MINE 2 Read online

  But everyone’s happy, and for once I feel like maybe things are finally going to start going my way. I mean, Lucian has to so totally fall in love with me again. He’d looked too overwhelmed at the news that I am carrying his kid.

  Plus, well, I’m feeling really positive about things, especially since Ben has taken our news with such enthusiasm and excitement.

  So yeah, feeling really good about shit.

  “I’ll get it,” I mutter when the doorbell rings just as I’m coming back from the bathroom.

  No one hears, thanks to the din of voices and the soft music playing in the background, so I shuffle to the door and pull it open, expecting to see Frank or one of the other security guys, since no one can just show up at the door without going through a freaking twenty step clearance check.

  What I see when I open the door makes me rethink my casual approach to things—yeah, yeah, maybe Luc is right about me needing to be more careful.

  A young girl is standing on the doorstep, her long brown hair a bedraggled mess as she shivers in the late night chill.

  “Hello.”

  Well, what the heck else am I supposed to say? The kid can’t be anything past six, if her small stature is anything to go by, and she’s so wafer-thin and poorly dressed it’s a miracle she’s not turning blue in this weather.

  “Hello, Mum, I’m sorry to disturb, but may I please speak to a Mr Jasper?”

  Check this kid out! Her diction is better than mine was at sixteen, and she’s sporting an accent that reminds me of that kid from Harry Potter, Hermione something… I can’t remember.

  “Uh, sure. Um, how did you get through the gates?” I ask, opening the door to let her inside and out of the rising wind.

  She looks up at me with a set of wise, sad eyes and shrugs.

  “I came through the trees, Mum.”

  Oookaaay.

  “Um, you look cold. I should get you a jacket? And….where are your parents? How… Are you lost?”

  “No, Mum, this is the right address,” she says quietly, giving me a slight smile that’s setting off alarm bells in my head.

  Something about this kid is just weird, and yeah, I know that sounds like me being a bitch, but I can’t help it. She’s come out of nowhere, dressed like a street urchin, and is looking at me so calmly I feel myself pause and look closer.

  “What’s your name, sweetheart?” I ask, stalling a bit.

  For some reason I really don’t want to go into the living room to get Luc, almost as if some strange sixth sense has taken hold and is screaming at me to hold on to whatever happiness I’ve had because shit is about to hit the proverbial fan.

  “Madeline Barker.”

  “Can you tell me what you’re doing here in the middle of the night and all alone, honey? It’s awful late and cold out there to be wandering around without your mom or dad.”

  Her smile, when it comes, knocks the breath right out of my lungs, and I hold up a hand and pull her into the study, wrapping a blanket around her scrawny shoulders before taking a deep breath and walking out to the living room.

  “Lucian, I need you for a second,” I say quietly when my shaky legs finally get me across the room.

  My tone must be telling, because he nods immediately and follows me out, waving off Brody’s suggestive wink as I take a deep breath and push him into the study.

  My eyes never leave his face, not once after I close and lock the door, pointing at the sofa and the almost invisible bundle sitting there.

  “What’s wrong, love? What’s going on?”

  I walk over to the sofa and lower the blanket from around her head, being careful to keep her thin arms tightly wrapped beneath the warmth of the blanket.

  “Here he is, honey.”

  She looks back at him and smiles, breaking my heart even as I feel myself wanting to laugh for the obviousness.

  “Hello, Daddy.”

  # End of Part Two #

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