The Baby Bonanza by Jacqueline Diamond

Author:Jacqueline Diamond
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2014-10-14T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

Angered by Lucky’s arrogance, Zora avoided him over the weekend. She kept busy exchanging photos and messages with Zady, and went grocery shopping with Keely, although the nurse’s insistence that she buy organic foods ran up the bill.

It was more than Lucky’s haughty attitude that disturbed her, she realized after a second night of troubled sleep. In her dreams, her angry father raged at her, Zady and their mom. After his sudden death from a heart attack when she was twenty-two, Zora had pushed those ugly memories aside, preferring to dwell on her father’s kinder, more loving moments. But the discovery of this rigid, unforgiving side of Lucky’s nature had reawakened them.

Not that she hadn’t expected this, at some level. After all, he insisted on the perfect family situation, including, presumably, a wife who arrived without baggage. No messy old relationships, and no children.

Yet, foolishly, she’d allowed herself to count on Lucky, to venture close to loving him, as if he might find it in his heart to change.

Why do I keep falling for the wrong guy?

If she entered another intimate relationship, Zora vowed to do it with her eyes open. Until then, once she discovered a man’s fatal flaw, she’d distance herself from him, no matter how much her heart ached. And Lucky’s fatal flaw was his intolerance for other people’s flaws.

On Monday, she consulted Edmond regarding child support. He promised to file for half of Zora’s unreimbursed medical and other maternity expenses.

“Once the babies are born, their father will be entitled to visitation and possibly shared custody,” Edmond advised from behind the desk in his fifth-floor office. “That doesn’t necessarily mean he gets physical custody half the time, but he will have an equal say in decisions about their care.”

Much as she would hate sharing the children with their unworthy father, Zora supposed that she could hardly refuse contact. “He can’t take them away from me, though, can he?”

“That would be extremely unusual,” Edmond assured her. “He would have to prove that being around you endangers the children, such as if you were using drugs.”

“I’d have to prove that for him, too, to block shared custody?”

“That’s right.” He adjusted his glasses. “In a case like this, it’s tempting to try to cut him out. However, the courts have ruled that it’s in a child’s best interest for him or her to have a relationship with both parents.”

Privately, Zora doubted it. However, she understood that laws and legal rulings had to apply to a wide range of cases.

When Lucky drove her home that evening, she suppressed the instinct to spill out what she’d learned from Edmond. She hadn’t shared Betsy’s confidence about Andrew’s latest ploy, either.

He’s judgmental and pitiless. The words played through her mind on a repeating loop, warning her to maintain a distance.

So when the silence weighed too heavily, she broached the merits of organic foods, a topic that interested him. Lucky explained that he was vegetarian more for health reasons than for philosophical ones, although sparing animals’ lives was a bonus.

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