This Child Is Mine by Mildred Colvin

Author:Mildred Colvin
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781475160901
Published: 2012-04-07T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter Ten

Jon helped Beth carry the girls into the house and deposit them in the family room. He stepped to the door and turned. “I’ll take the puppy back to Brad’s now. Please, tell Mrs. Garrett I won’t be here for dinner.”

Beth nodded and watched him walk away. She ran over the events of the afternoon and could think of nothing that might have caused him to be angry with her. Had she said something to triggered a memory or that he might have taken the wrong way? She didn’t think so. Maybe the problem wasn’t hers. In any event, she wouldn’t let it take away from a wonderful time with the girls. She ignored the voice in her mind that said, “And with Jon.”

Somehow during the afternoon, she’d stopped thinking of him as Jonathan McDuff, her employer and competition for her girls. As they’d relaxed together and played with the girls and puppy, he’d become Jon in her mind. She lifted her chin. So what? If her feelings toward him had changed to friendship, he’d have to deal with his own problems. She refused to go back to the more formal name of Jonathan.

She and Mary ate Sunday dinner with two wound-up little girls. Mary seemed unconcerned by Jon’s absence, but Beth’s gaze continually wandered to the empty chair at the head of the table. Even with Mary’s friendly chatter and the babies’ antics, she couldn’t keep her mind from Jon. While Mary cleaned up from their meal, Beth took the girls upstairs.

Jon’s nightly routine with Lexie had become hers and Stevie’s as well. Beth put the girls in the tub. Lexie looked up with questioning eyes. “Dada?”

“You miss him, too, don’t you baby?” Her heart sank. “Dada will be back soon.”

Stevie hit the water causing a splash and mimicked Lexie. “Dada!”

As she dodged the water, Beth’s heart dropped even farther. “No, Stevie.” She spoke harsher than normal. “We don’t splash water.”

Stevie looked at her with a solemn face. “Dada bye-bye.”

“No.” He isn’t your dada. She couldn’t say that. Of course he was Stevie’s daddy. Tears stung her eyes, and she wiped them away. She couldn’t fight the inevitable. Stevie would learn to call Jon “Daddy.” It was only right that she should if they were going to live in the same house. She should never have brought Stevie here in the first place. She should have known it would cause more problems than she could handle.

Beth finished the girls’ baths and put them to bed then went into her own room, leaving the door ajar. She fell across the bed and thought of Jon and how he played with the babies. His love for both was evident in everything he did and said. She didn’t want to compete with him, yet every time she thought she was over the petty jealousy, it sprang up again.

Two short weeks in the McDuff family home and she couldn’t love Lexie any more than she did at that moment. Probably Jon felt the same for Stevie.

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