions about what happens to our family like we always have.”

“Like you’ve ever made a decision about our kids.” She said and made sure to sneer through the word our. “I’ve made all the decisions since they were born, Jon. So you can just jump down off that high horse you have about this sudden joint family decisions shit.”

“Hey,” he said on a near roar. “We’ve always made the decisions together when it came to the hard stuff.” He could feel the control bubbling over and forced himself to pull back.

“And when it came to the safety and protection of our children I never had to remind you to be careful. But now you are thinking more with your dick than your brain. It’s a new development and one I never had to worry about before.” She crossed her arms and cracked a knuckle in her hand.

He let the dick comment pass. He knew she was angry. “You don’t know a thing about my relationship with Tessa and I resent the fact that you think I don’t know what’s best for my kids.”

“You used to,” she said dryly.

“This isn’t some girlfriend that will be gone in a week, Dorothea. I’m in love with this woman.”

“You’re what?” she reeled back as if she’d been slapped.

“I love her. I didn’t think it would ever happen again in my life but it did.”

“Now I know it’s your dick that’s talking. You’ve barely known her for…” she fumbled for a time frame because she just didn’t know.

“A little over two weeks,” he said tightly.

“Infatuation does not lead into forever Jon. She’ll be yesterday’s news when you get over the afterglow,” she said bitterly.

He knew the difference between a fling and a woman he was in love with, but how did you tell our ex-wife that without ripping out her heart? He’d loved Dorothea with a single minded determination for most of his young adult life and well into his thirties. But he needed someone that would love him back just as strongly. And while he loved Dot’s independence she grew so far away from him that she didn’t need him at all. “I’m taking things slow with Tessa,” he said gently.

‘Oh yeah it sure sounds like it.”

“I have no intention of molding Tessa into a stepmother role right away.”

“That will happen over my dead body,” Dot said icily.

Jon’s molars clicked together. “It’s going to happen one day. If God forbid, something happens and I don’t have Tessa in my life I will eventually find someone that I want to introduce my kids to.”

“After careful discussion and a long period of-“

“What? Deliberation? I’m not going to shut off that part of my life forever, Dot. I want to share Tessa with the kids someday. We’ve talked about it-“

“Oh you’ve talked about it with your slu-“

Jon’s eyes went flat. “Don’t you ever,” his voice went clipped with anger as he cut her off. “Call her that.” He heaved in a deep breath and stepped back from her. “Tessa and I have discussed a lot of things when it comes to her and I as a couple.”

“Evidently not well enough since she couldn’t stop talking about you to the reporter on Christmas Eve.”

“Okay now who’s being ridiculous? You know more than anyone how the press has their own agenda. The raw footage of that interview was all about her store. Char was just trying to score ratings.”

“Char is it? Another one of your girlfriends?”

“Jesus,” Jon growled. “Just what has happened to us that you’d believe any of that about me?”

“I don’t know who you are anymore, Jon.” Her eyes were so flat when she continued. “All I know is that you won’t be seeing your kids with that woman around. All visits will happen at my house.”

Rage threatened to choke him. “You’re going to keep my kids from me?”

“Stability is what they need now, not a father who can’t think straight. When you get your head out of the clouds you’ll realize I was right.” She gathered her purse and coat.

Jon jerked her coat out of her hands. “I said nothing about introducing the kids to Tessa any time soon.”

“I can’t trust you to keep your word. You’ve already gone back on it once.” She took her coat from his numb fingers and let herself out.

She was going to keep his kids away from him? He rubbed the heel of his hand over his chest and struggled to breathe.